Parking ticket from PPS (Plymouth)

Oh_No

While recently out in Plymouth I parked in a pay and display car park. I paid for a 24hour ticket. Upon returning to my car I found that I have been given a parking charge notice by a company called pps as it seems that I mistakenly parked in the short stay area of the car park, genuine mistake, didn’t see a sign stating that – it turns out as it one that looked like the standard ‘pay for a ticket or x company will give you a ticket etc.’ but in very small writing it said that certain spaces were short term stay. As I was paying for a ticket I didn’t pay it any more attention at the time.

The charge is for £100 or £60 if paid within two weeks, which I find very extortionate for such an easy mistake to make.

The car is a company car and I was hoping I could get some advice on the best course of action such as:

Should I just pay this charge?

Should I contact the company or completely ignore it?

Should I appeal? (does that ever help or just alert them to your contact details etc)

Any other advise

Many thanks for anyone that can help me here

Folkiedave

First of all don't pay. You don't owe anyone anything.

Secondly don't admit to driving.

Third - assuming you got a ticket to your windscreen which is what it sounds like - are you in a position to tell the registered keeper of the car this has happened and to ask them to forward any paperwork they get from PPS to you? They cannot access your details until 28 days from the date of the ticket - but I would still treat this as urgent. If you can't you are going to be writing to them yourself.

What you want to stop is them paying it and charging you.

If you can do this fine. In the meantime get reading around the forum.

Folkiedave

A WALK THROUGH THE PROCESS

Firstly, you don't have to pay the charge, it is not a fine, it is not a penalty, it is a speculative invoice from a Private Parking Company that has no statutory authority. However, you will need to go through a few hoops to get rid of it.

The first thing you MUST do is to start to understand what all this stuff is about. The only way to do this is to spend a day or so reading this forum - the most recent threads, say from the past month. If you see the advice 'IGNORE' you MUST ignore it. Ignoring a Parking Charge Notice will bring you months of fun and games that I can assure you, you don't want to be dealing with.

In a nutshell this is the process you will need to follow.

1. Read recent threads.

2. If the parking incident was at a retail park/shop go back to the store the Parking Charge Notice relates to and see THE manager, complain about a genuine customer being harassed and ask that they cancel the ticket. Show him/her any receipts for the day in question. If they are unable to do this ask for the name and address of the MD/CEO, as you will now write to them (and DO it!).

3. If it was a general car parking facility you need to find out who the landowner is (Google search) and send off a letter of complaint to them.

4. If you have receipts for the day (or bank/credit card statements) proving purchases, send (redacted) copies of them to PPC with covering letter stating you were a customer on the day, and shopping at their principal's establishment was the only cause of any overstay.

5. If 2, 3 or 4 above don't work, then you're into the more formal stuff.

6. If it was a windscreen ticket, do not contact the PPC at this point, you must wait for the 'Notice to Keeper' (NtK) to arrive. This should be no sooner than 28 days after the incident and no later than 56 days after it. Theses dates are very important, and you must retain all tickets and letters you receive.

7. If it was an ANPR camera incident and the first correspondence you've received is the NtK, this needs to be received within 14 days of the incident; as above, dates very important, retain all paperwork.

8. Once you receive the NtK the process below will need to be followed.

9. Soft appeal to the PPC (you'll understand this when you start reading the threads).

10. Likely rejection, so in your soft appeal you ask that a POPLA code be given to you if your soft appeal is rejected.

11. Lots more reading about POPLA Appeals (read the 'sticky' at the top of the forum index 'POPLA Decision', especially the last couple of months' reports of victories - it will give you a good idea of which points win at POPLA).

12. Draft POPLA Appeal and let us see it for further advice before submission.

13. Send to POPLA.

14. Await POPLA (positive) result with PCN cancelled - we're running at 100% success rate on the forum. A POPLA decision is binding on the PPC, but (in the event of an unlikely loss), not binding on you.

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Please confirm a couple of things (if they are not already contained in your opening post)

a. Was the incident, and do you live, in England or Wales?
b. Is the car a lease/hire or company vehicle (important as the process will be slightly different and you will need to act quickly)?
c. Are you under 18?

