Parking Eye... with a twist

swarfey

G'day all, and congratulations on such a fab, informative forum.

Last week I received a 'PCN' from Parking Eye for parking for 3h30m in a supermarket car park in Surrey when the limit was two hours. I've had a good read of all the Parking Eye correspondence on here, but here's the slight difference: the car does not belong to me - it was in my possession to review for a car magazine, and is registered to the press office of the car company, who emailed the fine on to me.

As I am not the registered keeper, does this make any difference to the 'appeal' process? Obviously the press office will not deal with Parking Eye's correspondence themselves, and will pass everything on to me. From the point of view of the press office, their legal position is that the car was loaned to my employer during the period that the fine was issued, not to me personally...

Thanks!

spacey2012

If you think this is a "fine" and you work in the press.
I have to ask, how did you get the job.

bazster

It's not a fine.

Legally the Press Office is right and wrong. Sort of!

The Protection of Freedoms Act 2012 makes specific provision for hire companies to escape registered keeper liability, but it says nothing about loan vehicles.

However, it does allow for the de facto keeper not being the same person as the registered keeper. So, if you had the loan vehicle for any length of time, I guess it could be argued that you were, at the time, the keeper of the vehicle.

I think your options now are:

- ignore it all and leave it all for the press office to sort out (which I suppose might result in no more loan vehicles for you to test!)
- write to PE telling them that you were the keeper of the vehicle at the time, without admitting to being the driver (a letter from the Press Office confirming that the vehicle was loaned to you for however long might help)
- or, write to PE telling them that you were the driver of the vehicle at the time (which has the disadvantage that you can't later challenge them for getting their keeper liability stuff wrong, although there's plenty of other stuff you can see them off with).

swarfey

Bazter, thank you so much - that's a brilliant reply. I think option 2 is probably the smartest bet. From your experience, would PE be more likely to continue sending correspondence to the registered owner, or to the fool that replies to them?

In answer to your question, spacey2012: I made a lot of cups of tea.

The_Slithy_Tove

If you are a motoring journalist, then this is your opportunity to make public the scam that is the private parking charge robbery. First hand knowledge of the whole process makes a much better story.

bazster

I really don't know swarfey, it's a rare situation. But if they do keep chasing the RK after it's been shown to them that someone else was the de facto keeper they will get themselves into a pickle somewhere down the line.

And the option to dob in the driver remains, all the way up to the point where they file a court case (if they ever do, you are a long, long way from that!). So, that is there as a backstop to get them out of the Press Office's hair once and for all.

Oh, and great reply to Spacey. And listen to ST: can you please write about this?

Coupon-mad

swarfey wrote: »

Bazter, thank you so much - that's a brilliant reply. I think option 2 is probably the smartest bet. From your experience, would PE be more likely to continue sending correspondence to the registered owner, or to the fool that replies to them?

In answer to your question, spacey2012: I made a lot of cups of tea.

You need to make some sort of general 'appeal' as well - to get a POPLA code. You do not want to miss the chance to win at POPLA appeal with our help (and then publish an article about it!).

So you could say,




Dear Sir/Madam,
Re fake PCN number xxxxxxxx
Your letter dated xx/07/13 has been passed to me to reply as at that time I was the 'keeper' (as defined in the Protection of Freedoms Act 2012). See below for my name and postal address for service of Notices.

The charge you are seeking to claim is punitive, extortionate and wholly unrelated to any loss you can be making in the car park, where the owner/occupier offers free parking. Clearly your only 'income' in that car park is from people who pay fake PCNs, reminiscent of some sort of shady protection racket. As such the amount fails the test of representing a 'genuine pre-estimate of loss'. Parking Eye do not enjoy ownership or legal interest in this car park in any sense and cannot possibly be running a business model at a permanent loss, save for some claw-back from people who are intimidated or naive enough to believe they have a parking ticket. The truth is this is pure income for Parking Eye and I will not add to your profits.

Your signage is also not compliant with the strict requirements in the BPA Code of Practice. In addition, I suspect that the local Planning Department would be interested to hear that you are running a business in this car park and would be pleased to be able to pursue the rightful occupiers/landowners for business rates on this land, now that this has been exposed.

And as regards your apparent 'breach' allegation it is clear that you offered no consideration that could have created any contract with the driver and there was no offer capable of resulting in any acceptance. So the elements of a contract are conspicuous by their absence. You have not convinced me of your case.

Perhaps you would like the opportunity to show your hand to POPLA, which is what you will need to do if you do not cancel this fake PCN forthwith.

yours,


PRINT NAME AND GIVE A 'POSTAL ADDRESS FOR SERVICE'


Or write your own hard-hitting version without saying nor implying who was driving. You write as the 'keeper' in response to the Notice and your appeal at this stage is designed to knock down their house of cards so that they either cancel the fake PCN or send you a POPLA Code. At which stage you go to town with a full appeal and win it. The POPLA decision is binding on the parking 'industry' but not on you - and they fund each appeal, and we win them - LOL!!

P.S. Parking Eye have employees paid to read these forums (we know, we saw the job advert!). If they see the above appeal verbatim what's the betting they cancel your fake PCN immediately as they've seen you are a journalist. So I would encourage you to write a completely different one, maybe even a shorter and more naive one (but not implying who was driving)...to try to get that POPLA code!

swarfey

Right, will fire over a soft challenge to PE to get a POPLA code and see what happens from there.

ST and Bazter, I certainly will write about it - is the feeling that the challenge process has become any more straightforward since the law changes last October? It'd be interesting to know whether people feel POPLA has genuinely helped to beat the scammers. Seems there's still plenty of them around...

swarfey

Coupon-mad, thank you, that's a stunning letter. Will give it a couple of gentle tweaks and then unleash it on PE. I know the issue of cowboy parking firms does surface from time to time in the mass media, but it's something of which more needs to be made, I think. And you guys seem to be the experts in the field...

Orrin

From POFA Schedule 4 paragraph 2 (1):

“keeper” means the person by whom the vehicle is kept at the time the vehicle was parked, which in the case of a registered vehicle is to be presumed, unless the contrary is proved, to be the registered keeper;

As bazster says it could be argued that you were the keeper, or perhaps your employer. Note the assumption is the keeper is the registered keeper unless proven otherwise. If PE don't accept you were the keeper they may decide to pursue the RK anyway.

Looking at it from Parking Eye's point of view they will go after whoever they think is most likely to pay up.

bazster

swarfey, I don't think POPLA is helping at all. The number of charges being appealed to POPLA is vanishingly small as a proportion of charges issued. Furthermore, whilst we here and on PePiPoo may have figured out the Magic Incantations that work with POPLA, anyone who doesn't know the magic words is almost sure to fail. And POPLA's own documentation and website are still hopelessly misleading about the allowable grounds for appeal. It's a terrible indictment of a supposedly-independent appeals body that it allows appeals written or aided by a few sorcerors but hides from the mass of the public the kind of sorcery it will listen to.

Furthermore, far from things getting better since the law changes, they have got immeasurably worse. Despite the lies told to the DfT by the BPA, court cases relating to private parking charges were running at about 600 per year prior to the law changes, which amounted to virtually nothing as a proportion of all the charges issued. Since the law changed, just one company, ParkingEye, has filed thousands of court cases. So the Protection of Freedoms Act, and POPLA, have backfired spectacularly.