UKPC parking 'Charge' Northern Ireland

stivanii

Hi was hoping for a bit of advice on a UKPC parking fine i received today at the Boucher retail park in Belfast. Basically i entered a small car park where there were a few free spaces at the end but a car was blocking my path so i pulled into the end of the row where there wasn't a marked space but yet there was enough space for another 2-3 cars to park. So i wasn't blocking anyone or creating an obstruction.

I waited 5-10 minutes for the car to move in the mean time another car pulled in beside me presumably to also wait, the car creating the obstruction didn't look like it was moving any time soon so i left the car as i was just popping into a shop right beside where i was parked.

Came back 5 minutes later to be greeted by a fine on my windscreen. When i seen it i was tciked off and expected a £14-15 fine (never received a parking fine before) but it was a £60 :mad: fine rising to £100. For a free car park thats ridiculous how can they justify that?

What i would appreciate is some information on whether this is actually enforceable or not? As i would be loathed to pay that much for a fine i feel i didn't deserve. I could understand if i had blocked someone in or was creating an obstruction but i wasn't doing either.

Any help would be appreciated.

pogofish

You need to read the Newbie Sticky - paying particular attention to the advice for Scotland and NI.

There is no keeper liability in Scotland and NI, so your best course of action is to ignore them completely as they can only pursue the driver and if you don't identify them, there is little they can do about it. Expect some ever more hysterical letters from UKPC and their toothless debt collector.

Not that there is much chance of UKPC going the distance after their recent chickening-out of court cases in Scotland, even with identified drivers.

Coupon-mad

Search the forum for Boucher or Belfast as a keyword, and ignore it completely. If you pay you've been mugged.

stivanii

Hi thanks for the replies guys, i did read the newbies sticky just wanted to make sure though in case things had changed.

I forgot to mention that it is a Motability car, does that make any difference? Could they contact Motability to get my details?

The car has two registered drivers neither of which are the keeper of the car. So i guess they would still have problems proving who was actually driving. Am i right?

Coupon-mad

You are right - and they can only get the registered keeper's data. They won't write to Motability.

stivanii

Thought so thanks for confirming my theory. I will just ignore them then.

SevenTowers

They won't bother contacting motability as the DVLNI will hand over the registered keeper's address for the princely sum of £2.50.

Whatever you do, DON'T CONTACT UKPC in any way, just ignore everything from them, Debt Recovery Plus, Zenith Collections and especially Small Claims Solictors.

The current UKPC letter chain in NI is as follows, my interpretation of UKPC rationale in blue:-

1. Ticket on the car demanding £100 for "contravening" some fabricated rule, generously discounted to £60 if you cough up in 14 days. [Let's hope the driver is daft enough to fall for our efforts to imitate a real DRD Roads Service PCN (Penalty Charge Notice), we'll call ours a PCN too (Parking Charge Notice), crafty huh? ;-) hopefully the driver won't notice and will cough up right away. Even if the driver doesn't give us their dosh immediately, with a bit of luck they will use our sham appeals system to provide us with their name and address and save us £2.50 in DVLNI fees and an opportunity to send out another lovely appeal rejection as well as incriminating themselves as being the driver. Rupert will be pleased! (Rupert is our boss and owner of UKPC, a delightful gentleman, not weasily in the least) ]

1a. Letter from UKPC rejecting the appeal (optional - only if the driver was duped into "appealing") [We'll say the appeal was personally reviewed (yeah, rite!) but is of course rejected. Let's pretend that our parking charges are fully backed by the law and the courts, even though we wouldn't dare chance having our dodgy business model exposed in court. Lets try to sound kosher by saying that we do what our trade association, the ever so independent and respectable BPA Ltd., tells us to do. As this punter has appealed we're going to have to show we're really nice by extending our "discount" period and demanding only £60 ......... We are such a considerate company!]

