Private Parking Fine

ckerrd

bambam69 wrote: »

Also, for all those that pointed out that I asked for advice and now smugly tell me that they did indeed give me advice (pay up), thanks very much.

It's a bit like the doctor saying you have cancer and you replying "What can I do?"
and the doctor saying "Die?"

A somewhat poor analogy.

You asked for advice.
Got it.
In my case I suggested that you contacted the Uni and asked if you could pay the orginal fine, others suggested you cough up the full amount. Yet another suggested you may be able to ignore it.

All advice freely given - if you don't like it then fine. (no pun intended)

And if you do go to the doctor with cancer one of the options is to have no medical intervention of any sort and indeed you may die quicker than you would have had you not had cancer. Or you may not.....

Ironick

I don't see why people hae to get so worked up about things, the OP's (and respondents') personal circumstances are surley irrelevant.

Essentially you have 2 choices;
a) Pay
b) Don't pay, recieve letters through the post and ignore them, I don't think they can realistically make you pay. You were parked incorrectly so getting the "notices" cancelled or reduced is not an option.

Don't worry about the threat of not letting you graduate, the car is in your husband's name, even if it was in yours I doubt the university have any way of linking you the student with this fine. Library fines and money owed directly to the university are different.

Elle00

bambam69 wrote: »

And Elle, you seem to misunderstand. I am not saying that you have brought single motherhood on yourself etc, but merely that many in society who choose not to look at the details of someones life may draw this conclusion. I feel that you were very quick to pass judgement on MY situation with moral pontificating, when someone in a situation so often moralised against could have had more understanding. That is all.

In your OP you went out of your way to morally justify why it was okay that you shouldn't be fined for parking incorrectly - so I responded to clarify that from my point of view yes you should be. Your post was not a simple one-line question; the overall question was preceeded by a short essay exploring the moral issues surrounding the way in which you obtained the fines.

You started the debate so I don't know why you then took exception to other people contributing.

I'm still waiting for an apology.

Altarf

herbie-152 wrote: »

As far as I can work out, these are some of the pertinent facts:

1. You are breaking no criminal laws by parking on private land longer than someone wants you to.

Correct, but the landowner could sue you for the loss they have incurred by you trespassing on their land. They are also allowed to clamp you, subject to the Private Security Industry Act 2001 and charge a fee to release the car.

herbie-152 wrote: »

2. An individual or company cannot impose a fine for breach of contract on another individual or company under English law that is disproportionate.

What most of the car parks do, is not impose a penalty for breaching the conditions, but allow you to do things subject to a charge. For example, "Free parking for 2 hours providing you use our shop, £150 after two hours or if you don't use our shop, or park outside a bay, or park in a disabled bay without a blue badge, etc". They are not saying you cannot park for more than 2 hours, etc, but are saying you can and if you do then you have agreed to pay £150.

herbie-152 wrote: »

3. An individual or company cannot demand that another individual or company pays a fine that they have given out without a court order.

It's not a fine, but an agreed charge between the vehicle driver and the landowner. The landowner can pursue the driver for the amount that they agreed to pay.

herbie-152 wrote: »

4. An individual or company may have some form of legal redress, e.g. trespass or breach of contract, against another individual or company, but this must involve the courts.

But as described above, unless the car has been clamped, then in all probability the amount being sought will not be for trespass or breach of contract, but for money due under an agreed contract.

herbie-152 wrote: »

5. Unfortunately, the DVLA have decided that they can legally hand out the details of a car's registered owner on requested by a car park operator. This has been hotly contested but I don't believe the DVLA have been challenged in the courts and according to the DVLA website they are continuing to do so.

In fact the DVLA will give out information to anybody who can demonstrate "reasonable cause" (I think that you bumped into my car is given as an example) - http://www.dvla.gov.uk/foi/relinfo.aspx

On other internet sites, people are arguing that they have no legal duty to advise the landowner who the driver is and it is up to the landowner to prove who it is. To date the car park operators seem reluctant to push the debt to court, probably because they get a high enough payment rate anyway with the legalistic threat letters they issue and as it would end up in the small claims court they would have difficulty getting their costs back. However if they did, then since such cases are "on the balance of probability" you might well lose if you refused to tell the court (or "couldn't remember") who the driver was as they might surmise "on the balance of probability" it was you.

Hapless_2

I should imagine that if you park on privater property you should then be bound by the rules of the landowners conditions of use. i.e. park correctly.
What would you have done if the rules were incorrectly parked vehicles would be towed?
When I was at college the rules were...any vehicles incorrectly parked or not displaying a college parking permit will be towed immediately. These rules were in the college building and in the students handbook.

hollydays

Well done Timne-caused a first time poster to quit on the vent board (post now called" forget it").. and to think i accused you of being nasty...how right i was.
Edit-Timnne post now removed from here..

frank_potter

For correct details of the legal position relating to private parking (as opposed to some of the speculative ones previously mentioned) I suggest browsing the following link:

http://www.logiclaw.co.uk/pages/PJ.html

and also the forum at:

http://www.pepipoo.com/

Hope that this helps.

Altarf

frank_potter wrote: »

For correct details of the legal position relating to private parking (as opposed to some of the speculative ones previously mentioned) I suggest browsing the following link

Not exactly unbiased are they though.

frank_potter

Altarf wrote: »

Not exactly unbiased are they though.

If you consider the above advice to be incorrect please kindly quote a County court case of this kind where a private parking company has been successful.

I have yet to hear of one.

Altarf

frank_potter wrote: »

please kindly quote a County court case of this kind where a private parking company has been successful.

I have yet to hear of one.

Keep up, that's what I said several post ago. That doesn't make these two sites unbiased or right though.