Looking for advice

Bairdy47

Hi, today at 16.12 I received a parking ticket from the company UKPC for parking in a disabled space without displaying a disabled badge. This happened in a retail parking grounds outside Matalan in the Gallagher Retail Park (Dundee). Now this car park has no visible child parking spaces, but with only visible sign posted disabled spaces. With the car park being generally full and with 2 young children in the car, i felt I would be ok parking in this space. The funny thing about it is the similar idea must of appealed to a similar family as they parked right next to me(directly in front of the disabled sign post). I still went and purchased a ticket which would give me a two hour period of parking. I must of been in the shop for no longer than 20 mins and came out to find a parking ticket for £100 (£60 if paid in 14 days), the parking attendant was no where to be found. The unbelievable part to this story is that the family who had parked next to me had no ticket on their car. Everything is telling me not to pay this fine but I am looking on advice on what to do, write a appeal letter, pay the fine, not pay the fine, etc?
Thank you very much for reading and your advice

Bantex_2

Has to be a wind up.

Redx

read this https://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/discussion/4816822

pogofish

Children are not a disability and do not entitle you to an accessible space - So please, in future leave them for someone (eg a parent of a disabled child) who needs them.

However, the Blue Badge Scheme does not apply on private property (its the Equality Act Scotland that has primacy here), so UKPC have no right to dish-up that meaningless twaddle and in Scotland, POFA 2012 does not apply, so there is no meaningful way to appeal, nor can they pursue you (or the RK) for anything if you don't tell them who was driving. So do not communicate with them in any way and after a series of ever-more threatening letters from themselves and fake "debt collectors", UKPC will give-up.

And Gallagher Retail Park has featured in umpteen threads her over the last few months, so do search the forum to see this advice repeated again and again - and nobody has come back to say they got any further action.

Half_way

As above children are not a disability ( unless they actualy are disabled) and parent and toddler/child spaces are nothing but a gimmick, before these parent and toddler/child spaces came along people used to get by just fine.
As for Disabled spaces these are genuinely required by people with a disability, blue badge or no blue badge and by abusing such spaces not only do you /could you deprive someone who actually may need that space you are also giving the Parking company the oxygen they need to exist in the eyes of the car park owners.

Despite all of the above this still does not give a parking company the right to fine you.
wait for the notice to keeper to arrive in the post to the registered keeper, challenge it to the parking company if you want mention not a genuine pre estimate of loss as a direct result of your parking ( you may need to expand on this ) if its rejected you should get a popla code then appeal to popla.

Redx

if its rejected you should get a popla code then appeal to popla.

not in Dundee they wont

no excuse for parking in a disabled space though, as I believe the Equality Act 2010 applies in scotland ? (or a similar law)

Coupon-mad

The EA does apply in Scotland.

Now this car park has no visible child parking spaces

So what? Park in a normal bay then like everyone else who is able bodied.

Posts like this drive me mad. I have 4 kids myself but how dare someone with children think they have a 'right to a special space' (LOL!) and then take up a disabled bay? Has the OP not yet twigged that Parent & Child spaces are a marketing gimmick by certain Supermarkets, not a legal right?

Here we go again with us having to educate parents about STAYING THE HELL OUT OF DISABLED BAYS WHICH ARE THERE FOR A VALID REASON:

https://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/discussion/4801002 (this case is exactly like yours and was in NI so the advice is the same as in Scotland)

https://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/discussion/4879297 and again

https://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/discussion/4852069 and again...beggars belief.

But at least the OP is in Scotland (like the first link to a NI case) and can take the advice in the newbies thread for Scotland & NI. Maybe when the realisation dawns that this was, in fact, incredibly selfish parking but they can ignore the fake PCN from UKPC, they should instead send a donation to a disability charity.

Bantex_2

OP will just ignore all the advice about not using disabled bays and will run with do not have to pay stuff.

Get away with it and just repeat and repeat.

Welsh_Exile

Bantex wrote: »

OP will just ignore all the advice about not using disabled bays and will run with do not have to pay stuff.

Get away with it and just repeat and repeat.

I don't believe in clairvoyance, do you? Actually I think it's more likely that the robust responses on this thread will give the OP pause for thought in future.

Bairdy47 - follow the advice given, including a donation to a disability charity. Doesn't, IMO, have to be for the amount of the ridiculous parking charge - £5 or £10 would do it. If you do that no doubt you will receive a warm (virtual) round of applause when you post back here.

Bantex_2

Welsh_Exile wrote: »

I don't believe in clairvoyance, do you? Actually I think it's more likely that the robust responses on this thread will give the OP pause for thought in future.

Bairdy47 - follow the advice given, including a donation to a disability charity. Doesn't, IMO, have to be for the amount of the ridiculous parking charge - £5 or £10 would do it. If you do that no doubt you will receive a warm (virtual) round of applause when you post back here.

I would suspect that forking out £100.00 would be more likely to make the OP think twice about their attitude. They obviously do not give a toss about others with a more difficult life than their own or they would not have used the bay in the first place.

Welsh_Exile

Well, they won't be paying any phoney £60 or £100 PCN and perhaps they'll come back here and say what their attitude to disabled bays will actually be from now on.