2. Official looking letter from UKPC demanding £100, too late for the "early pay discount" to £60. [Well if the ticket didn't fool the driver into paying, hopefully this should do the trick, let's spell out that a government agency handed us their name and address coz we had "reasonable cause", that'll make us look legit. We'll try putting them under pressure by saying we'll add more costs if they don't pay pronto. If we can scare some money out of the plonker at this stage we'll get a ton out of them and not a measily sixty quid, Ker-ching! Another contribution to the Rupert Williams new Aston Martin appeal :-) ]

3. "Final Reminder" from UKPC still demanding £100. [Hmmm, this driver's not going to be hoodwinked quite so easily, let's ramp up the pressure by using our, wait for it,.........red ink cartridge! In fact, let's really ratchet up the pressure by using our red ink cartridge, in bold, and large font! (How scary does that look!) Just for good measure let's slip in a mention of courts, Enforcement of Judgements and CCJs - even though UKPC has never got a CCJ against anyone - that should put the willies up em! Everyone wants a good credit rating, so let's mention that too, even though we know that nothing short of a CCJ not being paid in time could have the slightest effect on the credit rating of this "customer". Don't worry Rupert, we have a few tricks up our sleeves yet, go ahead and pick out your new Aston.]


4. Letter from Debt Recovery Plus demanding £160. [OK, the red ink, mention of courts and credit ratings still didn't fool the driver, let's pretend this is actually a real debt that we have passed on to another company, hopefully the driver won't go to those pesky forums to find out the truth - that a so called [/COLOR][COLOR=blue][COLOR=blue]"debt recovery agency" has just about the same powers as a travel agency.[/COLOR] We'll even write in big bold letters "Notice of Intended Court Action" (yeah, rite! like that's ever gonna happen in N.Ireland! lol!) We'll hike the amount we're demanding up to £160, that'll really put the thumbscrews on the driver, hehe! Actually Rupert, hang fire on selecting the new Aston, this client is being a bit troublesome.]

5. Letter from Debt Recovery Plus - reduced payment offer £128 [Oh dear, this is not looking good, the driver hasn't been taken in by any of our posturing so far, let's try being nice and say that we'll take a little less money from them to make this go away, but we still want to look tough so we'll say we're only doing this to conform to court protocol. We'll tell the driver that if they don't accept our lovely offer then we'll rack the cost back up to £160 even though we intend to do the exact opposite and half it to £80. Let's throw in a mention of court fees and solicitors cost - if that doesn't scare em nothing will! Rupert, I know this is not what you want to hear, but you might just have to drive your current Aston for another year.]

6. Letter from Zenith Collections - further reduced offer £80 [Oh dear, Oh dear, Oh dear, this motorist has obviously read the forums. All our red ink, bold lettering and empty threats of additional fees and court actions haven't scared this geezer into handing their lovely dosh over to us. Let's send the letter from the next desk down in the office but make it look like it's from a different company altogether, we'll write "Without Prejudice" at the top, that'll make it sound legalistic. As we've just reduced the amount we're demanding, there's no point in threatening escalating fees, it obvious by now that the punter isn't buying our BS. Rupert isnt going to like this, he isn't going to like this one little bit.]

7. Another letter from Zenith collections, final extension of the £80 offer. [Oh B@££@#K$!! This guy isn't your average mug. Let's give it one last roll of the dice and try being extra-friendly by making a final final final offer of £80 for yet another 7 days. Let's pretend that Zenith actually have a "legal department" (I know ROFL!) and could ever take a court claim for a non existant debt. Even though it doesn't look like this customer believes a single word of the nonsense we're spouting, we have a full page to fill so let's throw in another mention of court fees and solicitor's costs. Honestly, some motorists have no consideration for UKPC at all, Rupert is now going to be seen driving last year's model of Aston Martin, how humiliating!]