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Now - final, but IMPORTANT points.

* Never say who might or might not have been the driver on the day - there is no obligation on you to do so (some PPCs will ask you to name the driver/motorist before they can deal with your appeal - DO NOT comply with their wishes). In any correspondence with the PPC, always refer to the driver in the third person, never say 'I didn't see the signs' or 'my wife didn't see the signs', you say 'the driver didn't see the signs'.

* Always be aware of any deadlines, PPCs impose them (but most of these are challengeable), but if they are reasonable do keep to them. The important one is the POPLA deadline - strictly 28 days from the date the rejection letter containing the POPLA verification code is sent to you by the PPC. Miss it and you miss the one golden opportunity you have to totally kill this charge. I cannot stress that enough.

Sorry this is a bit long, but it does more or less cover most bases.

Oh_No

Folkiedave - Many thanks, I won’t quote you as its a long post

Some further info:

It was a car park unattached to a retail facility (as far as I could tell), it was called Athenaeum Car Park.

The car park is located close to Plymouth city centre (PL1)
It was a windscreen ticket

Your specific queries:

A – Incident in Plymouth, I live in Somerset
B – The company car is (I think) a lease hire as after four years it is returned and I get a new one. It is definitely not owned by the company and it is ‘assigned’ to me (although I cannot refuse any reasonable request for work mates to use it)
C – I am well over 18

From what I gather from your post I am at the sit and wait for a NtK. I will in the meantime inform our transport department to send all correspondence to me if any should turn up (upon speaking to a work mate it seems this is not uncommon for that office to receive such letters for other employees).

Umkomaas

Oh_No wrote: »

Folkiedave - Many thanks, I won’t quote you as its a long post

Some further info:

It was a car park unattached to a retail facility (as far as I could tell), it was called Athenaeum Car Park.

The car park is located close to Plymouth city centre (PL1)
It was a windscreen ticket

Your specific queries:

A – Incident in Plymouth, I live in Somerset
B – The company car is (I think) a lease hire as after four years it is returned and I get a new one. It is definitely not owned by the company and it is ‘assigned’ to me (although I cannot refuse any reasonable request for work mates to use it)
C – I am well over 18

From what I gather from your post I am at the sit and wait for a NtK. I will in the meantime inform our transport department to send all correspondence to me if any should turn up (upon speaking to a work mate it seems this is not uncommon for that office to receive such letters for other employees).

No - you mustn't sit back and just wait for the NtK. As it's a company/lease car you've got to be more proactive.

You need to talk to your transport manager (or similar) to determine just who is the Registered Keeper and find out what the normal protocol for dealing with these things is.

If the RK is a leasing company it's important to find out whether they normally pay these charges, invoice your company and charge them an additional admin charge. That could all find its way to you.

If your company is the nominal RK and the lease company by agreement forward all fines and parking charges direct to your company to deal with, then you need to get your company to respond to the PPC to tell them that you are the normal, recognised 'Keeper'. You have more protection as the Keeper than you do as the Driver.

So you do need to crack on with this.

Oh_No

I have enquired with my transport office who's name the car is in and asked that any documentation from PPS be sent onto me. I have also asked what the arrangement is with our leasing company and if I need to contact them or if it goes through our transport office.

Coupon-mad

Oh_No wrote: »

I have enquired with my transport office who's name the car is in and asked that any documentation from PPS be sent onto me. I have also asked what the arrangement is with our leasing company and if I need to contact them or if it goes through our transport office.

This is an unsafe position to be in so if in any doubt, send an appeal earlier than normal (i.e. now). As advised already on this thread today:

https://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/discussion/4794450

Where a lease firm is concerned we find that the DVLA have that address and that PPCs send a fake PCN there and the lease firm pays it. You DO NOT want to be in any risk of that happening. If in doubt then appeal before day 28 (sooner rather than later). I think I put an example of appeal wording on that thread, but I certainly did on this thread anyway:

https://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/discussion/4793456

This is important to ensure this charge is not paid by any company. YOU will win it at POPLA so the safest thing would be to appeal early, in your case.