We will robustly defend your right to talk about how to fight unfair tickets

MSE_Martin

I have read some of the concern threads on here about post moderation, as well as some of the tweets I have been sent over post removal here and have reviewed the situation personally and want to explain where we are.

MoneySavingExpert is 100% committed to taking on unfair private parking tickets and companies behaving inappropriately. This is often a cowboy market with some firms displaying behaviour only suiting the wild west.

The industry has tried to legally shut us up - and we have robustly defended and refused to make any changes to our guide - which is the key focal point - and receives the bulk of traffic. Much to their chagrin.

In the forum, we have and will continually protect discussion of how to legally fight unfair parking tickets again much to the companies unhappiness (not that I give a flying fig about that).

Yet I can't prioritise resourcing defending the very occasional potentially defamatory name calling of INDIVIDUAL companies as. Say you believe they've behaved badly, inappropriately, unfairly by all means - but if you call them "thieves or scammers" it crosses the line - and causes all of us difficulties.
Remember when you say it on here, when we are notified as a complaint, we in many circumstances then become the publishers of it.
When someone does casually allege illegality, for us to defend that needs evidence and proof and on occasions we have done that (not specifically related to parking but as a general premise across the forum) we find users then disengage and don't want to get involved, leaving us high and dry.

Yet even so, I don't consider defending name-calling a priority for the limited legal resource we have. Defending your right to fight unfair tickets, yes. Saying you are unhappy, believe companies are pushing it, encouraging others to fight unfair tickets - is all good.

So all we're asking is that you moderate your language and stick to the meat of this subject which is tackling unfair treatment, rather than fighting for the right to call them '!!!!!!!s'.

My forum team are not legal specialists, though we do have limited internal legal resource things can be escalated to. They do their best.

I understand the decisions haven't and if I'm honest won't always be 100% spot on - there are millions of words written in the forum every week, its not an easy job and perfection isn't attainable.

I don't intend to sit here and review every past decision on a case by case basis, I don't have the time to do that with so many things going on.
However I am alive to your concerns and having reviewed it have explained to my team I have some sympathy with the viewed expressed. So from now on I have asked the forum team to be a bit more robust here in terms of defending the posts that are on here.

As my time is tight, I have also asked my Managing Editor (ie the boss of my editorial team) MSE Guy – who himself is a campaigning journalist with a personally robust view on this - to take an interest from the editorial perspective to ensure that the line we take on the main site is not being diluted in the way the forum team look at posts.

The last thing I want is parking companies who are unfairly treating consumers to get away with it.

I can't vouch we'll get it perfect to every users satisfaction in future. Nor can I ask the team have the time to explain every decision (we simply couldn't run this place if we did).

I do though commit that we are on this subject and want this forum to remain a place where people who feel unjustly treated by parking companies can get help and share information to take on their cause.

I would ask you just to understand that we are in no way cow-towing to anyone in this fight and that if you do understand that, if you are tempted to 'have a go' at a company on here, you think carefully about the precision of the language used.

Martin

PS If you do genuinely believe you have a story about a parking company who has behaved criminally and have evidence to back it up - as well as obviously going to the police - please let [EMAIL="news@moneysavingexpert.com"]news@moneysavingexpert.com[/EMAIL].

We are unafraid of publishing such stories that check out and are in mainstream public interest and via that mechanism can draw far more attention to it than just here in the forum.


PPS Im writing this on my birthday when I'm meant to be off, and Mrs MSE is telling me I shouldn't be working, so do forgive me if any phrasing is scrappy!