Missing photos leading to PCN

rossyg123

Hi - first time post


I've just received a PCN showing my car entering a supermarket car park at 08:20 and leaving at 15:26. I don't deny any of this however I left the car park in the morning after dropping my daughter off about 2 minutes later and returned to the car park later in the day (about 15:10) to do a bit of shopping and pick my daughter up after school.


I've used the company's on-line appeal process providing these details and asked them to check their records which should show me leaving and then re-entering over 6 and a half hours later.


Has anyone experienced this before and give me some advice on what to do or what response I should expect? The company is euro car parks.


Should they have kept records that will prove I'm right?

Fruitcake

rossyg123 wrote: »

Hi - first time post


I've just received a PCN showing my car entering a supermarket car park at 08:20 and leaving at 15:26. I don't deny any of this however I left the car park in the morning after dropping my daughter off about 2 minutes later and returned to the car park later in the day (about 15:10) to do a bit of shopping and pick my daughter up after school.


I've used the company's on-line appeal process providing these details and asked them to check their records which should show me leaving and then re-entering over 6 and a half hours later.


Has anyone experienced this before and give me some advice on what to do or what response I should expect? The company is euro car parks.


Should they have kept records that will prove I'm right?

You need to read the Scicky thread for NEWBIES at the top of the main page. This tells you all about this scam which is known as double dipping and how to beat it.


Did you name yourself as the driver in your original appeal or did you do the correct thing and wait for the notice to keeper/owner?


Was this in England or Wales, and which supermarket? They need to be named and shamed for using a private parking company that scams its customers. Number plate recognition is not fit for purpose either.


Have you complained long and loud in the supermarket to get this cancelled. If not, please do so and make a nuisance of yourselves. If they agree to get it cancelled get it in writing. Fakebook is a good place to highlight this scam as well.


Contacting the parking company about what happened on the day won't work and is a waste of time. Use the tried and tested appeals process in the NEWBIES thread and you will beat this and cost the parking company money.

rossyg123

Many thanks I'll read it now.


I'm fairly sure I stuck to "my car" but didn't refer to me as the driver.


It was in England and was Euro Car Parks. The supermarket was Sainsburys to whom I'll write a snottagram to now!!

Fruitcake

rossyg123 wrote: »

Many thanks I'll read it now.


I'm fairly sure I stuck to "my car" but didn't refer to me as the driver.


It was in England and was Euro Car Parks. The supermarket was Sainsburys to whom I'll write a snottagram to now!!

There is a lot of info but concentrate on only the bits that are relevant to you. In other words you don't need to read the info about debt collectors etcetera.


Your initial appeal WILL be rejected but this is normal. Euro are members of the BPA (all acronyms explained in the NEWBIES thread) so they MUST provide you with a PoPLA code. You use this along with the How to Win at PoPLA part of the sticky thread, win, cost Euro money, and gloat if you feel the urge.

rossyg123

Put a grievance in to sainsburys and got a very apologetic and helpful manager on the phone followed up with an e-mail stating that they have put a request into ECP to have the PCN cancelled and will let me know when and what they're response is. She did say that the cameras were only recently introduced and they have been having teething troubles. I assume that means I'm not the only one to receive a PCN "in error".


I'll post when/if I get confirmation of cancellation.

Fruitcake

rossyg123 wrote: »

Put a grievance in to sainsburys and got a very apologetic and helpful manager on the phone followed up with an e-mail stating that they have put a request into ECP to have the PCN cancelled and will let me know when and what they're response is. She did say that the cameras were only recently introduced and they have been having teething troubles. I assume that means I'm not the only one to receive a PCN "in error".


I'll post when/if I get confirmation of cancellation.

Euro Car Parks have been around long enough to get this right so it is my opinion that there are photo's of your car leaving and returning but have been deliberately ignored. Good result from your complaint but print and keep the email in case this doesn't work.
Complaints to Trading Standards, DVLA, and BPA would be in order stating that Number Plate recognition is not fit for purpose and open to abuse as can be seen by the number of times double dipping tickets have been issued. Complaints to Sainsbugs' CEO that they will alienate customers if they do not remove these parasites, er, sorry, parking companies from their premises are also in order.
I take it you will be demanding compensation for your time and cost of 'phone calls and electrickery etcetera to beat this scam.



Have a look at the sh1tstorm Aldi have caused by using parking lie if you can spare the time. Aldi's fakebook page is littered with them.

Umkomaas

'Teething trouble'? Which will no doubt be causing grief to all those caught up in their 'teething troubles'. They should, as a minimum, put up in-store customer notices to inform those who've fallen foul of this and demand that ECP stops issuing penalties on their customers while these problems exist.

Better still, they should frack ECP off from the premises, as the last thing customer-facing organisations (especially those with current profits problems) need is some outfit stealing £100 a throw from customers' pockets that will definitely not find its way into the shop till.

Another retailer sucked in by a suit from a PPC! Mugs!

Northlakes

A correspondent to our local newspaper reported that only on one occasion in five did the ANPR read the number plate correctly.

The Sainsbury's supermarket recently installed a ANPR system which displays to the entering motorist their registration number and informs them that they have 3 hours free parking.

A motorist who used this car park regularly recorded the registration on each visit. Even though he had a valid registration plate that complied with the MOT, the system had only a 20% success rate in capturing the correct number.

It doesn't seem fair (or legal) that a PCN should be issued when the system is clearly faulty. The OP has done the correct thing in tackling the supermarket head-on and getting the PCN cancelled. A PPC is only interested in the money and leaving Sainbury's supermarket in the invidious situation of defending the indefensible.

trisontana

In the last few months I have had problems with ANPR cameras not doing their jobs properly. In both cases they were at airport car-parks where I had prepaid for parking. The first was at Birmingham airport with NCP, and the second was at Luton with Apcoa.

When you turn up at the car park you are issued a ticket. When you leave you just put that ticket in the machine, the cameras capture your number plate, the system flags up that you have prepaid and it opens the barrier.

That's the theory, but in both of those cases when I put my ticket into the machine I was presented with a bill of over £100 pounds. This was because the cameras had not recognized my number plate and thought I hadn't paid. Luckily there was a human-being I could talk to via an intercom who pulled up my booking and opened the barrier for me. So much for the infallibility of ANPR systems.

rossyg123

Got a very quick email response (very next day!!)from ECP to say they had cancelled the PCN but no real apology (quoted 93% reliability of system, etc...in other words not their fault). I did respond asking, if it was so reliable then why did it miss my number plate twice in one day? Surprisingly I got no reply to that:)


I also got independent confirmation from the manager at Sainsbury that the PCN was cancelled. Will be keeping both confirmations in case this rears it ugly head again in the near future.


I wonder if ECP would have responded so quickly if Sainsbury had not got in touch with them?


Many thanks for all the responses to my issue. Really appreciated.