Civil Enforcement - Advice Welcomed

OAP_Hampshire

In November I received a Parking Charge Notice from Civil Enforcement Ltd "Payment not made in accordance with terms displayed on signage" on 14th November at Rear of 1-14 The Parade, Frimley High Street (Surrey).


In 29th November (after a false start due to their confusing website) I sent the following email to their appeals dept., which explains what happened:-


I was expecting to hear from someone about this! I just did not know WHO to contact. I’ll explain what happened:-


"I parked in this unfamiliar car park for an appointment at Lloyds Bank in the High Street. I looked around for a parking meter, eventually saw one and looked at the charges. I thought I might be about 2 hours so I started putting my money in but it came straight back. Only then did I see a little keyboard and something about typing in my registration number, which I did, and a ticket was issued. I saw that I didn’t need to display it in my car so put it in my purse.


I am nearly 66 years old and probably not as bright as I once was, but I had heard from my daughter that the Camberley town centre car park (local) was now requiring that the car registration number be input into the meter so I wasn’t as fazed as I might have been, believing that I would be charged for the length of my stay upon my exit from the car park. When I returned from my gruelling appointment with the bank manager, I went with the ticket to the machine, and went to post it into a slot to be told how much I had to pay (like I am familiar with in the car park at Frimley Park Hospital, nearby) but I couldn’t find a ticket receiving slot anywhere! It was now dusk, I looked again at the machine for instructions but could only see those I saw in the first place about putting in my reg no. There was no-one around to ask for assistance and I didn’t know what to do! Then I thought that there would be probably be a barrier when exiting the car park into which I would put the ticket and be charged for my length of stay .... but there wasn’t!


So, knowing that I would easily be traced by my car registration number I kept the ticket so that when I was contacted I could explain what a muddle I had inadvertently got into and pay what I owe for 1 and a half hours parking. The ticket was issued at 15:03 (showing how long I fiddled about trying to make sense of the thing) and has a time in bold of 15:23 near the top (this I don’t understand). Paid £0.00 (As mentioned, I had tried to pay but the money was returned, and as soon as I typed in my car reg no. the ticket was issued). If you would like to see this ticket, do please let me know.


I am a law-abiding citizen and tried to pay for my parking as explained above, but even if I was dishonest enough to try to “get away” without paying my parking charges (I had made sure I had enough change in my purse to pay for it at the time) , I am not so daft that I would have thought that I would “get away with it” when I had entered my car registration number. Modern technology however does sometimes bamboozle me when I have to apply it myself as in this case, and I still have absolutely no idea what should have been the correct procedure to pay for my parking, because I found it impossible!


I will gladly pay what is owing for just over 1 and a half hours stay, as I tried to do twice on the day; please let me know what it is and I will send it at once. And, if it is not too much trouble, I would be glad if you could explain exactly how I should have paid for my parking at the time, should I come across a similar situation again. It would be very helpful if car park owners could explain this clearly on their parking meters – I did my very best but was defeated.


Thank you for your patience in reading this, for your understanding and your advice"


I received a letter from Civil Enforcement dated 11th December, which (since I have visited your site) I recognise as their standard refusal letter, tweaked in one place in which they say I "claimed that the payment machine was out of order" , which I didn't actually say as you can see.


I am inclined to copy my original email as above to POPLA, also pointing out that I was hardly depriving anyone of "valuable space" as the car park was only about a fifth occupied (and now I know why!), that I still have the ticket which was issued as soon as I entered my car reg no. which they can see if they want to, etc etc etc. I am determined to fight as I tried to pay several times and have offered to pay what I owe for parking there for 1 and a half hours.


Shall I go ahead?

bluetoffee1878

The first thing is to make sure you do not lose the opportunity to use your POPLA code, there is a time limit so don't hang around too long.
The second thing is read the Newbies thread post #3 http://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/showpost.php?p=64350585&postcount=3
This will explain how you will win at POPLA.
I'm sure one of the regulars will be along with more thorough advice than mine but read up while you're waiting for more replies.
Third thing is forget mitigating circumstances, never used the car park before, don't understand the technology etc POPLA are not interested in this. So follow the advice on the Newbie thread above and from the regulars who I'm sure will be along soon.

Umkomaas

You've outed yourself as the driver, so you can't rely on no keeper liability. But no GPEOL, poor signage, no locus, etc will be good enough to win this.

Read through post #3 of the NEWBIES sticky - you will find a current CEL POPLA appeal example. Go through it in the context of your circumstances on the day and tweak it to suit.

Leave out the Keeper Liability section, forget any 'story' about being law abiding or a person of a certain age, then post up your draft here and we'll help you to fine tune it, to a point where you will win at POPLA.

Whatever you do DO NOT MISS THE POPLA DEADLINE, or you'll be faced with up to 6 years facing the possibility that CEL will issue court papers. They're certainly doing that at the moment - writ large!

