Appealed to PE, Rejection of Invalid invoice & NO POPLA CODE

Pmanesh

Umkomaas wrote: »

Well either it was or it wasn't - have you just copied this appeal and not adapted it to your actual parking incident?

Thanks so much for your time, ill make the amendment now and resend it to the thread.
I added this sentence myself as this is actually the case, I had a blue badge holder with me.
I will make the other changes and resend
thanks Umkomaas

Pmanesh

After @Umkomaas kind reply,
I appreciate everybody's patience.
I have looked at a more recent post in the POPLA DECISIONS thread and amended my letter as below:

Re: ParkingEye PCN, reference code xxxxxxxx
POPLA Code:

I am the registered keeper and I wish to appeal a recent parking charge from Parking Eye. I submit the points below to show that I am not liable for the parking charge:

1) No genuine pre-estimate of loss
2) No standing or authority to pursue charges nor form contracts with drivers
3) The signage was not readable
4) The ANPR system is unreliable and neither synchronised nor accurate

1) No genuine pre-estimate of loss
The Amount of £70 demanded by Parking Eye is not a genuine pre-estimate of loss. The estimate must be based upon loss following from a breach of the parking terms. This might be, for example, loss of parking revenue or even loss of retail revenue at a shopping centre. As this is a free car park there can be no losses incurred from onsite parking charges and as the car park was mostly empty, no loss of retail revenue. I request Parking Eye to provide a full breakdown of how these costs are calculated, all these costs must represent a loss resulting from the alleged breach and the pre-estimate of loss must add up to the amount demanded of £100.

As in previous cases the parking company has included day to day running costs of the business (for example Wages, Uniforms, Signage erection, Installation of ANPR cameras, Office Costs, Maintenance Costs) these would have occurred had there been a breach or not and therefore may not be included in this pre-estimate of loss.

Given that Parking Eye charge the same lump sum for a 25 minute overstay as they would for 250 minutes, and the same fixed charge applies to any alleged contravention (whether serious/damaging, or trifling as in my case), it is clear there has been no regard paid to establishing that this charge is a genuine pre-estimate of loss.

The Office of Fair Trading has stated to the BPA Ltd that a 'parking charge' is not automatically recoverable simply because it is stated to be a parking charge, as it cannot be used to state a loss where none exists. And the BPA Code of Practice states that a charge for breach must wholly represent a genuine pre-estimate of loss flowing from the parking event.

2) No standing or authority to pursue charges nor form contracts with drivers

I believe that this Operator has no proprietary interest in the land, so they have no standing to make contracts with drivers in their own right, nor to pursue charges for breach in their own name. In the absence of such title, ParkingEye must have assignment of rights from the landowner to pursue charges for breach in their own right, including at court level. This has not been produced by the operator in their rejection statement so I have no proof that such a document is in existence. I contend that ParkingEye merely hold a bare licence to supply and maintain (non compliant) signs and to post out 'tickets' as a deterrent. A commercial site agent for the true landholder has no automatic standing nor authority in their own right which would meet the strict requirements of section 7 of the BPA Code of Practice.
I therefore put ParkingEye to strict proof to provide POPLA and myself with an unredacted, contemporaneous copy of the contract between ParkingEye and the landowner. This is required so that POPLA and myself can check that it allows this Operator to make contracts with drivers themselves and provides them with full authority to pursue charges, including a right to pursue them in court in their own name. Please note that a witness statement to the effect that a contract is in place will not be sufficient to provide sufficient detail of the contract terms (such as revenue sharing, genuine intentions of these restrictions and charges, set amounts to charge for each stated contravention, etc.). In any case, ParkingEye's witness statements have been exposed as photocopy templates from clients who may well have no knowledge of any individual parking event and the signatory may never even have seen the contract.
The BPA code of practice contains the following:
7 Written authorisation of the landowner
7.1 If you do not own the land on which you are carrying out parking management, you must have the written authorisation of the landowner (or their appointed agent) before you can start operating on the land in question. The authorisation must give you the authority to carry out all aspects of the management and enforcement of the site that you are responsible for. In particular, it must say that the landowner requires you to keep to the Code of Practice, and that you have the authority to pursue outstanding parking charges , through the courts if necessary.

