UKPP Newcastle Airport

chippy_76

Hi All,

I've read all the newbie's info and done a lot of searching in these forums and read quite a lot about the UKPP in Newcastle Airport and although I have a ticket that is identical to some of the previous post, they have all been offered POPLA whereas the UKPP won't give me a POPLA code. i apologise profusely if this has been covered somewhere else that I was unable to track down.

To give a brief overview of the ticket, they have a photo of the car briefly (6 seconds) to pickup someone in an area supposedly covered by the No loading / unloading signage.

I used the generic appeals letter and was replied to with the following..

Quote

UK Parking Patrol
Department 309,
Great Northern House,
275 Deansgate
Manchester
M3 4EL
Penalty Charge Number: XXXXXX
Vehicle Registration Number: XXXXXX
Dear Sir/Madam,
Thank you for your email regarding the Penalty Charge Notice issued by us on 29.07.2015.
In response to the points made please be advised that:

The charge is not issued under contract law and is not an attempt to recover damages for breaching a contract. The charge is an alternative to prosecution in the Magistrates Court for breaching the byelaws. As a result of the charge being permitted under the byelaws Genuine Pre-estimate of loss is not a consideration which is relevant.

The land is subject to byelaws, to which we are contracted to enforce. The penalty was issued under these byelaws and not contract law, therefore the Protection of Freedom Act does not apply and the registered keeper is held liable.

We are in possession of a signed agreement with the landowner. We are unable to supply you with a copy of this agreement due to Data Protection but a copy will be produced should the case go to court.

Kind regards
Appeals Dept
UK Parking Patrol

Unquote

I responded asking for POPLA code, and the reply from them was as follows:

Quote
Penalty Charge Number: XXXXXX
Vehicle Registration Number: XXXXXX
Dear Sir/Madam,
Thank you for email regarding the Penalty Charge Notice issued by us on 29.07.2015

Please be advised that the appeal was rejected with the omission of a POPLA code as we have been informed by the BPA as this charge is a penalty issued under byelaws we cannot offer POPLA.

Kind regards
Appeals Dept
UK Parking Patrol

Unquote

Unlike all the other posters who received Popla, I haven't been offered it. Any advice from the guru's?

enfield_freddy

umm this is interesting , no recognised parking company can be a member of an ATA or get info from the BPA unless they offer an independent appeals system


looks like the BPA are jumping in on those airport "stopping" charges.


I think I would play ping pong with this lot by 2nd class post , as the "trespass" charge will have to be laid in front of a court within 6 mths ,


edit: only the landowner or his legal team can bring a charge for trespass , this would be for a nominal fee , less than there solisitors fees (unless they can claim those in court?)


my reply to UKPP would be http://www.nasw.org/users/nbauman/arkell.htm

HO87

There are a number of issues.

1. What is the full legal title of the company that wrote to you? This may appear at the bottom of the letterhead. UK Parking Patrol (not Limited) are not members of the BPA and legally, absent any qualification about being a trading name or style of a limited company or without identifying the full name of the individual who trades under this name then it doesn't exist.

2. UKPP Ltd have claimed in the past to be duly authorised by the airport to enforce byelaws. That may be so but UKPP are not UKPP Ltd.

3. Have UKPP identified exactly which byelaw they allege was breached and if so which one?

4. Stopping to allow passengers to board or alight is not parking.

5. None of the potentially relevant "offences" (to the circumstances outlined by the OP) set out in the version available on the NIA website can be committed by the owner of a vehicle.

6. The only byelaws that can be enforced are ones that are both signed by the airport CEO, bear the common seal of the airport company and have been approved by the Secretary of State (or his nominee). The version on the website has none of those things present and there is no reason to suppose that they ever have.

7. It is no surprise that the purported byelaws provide no power nor mechanism that allows them to require driver details from the registered keeper. Furthermore there is no power whereby they can seek payment of their so-called penalty charge notices from the registered keeper.

8. It would seem that UKPP may themselves be in breach of the byelaws. Based on that it would seem that they may be liable to pay a fine of not more than £1,000 upon summary conviction. With one omission you have all the evidence necessary to secure that conviction based on the correspondence with you to date. What's more if UKPP themselves fail to supply that evidence then they commit a further offence.

Byelaw 11.2 clearly states:

No Airport Official shall exercise any powers under any of these byelaws without producing written evidence of his authority if required to do so.

Byelaw 3.1 provides:

Any person contravening any of the following byelaws or anyone assisting or procuring others to do so shall be liable on summary conviction to a fine which, in respect of a contravention of:

At 3.1.3:

any other byelaw shall not exceed level 3 on the standard scale.[£1,000]

Didn't you ask them to produce a copy of their contract - which is their authorisation? And didn't they refuse?

The offence (at 11.2) may only be committed by an Airport Offical - that is someone authorised by Newcastle International Airport Ltd. If UKPP are not in fact authorised by the Airport then it seems that they may well be committing another offence. Perhaps that set out in s.2 Fraud Act 2006 would fit the bill?

