Apcoa PCN

ncoates

Hi
I have received a PCN from Apcoa at Birmingham airport, I was using a hired van at the time and the hire company seem to have passed my details to Apcoa.
Could you please tell me if this is safe to ignore or do I need to appeal?
I can post more details here as needed, please just tell me what is necessary.
I have read a lot of threads on this but i'm just not sure what the current stance is?

Regards
Neil

fisherjim

The current stance is all contained in the Newbies thread on page one of this forum, you should not ignore!

pogofish

The Newbies Sticky contains all the current and up to date info.

If you are reading ignore, you are looking at old/outdated threads as the law changed over two years ago in England and Wales.

bazster

And now for the facts:

APCOA's airport sites (Luton and Birmingham) are not "relevant land" for the purposes of POFA 2012 Schedule 4, therefore the vehicle keeper cannot be held liable for parking charges. Indeed, if you carefully read the weasel words you have received you will find that it merely "invites" the keeper to pay, it does not say that the keeper is liable.

Accordingly fake fines at these sites are no different to how they were before POFA 2012 was enacted.

Furthermore (assuming this is a normal "stopping on the road" fake fine), your vehicle was never actually parked, which is another reason why POFA 2012 Schedule 4 doesn't apply and there is no keeper liability.

What has changed is that PoPLA now exists, so if you appeal this fake fine using the advice from this forum you will win, which has the benefits of (i) stopping you receiving silly debt collector letters for months and (ii) costing APCOA the £27 PoPLA fee.

But whatever you do or don't do, there is no need to pay this, just don't reveal who was driving at the time.

hoohoo

Also, the signage at Birmingham is particularly bad, does not mention APCOA by name, and therefore you cannot possibly have entered into a contract with them. It would be therefore be useful if you could post up a redacted copy of both sides of the NTK to see exactly what they are claiming.

blisteringblue

ncoates wrote: »

I was using a hired van at the time and the hire company seem to have passed my details to Apcoa.

Haven't the Registered Keeper identified them as the driver though, it was a hire van?

bod1467

They've been identified as the hirer; if more than one driver was on the hire agreement then the driver has not been identified.

But if the hirer was the only authorised driver, you are right. That doesn't mean the PCN is valid and needs to be paid though.

bazster

bod1467 wrote: »

They've been identified as the hirer; if more than one driver was on the hire agreement then the driver has not been identified.

Why would the hire company have given APCOA details of the hire agreement? They'd have simply passed on the details of the hirer.

bod1467

I wasn't sure about that, as there is mention (as I recall) either in the BPA CoP or in the BVRLA MoU talking about the hire agreement.

ncoates

Thanks for all your replies, I did look through the Newbies sticky but wasn't sure what was current, ok so don't ignore, thats good, so next step is send a letter to Apcoa I guess...

I did wonder if the hire agreement would make a difference, but there was only one driver/hirer.

Further the photos supplied don't show enough evidence of 'Dropping off/Picking up' as far as i'm concerned.

I will be happy to post a copy of the PCN I received, give me 20mins or so and i'll post it up.

Regards
Neil

Coupon-mad

I would still only appeal as 'hirer' (use the template from the NEWBIES thread) which from the point of view of the POFA, makes you the keeper, and you can then include the appeal wording at POPLA stage, that this isn't relevant land/APCOA have not sent a compliant NTK, so there can be no 'keeper liability' as defined in the POFA. Do not talk about what happened, no 'I did this'!