3) The signage was not readable

The BPA Code of Practice states at 18.1: “You must use signs to make it easy for them to find out what your terms and conditions are.”
At 18.3 it states: “Specific parking terms signage tells drivers what your terms and conditions are, including your parking charges. You must place signs containing the specific parking terms throughout the site, so that drivers are given the chance to read them at the time of parking or leaving.”
The BPA Code of Practice further states under appendix B, entrance signage: “The sign must be readable from far enough away so that drivers can take in all the essential text without needing to look more than 10 degrees away from the road ahead.”
The signs are small, unclear and mostly located well above head height . There is a large amount of small print at the bottom of the signs which is a struggle to read, even when standing directly in front of them.
The vehicle was parking in a Disabled bay with a blue badge clearly displayed, with no clear readable parking signage any where near the disabled bay.


4) The ANPR system is unreliable and neither synchronised nor accurate

If ParkingEye's ANPR records are completely reliable (which I contest) then this Operator claims the car was parked for around 30 minutes. And yet their evidence shows no parking time, merely photos of a car driving in and out. It is unreasonable for this operator to record the start of 'parking time' as the moment of arrival in moving traffic if it is at the time of parking that the clock should start. The exit photo is not evidence of 'parking time' at all.
This Operator is obliged to ensure their ANPR equipment is maintained as described in paragraph 21.3 of the BPA Code of Practice and to have signs stating how the data will be stored/used. I say that ParkingEye have failed to clearly inform drivers about the cameras and what the data will be used for and how it will be used and stored. If there was such a sign on entry at all then it was not prominent, since the driver did not see it. I have also seen no evidence that they have complied with the other requirements in that section of the code in terms of ANPR logs and maintenance and I put this Operator to strict proof of full ANPR compliance.
In addition I question the entire reliability of the system. I require that ParkingEye present records as to the dates and times of when the cameras at this car park were checked, adjusted, calibrated, synchronised with the timer which stamps the photos and generally maintained to ensure the accuracy of the dates and times of any ANPR images. This is important because the entirety of the charge is founded on two images purporting to show my vehicle entering and exiting at specific times. It is vital that this Operator must produce evidence in response and explain to POPLA how their system differs (if at all) from the flawed ANPR system which was wholly responsible for the court loss recently in ParkingEye v Fox-Jones on 8 Nov 2013. That case was dismissed when the judge said the evidence from ParkingEye was fundamentally flawed because the synchronisation of the camera pictures with the timer had been called into question and the operator could not rebut the point.
So, in addition to showing their maintenance records, I require ParkingEye to show evidence to rebut the following assertion. I suggest that in the case of my vehicle being in this car park, a local camera took the image but a remote server added the time stamp. As the two are disconnected by the internet and do not have a common "time synchronisation system", there is no proof that the time stamp added is actually the exact time of the image. The operator appears to use WIFI which introduces a delay through buffering, so "live" is not really "live". Hence without a synchronised time stamp there is no evidence that the image is ever time stamped with an accurate time. Therefore I contend that this ANPR "evidence" from the cameras in this car park is just as unreliable and unsynchronised as the evidence in the Fox-Jones case. As their whole charge rests upon two timed photos, I put ParkingEye to strict proof to the contrary and to show how these two camera timings are synchronised.

Accordingly, this appeal must be allowed.

Yours faithfully,

Redx

point 1) shows a decision made by a popla assessor, not an appeal by you , in other words its a reply by the assessor to an appeal made by somebody else, it has no relevance to your point 1)

what you need to focus on is the appeal made by the apellant, not the reply and decision by the assessor, so your gpeol section is still flawed

I dont think you have read this through properly, sorry

ColliesCarer

Would suggest you expand on challenge
3) The signage was not readable

3) The signage was not readable - No contract with driver

Include in the point that the signage failed to bring home the terms and conditions of parking so prominently that the driver must have been aware of them and consequently there was no contract formed with the driver, therefore there was no breach of contract.

Pmanesh

Redx wrote: »

point 1) shows a decision made by a popla assessor, not an appeal by you , in other words its a reply by the assessor to an appeal made by somebody else, it has no relevance to your point 1)

what you need to focus on is the appeal made by the apellant, not the reply and decision by the assessor, so your gpeol section is still flawed

I dont think you have read this through properly, sorry

My apologies, does this paragraph for point 1 sound better?

