Parking Eye The Range

Sound_man

Hi All

My car was clocked in and out of the car park with an onsite time of 11 mins. The incident occurred outside of store opening hours there was only one vehicle in the car park when I arrived and one other arrived during the time I was there. The car park was unlit and I did not see any signs when I drove in or out and it was only when I received a letter from Parking eye that I realised that the park was monitored. I have since revisited the carpark and seen that signs are actually at the entrance and around the car park but they did not show up in my headlights. I did not actually get out of the car. The car park is free for 2 hours during the store opening hours but parking is prohibited outside of these times. Outside of these times the parking charge notice states that the maximum free stay authorised is 0 hours 0 minutes.
I have been following the progress of a similar topic and I have appealed to Parking Eye on the grounds that they incurred no loss from the incident. They have rejected the appeal and given me a POPLA number. I am in the process of writing an appeal based on the cases on this forum and Pepipoo. I will post the draft appeal on here before it is submitted and would be grateful if those of you with experience of these things could review my appeal and suggest any improvements. Incidently are the photographs supposed to show a picture of the car all they have sent is a picture of the number plate on a black background.

Many thanks.

Coupon-mad

Yep we will be happy to look at your POPLA appeal wording first. Do click the 'how to win at POPLA' link in my 'newbies read this first!' sticky thread, for winning examples for PE situations. This month IMHO everyone should be submitting their POPLA appeals online (due to postal delays).

Sound_man

Hi all I would love your comments on my first draft.


PCN No.
Issued.
Reg.
Todays Date

I am the registered Keeper of the above vehicle and I am appealing against above charge. I contend that I am not liable for the parking charge on the following grounds and would ask that they are all considered.

1) The signage at the car park was not compliant with the British Parking Association standards and there was no valid contract between the parking company and the driver.
2) The amount demanded is not a Genuine Pre-estimate of loss.
3) No proprietary Interest


1) The Signage at the car park was not compliant with the BPA code of conduct. The car entered the car park at 19:46 27/10/2013 and left at 19:58 27/10/2013 (during hours of darkness) and during a very heavy rainstorm. The car park and parking notices are completely unlit, and the signs placed at such a height that they are not illuminated by the cars headlights. As a consequence, at no time did the driver observe the signs. The BPA Code of Practice states in Appendix B under Contrast and Illumination heading “If the sign itself is not illuminated, it should be made of retroreflective material meeting BS EN 12899-1:2007 class RA2 or higher (BS EN 12899-6:2012 class P3 or higher)”. I have visited the car park and the signs are not illuminated nor made of suitably reflective material. As a POPLA assessor has said previously in an adjudication “Once an Appellant submits that the terms of parking were not displayed clearly enough, the onus is then on the Operator to demonstrate that the signs at the time and location in question were sufficiently clear”. The parking company needs to prove that the driver actually saw, read and accepted the terms, which means that I and the POPLA adjudicator would be led to believe that a conscious decision was made by the driver to park in exchange for paying the extortionate fixed amount the Operator is now demanding. The idea that any driver would accept these terms knowingly is perverse and beyond credibility. I summit that since the signs were not seen as stated above then no contract was entered into and therefore no breach of contract occurred.

2) The amount demanded is not a Genuine Pre-estimate of Loss
The charge is a penalty and not a genuine pre-estimate of loss. The £100 charge asked for far exceeds the cost to the landowner who would have received £0.00 from any vehicles parked as the car park is free to use. At the time of the incident the store was closed and there was only one other vehicle in the car park, therefore the store did not suffer any loss as a result of the car being present in the car park nor did it in any way affect the successful operation of the business which was closed. For this charge to be justified a full breakdown of the costs Parking Eye has suffered as a result of the car being parked at the car park is required and should add up to £100. Normal expenditure the company incurs to carry on their business (e.g. provision of parking, parking enforcement or signage erection) should not be included in the breakdown, as these operational costs would have been suffered irrespective of the car being parked at that car park.

3) No proprietary interest
The registered keeper does not believe that Parking Eye has demonstrated a proprietary interest in the land, because they have no legal possession which would give Parking Eye any right to offer parking spaces, let alone allege a contract with third party customers of the lawful owner/occupiers. In addition, Parking Eye's lack of title in this land means they have no legal standing to allege trespass or loss, if that is the basis of their charge. The registered keeper believes there is no contract with the landowner/occupier that entitles them to levy these charges and therefore has no authority to issue parking charge notices (PCNs). This being the case, the burden of proof shifts to Parking eye. The registered keeper expects Parking Eye to prove that they are not in breach of section 7.1 of the BPA code. Furthermore since no parking is permitted outside of store opening hours then that is trespass. The motorist cannot contract to do something that is forbidden. There can be no liquidated damages for trespass as liquidated damages are compensation agreed upon by the parties entering into a contract. Trespass of land is a wrong against the possession not ownership of the land so only the person who has exclusive possession of the land can sue for trespass & that is not Parking Eye.


Do people think this will do the trick?

