Protection of Freedoms Act 2012/POPLA - the downside?

andydakin

Our haulage company has just received one of our regular "PCNs" from Parking Eye. Included with it this time was a handy little note from the BPA about the changes to the regulations thanks to the Protection of Freedoms Act 2012. As a company we have been able to use the excuse of not providing details of the driver however it seems that this avenue has now been closed. The only thing this will do is force more of our vehicles to park in lay-bys etc.

I am interested in other haulage company contributors' thoughts on this.

* I'm also expecting plenty of "about time too" type comments. I'm think skinned......

BASFORDLAD

You can continue to ignore them. Nothing changes

AlexisV

You are 'invited' to provide driver details. There is no legal requirement.

Your company should just ignore.

andydakin

AlexisV wrote: »

You are 'invited' to provide driver details. There is no legal requirement.

Your company should just ignore.

That has certainly been the case until now. However the 2012 Act states that after 28 days the parking company can then pass the charge on to the registered keeper. Does that not change the situation?

ManxRed

The charge itself is still unenforceable though.

1. They - in all likelihood - do not have landowner rights which means that cannot offer a contract to park, so cannot pursue in respect of any breach (VCS v HMRC).

2. The sum being sought is not representative of actual losses and hence means that the amount sought is a contractual penalty, which is unenforceable under contract law.

Also note that they can only pass the liability onto the RK under certain circumstances, for example they need to be BPA members, they need to provide all the correct information relating to POPLA on their correspondence, the charge sought needs to be one that the driver was liable for in the first place (which, arguably with the two points I mentioned above, was never the case in the first place) and so on.

Carry on ignoring.

grant_uk

andydakin wrote: »

That has certainly been the case until now. However the 2012 Act states that after 28 days the parking company can then pass the charge on to the registered keeper. Does that not change the situation?

The situation before was that they would only be able to take the driver to court to try and sue for lost revenue. Now they are able to take the registered owner to try and sue for lost revenue.

The shaky ground on which such rarely attempted court cases are made remains as shaky. Until such time as a court case is attempted by a PPC, their threat letters are as empty as they always have been. In the vast, vast majority of cases, they will lose interest after they have sent the usual array of letters and failed to jolt an unsuspecting recipient into a knee-jerk payment.

bargepole

Alternatively, you could write back to the PPC, stating that you will provide the driver details on receipt of a £100 administration fee.

taffy056

bargepole wrote: »

Alternatively, you could write back to the PPC, stating that you will provide the driver details on receipt of a £100 administration fee.

Yes this, or maybe you can't release information of the driver in this case as its against the data protection act, and the driver in question has refused my company permission to pass on his details to somebody or company who is not a statuary authority.

HardWorker2010_2

Andydakin'

I assume you are referring to motorway service areas and their 2 hour rule.

I used to expect my engineeers to respect this rule until one of them accidentally overstayed and CP Plus sent a letter demanding payment of about £80 for a 40 minute overstay. Luckily I found this forum.

My view of the motorway service area operators changed dramatically when it became clear they were actively involved in this scam. This on top of the poor quality and outrageously high prices they charge in their monopoly positions.

I now tell my guys to stop for as long as they need to be safe. I have many letters from PPCs and have ignored them all. Indeed I enjoy it when they arrive knowing that the PPC has just wasted more of their scammed income.

PPCs are nothing more than extortionists, the lowest of the low. They contribute nothing to our country but are intent on being a drain on it. They attempt to leach a living off the honest citizen. They are parasites and should be treated no better than something you would scrape off your shoe.

trisontana

I think we are the only country in Europe that's allows these parasites to infest motorway service areas.