1) No genuine pre-estimate of loss
The Amount of £70 demanded by Parking Eye is not a genuine pre-estimate of loss. The estimate must be based upon loss following from a breach of the parking terms. This might be, for example, loss of parking revenue or even loss of retail revenue at a shopping centre. As this is a free car park there can be no losses incurred from onsite parking charges and as the car park was mostly empty, no loss of retail revenue. I request Parking Eye to provide a full breakdown of how these costs are calculated, all these costs must represent a loss resulting from the alleged breach and the pre-estimate of loss must add up to the amount demanded of £100.

As in previous cases the parking company has included day to day running costs of the business (for example Wages, Uniforms, Signage erection, Installation of ANPR cameras, Office Costs, Maintenance Costs) these would have occurred had there been a breach or not and therefore may not be included in this pre-estimate of loss.

Given that Parking Eye charge the same lump sum for a 25 minute overstay as they would for 250 minutes, and the same fixed charge applies to any alleged contravention (whether serious/damaging, or trifling as in my case), it is clear there has been no regard paid to establishing that this charge is a genuine pre-estimate of loss.

The Office of Fair Trading has stated to the BPA Ltd that a 'parking charge' is not automatically recoverable simply because it is stated to be a parking charge, as it cannot be used to state a loss where none exists. And the BPA Code of Practice states that a charge for breach must wholly represent a genuine pre-estimate of loss flowing from the parking event.

Redx

yes, just add an extra note that any challenge made due to the recent Beavis case decision is countered by the fact that In june 2015 it is expected to be appealed yet again at the Supreme Court and so is disputed

also have a look at the signage issue the last reply mentioned too

if you dont have to appeal to popla just yet (if you have a week or so) then delay until you know the Beavis appeal has been logged (hopefully sometime this week) and amend the section accordingly (the SC appeal challenge is imminent)

Pmanesh

ColliesCarer wrote: »

Would suggest you expand on challenge
3) The signage was not readable

3) The signage was not readable - No contract with driver

Include in the point that the signage failed to bring home the terms and conditions of parking so prominently that the driver must have been aware of them and consequently there was no contract formed with the driver, therefore there was no breach of contract.

Thank you, I have added your point to my 3rd point and changed the title of it.
Is this sufficient now?

3) The signage was not readable - No contract with driver

The BPA Code of Practice states at 18.1: “You must use signs to make it easy for them to find out what your terms and conditions are.”
At 18.3 it states: “Specific parking terms signage tells drivers what your terms and conditions are, including your parking charges. You must place signs containing the specific parking terms throughout the site, so that drivers are given the chance to read them at the time of parking or leaving.”
The BPA Code of Practice further states under appendix B, entrance signage: “The sign must be readable from far enough away so that drivers can take in all the essential text without needing to look more than 10 degrees away from the road ahead.”
The signs are small, unclear and mostly located well above head height . There is a large amount of small print at the bottom of the signs which is a struggle to read, even when standing directly in front of them.
The signage failed to bring home the terms and conditions of parking so prominently that the driver must have been aware of them and consequently there was no contract formed with the driver, therefore there was no breach of contract.
The vehicle was parking in a Disabled bay with a blue badge clearly displayed, with no clear readable parking signage anywhere near the disabled bay.

Pmanesh

Redx wrote: »

yes, just add an extra note that any challenge made due to the recent Beavis case decision is countered by the fact that In june 2015 it is expected to be appealed yet again at the Supreme Court and so is disputed

also have a look at the signage issue the last reply mentioned too

if you dont have to appeal to popla just yet (if you have a week or so) then delay until you know the Beavis appeal has been logged (hopefully sometime this week) and amend the section accordingly (the SC appeal challenge is imminent)

Thank you RedX,
(so sorry for all the questions)
Do I just add " any challenge made due to the recent Beavis case decision is countered by the fact that In june 2015 it is expected to be appealed yet again at the Supreme Court and so is disputed" to my letter?
If yes, where would I add this in my letter?
Where can i find out when the leaves appeal has been logged?
Thanks

Redx

add it under gpeol as an aextra point, or add it as a new point at the bottom, you can have as many points as you like

I assume it will be announced on his Barry Beavistwitter account (google it) , parking pranksters blogs (google it) and on here too , so just keep an eye out for it, its not as if its going to be kept a secret

Pmanesh

Okay thanks so much, I'll keep my eye open for it, i think i have about 18 days still to appeal.