Petition to stop DVLA selling our information

surfboy1

ILW wrote: »

Guess that explains why Sainsburys, Tesco etc are making such massive losses then. Errrr?

I take it from the tone of your post you dont believe me then?
Ok ,fair enough, guess you will just have to check it out for yourself.
The Festival Park, Stoke on Trent.
I am sure there are other retail parks with the same problem as well?

surfboy1

Just found a nice link about this retail park.
http://www.thisisstaffordshire.co.uk/news/SHOPPERS-FACE-163-90-PARKING-FINES/article-2820594-detail/article.html

Stroma

ILW wrote: »

So it appears that major multinational retailers are incapable of setting up a contract that shows any benefit to themselves. That is obviously rubbish.

You are still not getting the parking company make up , are you ?

They make money by putting unrealistic limits on car parks, there is a car park near me with a 3 hour limit with a cinema a bowling alley and a pizza restaurant, if you go for a film and a pizza after you'll get a fake ticket, some films last that long!

Now the only way a parking company will make money is through legitimate people on site using their facilities, so they are ticketing the clients of the businesses. Half this site is empty though as the recession has hit.

I know one of my friends who has closed his business down from there because of the aggressive way the parking company is acting. He has taken his business out of there because his business went down by 20%-30% with the arrival of them. He is now trading from an out of town premises.

ILW

Stroma wrote: »

You are still not getting the parking company make up , are you ?

They make money by putting unrealistic limits on car parks, there is a car park near me with a 3 hour limit with a cinema a bowling alley and a pizza restaurant, if you go for a film and a pizza after you'll get a fake ticket, some films last that long!

Now the only way a parking company will make money is through legitimate people on site using their facilities, so they are ticketing the clients of the businesses. Half this site is empty though as the recession has hit.

I know one of my friends who has closed his business down from there because of the aggressive way the parking company is acting. He has taken his business out of there because his business went down by 20%-30% with the arrival of them. He is now trading from an out of town premises.

So why have the retailers agreed to it?
a parking company cannot just turn up and take over, they need to be given a contract by the landowner, who in turn wishes to get the highest rents from the tenants.
Many of the contracts are with major supermarkets where they are the only business on the site.

ILW

surfboy1 wrote: »

Just found a nice link about this retail park.
http://www.thisisstaffordshire.co.uk/news/SHOPPERS-FACE-163-90-PARKING-FINES/article-2820594-detail/article.html

The link also says that many commuters were using the carpark for the whole day to save paying city centre parking fees.

surfboy1

ILW wrote: »

So why have the retailers agreed to it?
a parking company cannot just turn up and take over, they need to be given a contract by the landowner, who in turn wishes to get the highest rents from the tenants.
Many of the contracts are with major supermarkets where they are the only business on the site.

Some of the supermarkets have parking limits of 1 hour or 90mins for example, but they also invite you to browse around the shop, relax and have a drink and a meal in their resteraunt , (such as the tesco extra at poole near camborne), and then charge you £100 if you dare to stay in there over 1 hour?
It is utter madness.

surfboy1

ILW wrote: »

The link also says that many commuters were using the carpark for the whole day to save paying city centre parking fees.

And how can they prove that?
They could be genuine customers parked there all day, maybe went to the cinema, then bowling ,then for a swim at waterworld, then for a bite to eat at pizza hut, then the weekly shop at morrisons. Who can say?

Half_way

ILW wrote: »

The link also says that many commuters were using the carpark for the whole day to save paying city centre parking fees.

Is that a fact, or some part of a sales tactc dreamed up by the PPC?

As stated in the link, if your operating a restaurant at that site 2 hours is no where near long enough, maybe the retailers there should take a look at the pepipoo flyers and hand some out to customers.

Guys_Dad

surfboy1 wrote: »

Some of the supermarkets have parking limits of 1 hour or 90mins for example, but they also invite you to browse around the shop, relax and have a drink and a meal in their resteraunt , (such as the tesco extra at poole near camborne), and then charge you £100 if you dare to stay in there over 1 hour?
It is utter madness.

I will give you my take on this.

The big supermarkets are all cost driven these days. They squeeze farmers and other food producers and are used to battening down costs. It is, therefore, attractive to get a low-no cost PPC option on managing their car parks. No one with any real objectivity on here will deny that some retail car parks would be faced with spaces being taken by commuters or people parking while going to do a full day's work if there was no form of management in place. Or even ensuring that there is sufficient churn in the parking spaces to allow lots of customers to come in and shop,particularly id spaces are at a premium or at weekends.

But what they are clearly overlooking or turning a blind eye to is, that in order to manage their car parks, the PPCs need to get a return themselves and to do that, just as contracted out council Parking Wardens do, the PPC needs to penalise the supermarket customers by issuing sufficient tickets every day/week and each of these tickets needs to be at a swingeing level way beyond what is reasonable.

So, they upset decent shoppers who, as said, use their cafes, go round all departments or even other shops on the site. Again, as said, hardly good PR.

There has got to be a better way.

Stroma

ILW wrote: »

So why have the retailers agreed to it?
a parking company cannot just turn up and take over, they need to be given a contract by the landowner, who in turn wishes to get the highest rents from the tenants.
Many of the contracts are with major supermarkets where they are the only business on the site.

Because the landowner are not the retailers, they are somebody who don't listen to the complaints from the likes of and I'll list them for you as a joint letter was sent

Toysrus, Mothercare, Odeon Cinemas, Staples, Bowling Alley, and other smaller retailers most of which are not there now. I am not saying they are fully responsible for businesses shutting up shop, but they haven't helped.

In the case of my friend's business they were actually a disability shop selling stuff like motorised scooters stair lifts and a myriad of other things for disabled people.