MET Parking at McDonalds

Umkomaas

Big_Ells wrote: »

My appeal deadline was the beginning of the month, but once a POPLA appeal is open you have 28 days, that would make today the final day.

Yea I have submitted my POPLA appeal and Met have responded quoting Beavis.

I need to reply tonight if I want to add anything

I'm not sure where you're getting the 28 days from? You have 28 days in which to lodge your POPLA appeal calculated from the date of the rejection letter containing your POPLA code from the PPC. You say you've done that, so that's the 28days scenario taken care of.

Once submitted within that timeframe POPLA will give you an estimate date by when you can expect a decision. During that time the PPC is invited to put together an evidence pack which is submitted to POPLA and to you (which I guess is what you've received).

That evidence pack is open to rebuttal by you to POPLA, but you don't get a 'submit by' official deadline, but you need to aim to return it by the estimated date POPLA has given you by when their decision will be announced.

Big_Ells

Umkomaas wrote: »

I'm not sure where you're getting the 28 days from? You have 28 days in which to lodge your POPLA appeal calculated from the date of the rejection letter containing your POPLA code from the PPC. You say you've done that, so that's the 28days scenario taken care of.

Once submitted within that timeframe POPLA will give you an estimate date by when you can expect a decision. During that time the PPC is invited to put together an evidence pack which is submitted to POPLA and to you (which I guess is what you've received).

That evidence pack is open to rebuttal by you to POPLA, but you don't get a 'submit by' official deadline, but you need to aim to return it by the estimated date POPLA has given you by when their decision will be announced.

I thought I had 28 days to replay after that its up to them to decide, it seemed strange that Met replied dead on 28 days.

Just read the first response from POPLA I have until the 28th July

Umkomaas

Here's an excellent example of how one poster dealt effectively and comprehensively with a PPC's Evidence Pack. I'm sure this will give you plenty of ideas on how to handle your case.

https://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/discussion/comment/67385911#Comment_67385911

And another one to consider.

http://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/showpost.php?p=67402366&postcount=26

Big_Ells

MET's case is mostly pictures of signs.

I have drafted my response, I would appreciate any input:

Dear Sirs

Ref. POPLA appeal xxxxxxxxxx

In response to the "evidence pack" MET Parking Services Ltd have submitted:
MET Parking Services Ltd Have submitted a 51 page ‘evidence’ pack in support of their speculative and disputed invoice. I do not intend to address each and every point they have raised in detail as their submission is clearly a quickly hashed template, much of which is repetitive or indeed irrelevant to the matter at hand.

In making their assessment I ask the POPLA assessor to consider the following in further support of my original POPLA appeal as submitted on 23/06/2015.


MET Parking Service State;

“There are significant costs incurred in enforcing the terms and conditions of parking at this location, these include both the cost of issuing the charge notice and handling the appeal made by the motorist, however, to list them in detail would not necessarily be relevant as the greatest potential cost to MET Parking would arise from failing to perform its duties in enforcing the terms and conditions of use of the car park which could lead to termination of the contract with our client with consequential financial loss and damage to our commercial reputation.”


To respond;

The Department for Transport guidelines state that:

"Charges for breaking a parking contract must be reasonable and a genuine pre-estimate of loss. This means charges must compensate the landholder only for the loss they are likely to suffer because the parking contract has been broken. Charges may not be set at higher levels than necessary to recover business losses and the intention should not be to penalise the driver."

I would conclude that Costs of Issuing the Notice, postage of Notice to Keeper, and Final Notice to Keeper, Admin and Man Hours are all business losses that Met Parking Service are trying to recover.

Applying a figure to MET Parking "potential cost" is unsubstantiated as it is unquantifiable. How can you apply a cost to an "appeal made by a motorist" that has not happened and I would suspect never do due to the threatening nature of these invoices.

Equally, there has been several invitations for Met Parking Service to break-down their cost to highlight exactly which losses they have allegedly suffered. The vagaries of MET Parking Service's response to this highlights that there is, in fact, no justification in a £100 or even a £50 charge for the alleged offence.


MET Parking Service State;

“MET Parking Services Ltd are contracted by McDonald’s to ensure adherence to the terms and conditions of the car park. Our interest in the land arises from our obligation to perform our contractual duties by ensuring provision can be made for motorists to park and facilitate motorists to use the client’s premises.”



To respond;

On further discussion with McDonald’s UK they have no time limit that customers can spend in their restaurant. As long as they are making purchases of food or drink and not causing a nuisance they are welcome to stay. By setting a time limit MET Parking Service are therefore limiting the time a customer can spend in their restaurant and are causing financial loss to the landowner.


MET Parking Service State;

“The parking charge notice was issued as the vehicle exceeded the maximum permitted stay in the car park. We assume that Mr ******** has copied this appeal from the internet as we have never stated in any of our correspondence shown in Section E that the parking charge notice was issued for the vehicle’s driver not being on the premises whilst the vehicle was parked in the car park. Please see Section F for evidence that the vehicle exceeded the maximum permitted stay in the car park.”


To respond;

As the driver was on the premises, unless you can prove otherwise, and using the restaurant there is no financial loss to the landowner thus you invoice is totally unwarranted. These invoices are to stop loss to the landowner of which there is none.

Also that it would be foolhardy of me to ignore and not research the matter as fully as possible using the internet. This is clearly what it is there to be used for. To this end the 'Findlaw' website suggests the following "Just as you would seek advice when going to court, you should in most cases seek advice when choosing and pursuing ADR." - Which is exactly what I have done.


MET Parking service have also quoted the case of ParkingEye v Beavis. As this is an ongoing case I would suggest that every reference to the case be ignored or consider that the charge is unconscionable and extravagant and unrelated to local Penalty Charge levels in this area. It is believed that the Supreme Court’s decision in ParkingEye v Beavis will have an impact on the outcome of this POPLA appeal. If the operator does not cancel this charge and/or if there is no other ground upon which the appeal can be determined, I ask that my appeal is adjourned pending the Beavis case.

Big_Ells

Any thoughts?

The_Deep

If MacD says that customers are welcome to stay as long as they like if the are eating, then the Commercial Justification argument used in Beavis goes out of the window.

Big_Ells

My issue with that is I don't have it in writing. My local McD's manager told me that this morning.

The_Deep

Good enough, it makes perfect sense. Find out his name, and put it in your defence.

Big_Ells

Will do. Is the rest ok? Does it make sense? I'm not 100% my wording is ok on th final paragraph.

Guys_Dad

http://www.mcdonalds.co.uk/ukhome/whatmakesmcdonalds/questions/running-the-business/parking/why-does-mcdonalds-have-parking-restrictions-in-some-restaurants.html

Is this of any help?

I would write to McDonald's asking why they don't have the bit about registering your car with the management clearly displayed in their restaurants.