8. Letter from .......... well, nobody at all [Sod that for a game of soldiers, we've wasted a parking ticket, £2.50 to DVLNI, 7 scary letters, 7 second class stamps and 7 envelopes on this punter and he/she still won't hand us over some lovely mullah, it's like trying to get blood out of a stone. This driver is obviously wise to us, time to cut our losses and run. Let's hope our next victim isn't as clued up, who's going to break the bad news to Rupert?]

9. Letter from Small Claims Solictors demanding £160 [Rupert is really !!!!!! off, he's seen the new Aston Martin in the showroom and he says he can't stand the humiliation of driving last year's model any longer so we've got to try harder to scare money out of victims who have been smart enough to ignore us.
Well guess what? We've thought of a brand new wheeze, we're getting together with our mates at LPC Law, and for a few quid, they're gonna let us use their headed notepaper under the name "Small Claims Solictors". Of course there's no such company and LPC are making us do all the work while they skim off some of the takings just for letting us use their trading name, but when the "ignorers" get a letter with the scary "S" word at the top of it, they're really gonna brick it hehe! With a bit of luck they'll be suckered into believing we're serious, we've even got the LPC law guys to make a website that looks very legalistic and scary - brilliant huh? We'll make sure to put the website address prominently at the top of every letter and hope the victims check it out, that'll make them think we're legit and we mean it lol!
And are we serious? You ought to know better than that! Of course we're not serious, this is all just more bluff, bluster and hot air. We're really hoping that they've forgotten to check out the forums that show we've never taken anybody to court, anywhere in the UK.
And of course we can't be bothered actually checking out legal stuff in N. Ireland, so we just hope that the punters don't realise that there is no such thing as a CCJ, Bailiffs or High Court Enforcement Officers in NI. Anyway, decree and enforcements of judgements office don't sound as scary as CCJs and Bailiffs, and the Belfast enforcement of judgements office has never had its own reality tv show - how's that gonna scare money out of our prospective "customers"?!?!]

10. Back to 8. again [Except add another wasted letter, envelope, second class stamp, and oh, the LPC commision..... Rupert, if you can get blood out of a stone you're welcome to it, I'm off to get a job in an ordinary decent company that has some ethical standards]

Fruitcake

Seven Towers, that did make me laugh. :T:rotfl:

stivanii

Thanks for the info Seven Towers, gave me a laugh cheers.

SevenTowers wrote: »

Whatever you do, DON'T CONTACT UKPC in any way, just ignore everything from them, Debt Recovery + and Zenith Collections.

No have done a bit of reading this evening of other threads and definitely won't be contacting them.

Was reading over the notice and i had to laugh at the £1:50 charge to pay by debit card haha. The cheek of them you would think if they managed to con someone into actually paying they would just be happy to get a payment but to charge more on top to pay by card takes some brass neck.

There isn't even a postage paid envelope to post the payment to them, tight gits. You would have to buy the stamp yourself lol

I had an idea this sort of nonsense wouldn't be enforceable so im glad i came here first before even thinking about contacting them, appreciate the help everyone has given me.

Cheers

Coupon-mad

Charging extra for credit card payments is also now illegal under the new EU Directive/Consumer Rights Regulations re Additional Payments.

SevenTowers

stivanii wrote: »

Was reading over the notice and i had to laugh at the £1:50 charge to pay by debit card haha. The cheek of them you would think if they managed to con someone into actually paying they would just be happy to get a payment but to charge more on top to pay by card takes some brass neck.

There isn't even a postage paid envelope to post the payment to them, tight gits. You would have to buy the stamp yourself lol

[We've got a live one here, they've swallowed the bait, hook, line and sinker, let's screw the last few pennies that we can out of them.]

stivanii wrote: »

I had an idea this sort of nonsense wouldn't be enforceable so im glad i came here first before even thinking about contacting them, appreciate the help everyone has given me.

Happy to help, knowing that we've saved another victim from UKPC is all the thanks that's needed. Be sure to spread the word about the great parking scam to your friends family and colleagues.