Many thanks

Redx

as an observation, the BPA CoP mentions having say 10 minutes to decide if you agree to the terms of any signage, or leave, that would be if you could actually read it (if it was well lit , not raining , correct colours etc)

they also have rules on signage too

they also have rules stating the loss must be a genuine pre-estimate of loss

there are plenty of PE threads on here and they have lost quite a lot at POPLA and court recently too

so yes sort out a decent appeal based on legalities and not mitigation

as per this thread here https://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/discussion/4816165 for example

bear in mind the following points so you make them prove their case , never mind losing £27 + vat too

1. Non genuine pre-estimate of loss
2. Signage
3. No Contract with landowner
4. Trespass
5. Unlawful Penalty Charge
6. Business Rates
7. ANPR Accuracy

so add any that are missing which are relevant

hoohoo

I'm assuming this is the range, barrow

You may want to look at this facebook group. There is a big local group trying to get fairness back at the range.

Parking Eye Charges Barrow-in-Furness
https://www.facebook.com/groups/176223182580308/185214248347868/?notif_t=group_comment_reply

ParkingEye have recently changed the entrance signage to be more compliant than it was before, so watch out if they try their trick of sumitting wrong photos in the popla appeal. The help group can tell you the time of the change.

Also, the signs are misleading, and they can help with that too.

...but you will win on gpeol.

Also, if this was pre feb 2012, then the range did not have a contract in place - search for A Walkden v ParkingEye

Sound_man

Thanks this was the Range in Dorchester. I have photos of the signs,

nigelbb

PE cannot claim damages for breach of contract as you cannot enter into a contract to do something that is forbidden. If you were there outside permitted hours then you were trespassing & only the occupier of the land (owner or leaseholder) can sue you & then only for actual damages. There cannot be liquidated damages with a GPEOL because liquidated damages are agreed by the parties to a contract & do not apply for trespass.

Coupon-mad

A good appeal! I would suggest a few things:

'I summit that...' should be 'I submit that...'

and add to the 'contrast & illumination' quote from the BPA CoP:

The BPA Code of Practice states in Appendix B under Contrast and Illumination heading “Signs should be readable and understandable at all times, including during the hours of darkness or at dusk if and when parking enforcement activity takes place at those times...if the sign itself is not illuminated, it should be made of retroreflective material meeting BS EN 12899-1:2007 class RA2 or higher (BS EN 12899-6:2012 class P3 or higher)”. I believe the sign here at this car park fails to meet the required standards, since they are trying to enforce at times of dusk/darkness.

and add an ANPR paragraph like here, post #22:

https://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/discussion/4816165

and add a 'no grace period' paragraph at the end, based on this part of the BPA CoP:

https://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/discussion/comment/63904132#Comment_63904132



HTH

tams

Soundman, I have literally just won a POPLA appeal against the parking eye fine I got at the Range in Dorchester. It was won on the grounds of no contract existing, and unreasonable punitive cost.
Your appeal looks good but PM me if you want to see what I wrote and won with.
Good luck, they are absolute *****.
Incidentally I believe they get charged £27 + VAT just for the fact you appeal so my thoughts were that even if I was unsuccessful, at least they wouldn't get much of my money.

Sound_man

Thanks tams PM sent.

polyplastic

I know that this is late but it has only just been discovered that ParkingEye has been operating this car park in criminal circumstances. It never bothered to obtain advertisement consent for its signage under the Town and Country Planning (Control of Advertisements) (England) Regulations 2007. By virtue of Regulation 30 that is a criminal offence. If the Council bothered to deal with this properly, and prosecuted, then a fine of up to £2500 could have been imposed with a daily fine of £250 for each day that the signage remained. Might be nice to see ParkingEye taken to court

So, in order to contract with motorists ParkingEye had to commit a criminal offence. Surely, on those grounds they should not be allowed to take money off motorists as that would be profitting from their crime and that is obviously taboo.

So, if anyone has paid ParkingEye why not write to
[EMAIL="enforcement&#64;<enforcement&#64;parkingeye.co.uk"][/email][EMAIL="enforcement&#64;parkingeye.co.uk"]enforcement@parkingeye.co.uk[/EMAIL] and ask for your money back. Maybe even sue ParkingEye under, perhaps, the Tort of Deceit.

ParkingEye, finally submitted an application for consent on the 18th November and the Barrow in Furness Council's Planning Committee is to consider the application on the 3rd February 2015.

Ironic isn't it that ParkingEye take people to court and criticise them for allegedly parking for too long but is not averse to committing a crime!

Under the contract that ParkingEye has with the Range (CDS (Superstores International) Limited) The Range agreed to get the necessary consent but, it seems, it just didn't bother. ParkingEye obviously never bothered to check that the consent was in place, or did know that it wasn't, and carried on anyway.

The Planners in Barrow started asking for an application for advertisement consent to be made, so that it could be properly considered, back in March 2014. Yet it took ParkingEye 8 months to do it. Does this show some kind of contempt for the law. During those 8 months they continued to issue tickets.

Under the DVLA's suspensions policy document any company that displays signage that does not comply with the law should be suspended for 3 months from access to data. Wil lthe DVLA comply with its own policy?

Is it one law for the rich and something completely different for the rest of us


Polyplastic