OAP_Hampshire

Thank you both. I have looked up my POPLA code and it runs out on January 8th, so I have some time.


Please forgive me but I have clicked on loads of links and found several templates of POPLA appeals, but they go into complicities of legal-speak which I can't begin to understand, never mind defend if I am challenged to.


It never was my intention to contest that I was the driver, as I was and I don't tell lies. Basically, all I ever wanted to do was to pay for my 1 and a half hours stay at this scruffy bit of ground, designated as a car park from signs on Frimley High Street. And I still am willing to send to CEL or whoever £2.50 or whatever reasonable charge for my stay, as stated initially.


Yes I am old and sometimes find modern technology confusing although I try my best, as I did in this car park which I wish I'd never entered, and never will again.


Are CEL and POPLA just crooks?

hoohoo

CEL have some interesting business practices, but have not yet been convicted of crookery, or even vexatious litigation.

POPLA are not crooks, although their admin people have been to the computer-says-no school of training and are unable to deal with anything remotely out of the ordinary.

My personal favorite is to keep these appeals short.

I wish to appeal as keeper on the following grounds.
1) The charge is for breach of contract but is not a genuine pre-estimate of loss. The average cost across the industry for dealing with a parking ticket is £20. The charge is therefore a penalty, and unenforceable
2) There was no contract with the motorist. For a contract to exists, the signage must be plentiful, easy to understand and unambiguous. it was not
3) There was no contract between landowner and operator which allows then to issue parking charges. Given the large number of operators operating without a valid contract, including the recent case of Vehicle Control Services operating in an Excel car park, it is reasonable to assume the majority of operators do not have correct contract in place. Other documented instance of operators operating without a correct contract include ParkingEye, Devere, District Enforcement, JAS, CEL and Highview Parking. In the past, CEL have often issued landowner witness statements to POPLA which were signed by Ashley Cohen of CEL, rather than the landowner, and which therefore have no legitimacy. There is therefore reasonable doubt the a valid contract exists.

hoohoo

http://forums.pepipoo.com/index.php?showtopic=95183&st=40&start=40

Oops, almost forgot APCOA

Coupon-mad

OAP_Hampshire wrote: »

It never was my intention to contest that I was the driver, as I was and I don't tell lies. Basically, all I ever wanted to do was to pay for my 1 and a half hours stay at this scruffy bit of ground, designated as a car park from signs on Frimley High Street. And I still am willing to send to CEL or whoever £2.50 or whatever reasonable charge for my stay, as stated initially.

You won't be able to, and if you repeated the email you first sent, but now to POPLA, you would lose. That's why we are saying use the Civil Enforcement example POPLA appeal in the NEWBIES thread post #3, or use hoohoo's shorter one; it has the necessary magic words.

Are CEL and POPLA just crooks?

The entire 'industry' (and I use that word very loosely) are rotten apples IMHO, many are ex-clampers and CEL's claim to fame is they are suing Co-op customers all over the Country right now and pretending they can increase the 'penalty' to £300-£400 (they cannot) and that any defendant who defends is 'unreasonable'! Oh, and they try to trick defendants into not turning up (which would hand CEL a default win) in court, by phoning them and saying the hearing is off:

http://parking-prankster.blogspot.co.uk/2014/12/civil-enforcement-limited-try-again-to.html

That is who you are dealing with, as far as CEL are concerned. POPLA is reasonably OK and better than its rival, but you must have the right wording which is what we are at pains to ensure you do include. It isn't about telling lies (most of us are law-abiding middle aged people as well you know!) but it is certainly NOT about telling POPLA what happened. That will lose.

The_Deep

A film company is interested in doing an expose on CEL, read the comment below the blog.

http://parking-prankster.blogspot.co.uk/search?updated-min=2014-01-01T00:00:00-08:00&updated-max=2015-01-01T00:00:00-08:00&max-results=50

The_Deep

They hace chickened again

http://forums.pepipoo.com/index.php?showtopic=92019

Coupon-mad

DP, the comment on the blog doesn't show with that view, so here it is:


From the CEL at Whitby Co-op Car Park Protest Page
- https://www.facebook.com/CelAtCoOpCarParkWhitby

"A TV company has been in touch, wants to contact people who have an ongoing issue with CEL, either Currently in Court action or fielding Debt Collection mail. This is a chance to try to get even - they need exposing.
So if that's you, get in touch with Latisha:-
"I work for a TV production company called Century Films. We made the BBC Documentary series- Parking Mad. We're now making a parking series for ITV and I'd love to get in touch with you about our programme. If you were able to email me with your contact details so that I can contact you - I'd really appreciate it: latisha.ma@centuryfilmsltd.com . I hope to hear from you, Latisha"

OAP_Hampshire

I have sent my appeal to POPLA - they are now on a fortnight's break so I'll have to wait and see.


Depending on what I hear, I was in the worst case intending to go to the local press. But thank you, The Deep, the TV exposure is an interesting option.