As suggested by Freddy there are plenty of issues here to keep them tied up for months. As he correctly points out proceedings in the Magistrates Court must be issued within six calendar months of them coming to light. There is no such statute of limitation in respect of fraud offences

chippy_76

Hi Enfield Freddy and HO87, thanks for your kind replies.

To further elaborate on the company name, it is in fact "UK Parking Patrol Office Ltd"

The bye-law section that is said to have been contravened is Bye-laws 1315 - Roads surrounding Newcastle Airport, Woolsington - Section 6.3 - Parking in Prohibited Area.

I didn't directly ask for a copy of their contract, the generic appeal point (c) which states "There is no evidence that you have any interest in the land. I will complain to the landowner about your aggressive ticketing." They do write that "We are in possession of a signed agreement with the landowner. We are unable to supply you with a copy of this agreement due to Data Protection but a copy will be produced should the case go to court."

After Enfield Freddy replied, I dropped a short query to the BPA which was as follows:

Quote
Dear Sir, I have been advised by UK Parking Patrol (UKPP) that I cannot appeal for a POPLA code for a penalty notice on Newcastle Airport for loading / unloading. The reason given for no POPLA is, and I quote "Please be advised that the appeal was rejected with the omission of a POPLA code as we have been informed by the BPA as this charge is a penalty issued under byelaws we cannot offer POPLA." unquote. Can you confirm that this is indeed the case that BPA advised this to their members.
Unquote

I got a very quick response back from BPA this morning which was as follows:

Quote
Good morning
At the present time if an area is covered by Byelaws such as Railway premises, the POPLA code does not have to be offered as this area is already regulated. We are hoping this will change in the near future.
Unquote.

Without POPLA, I am unsure as to further course of action. Do I continue to appeal based on the kind information from HO87, point by point each time in a posted letter?

Looking forward to your always helpful information.

enfield_freddy

ok , because of the stupidity of there claim , I posted your link on peppipo , and there have been quite a few comments , most if not all agree with me and HO87 , and some have elaborated on the stupidity and legal aspect


please read http://forums.pepipoo.com/index.php?showtopic=100961


enjoy , and I hope you collect the info you need to fight this scum

Herzlos

chippy_76 wrote: »

UK Parking Patrol
Department 309,
Great Northern House,
275 Deansgate
Manchester
M3 4EL

This was brought up on PPP, but I'm not a member there. That's a MBE (Mailboxes, etc) address - http://www.mbe.co.uk/manchesterdeansgate
i.e. a private PO box. Does correspondence need to go to a real address?

It does highlight the clout this company has i.e. none. Their "office" costs them £27/month.

bod1467

chippy_76 wrote: »

To further elaborate on the company name, it is in fact "UK Parking Patrol Office Ltd".

These people? http://parkingpatrol.co.uk/

enfield_freddy

Herzlos wrote: »

This was brought up on PPP, but I'm not a member there. That's a MBE (Mailboxes, etc) address - http://www.mbe.co.uk/manchesterdeansgate
i.e. a private PO box. Does correspondence need to go to a real address?

It does highlight the clout this company has i.e. none. Their "office" costs them £27/month.

this set of muppets show on there website


"UK Parking Patrol Office Limited are registered in England (company number 07105527)
Registered Office at: 7 Christie Way, Christie Fields, Manchester M21 7QY (not for correspondence)"


so as such , I don't think they are breaking any rules/laws by using a PO box

HO87

Muppets? One of the very basic purposes of a registered office is that mail to it will reach the company. Indeed, it is likely to be the only address to which documents that are required to be legally served will go.

As far as my earlier comments are concerned:

1. The fact remains that stopping for the purposes of allowing a passenger to board is not parking.

The byelaws use 2 separate terms - "parking" and "waiting" - but then does not provide a definition of them. Therefore, in the context of parking enforcement it would be proper to apply otherwise standard definitions as set out - originally - in the Road Traffic Regulation Act 1984 (and carried forward into other legislation such as the Traffic Management Act 2004 and subordinate regulations etc). It is clear from the Act that the terms are synonymous and effectively interchangeable. The OP's vehicle was not "left" and on that basis cannot have been involved in the commission of the offence alleged.

In any event, in applying similar standards there have been cases heard before the TPT who have held that stopping for a short period - 46 seconds in one case - was de minimis and should not properly have been proceeded with.

2. The byelaws simply do not provide a means of enforcing the charge on the registered keeper and unless an unfortunate error has occurred in any of the correspondence and our illustrious PPC are able to infer who the driver was then I would suggest that they are invited to contact the driver.

3. The above presupposes that the byelaws shown on the NIA website have been properly enacted.

There is so much low-hanging fruit in terms of means of repudiating UKPPO's allegations here that it is difficult to know which one to start with but I think overall that 1. above is sufficient.

Much as it might be tempting to use up a rain forest in what is likely to be a pointless and ultimately boring corespondence I think a straightforward legalistic FRO letter might be a better option.

Something along the lines of:

UKPPO Ltd
Whatever Street
Wherever

Dear Sirs

Re: Penalty Charge Notice No XZXZXZXZ

You are referred to the above matter and the previous correspondence. For the avoidance of doubt no admissions are made or will be made and no inferences undue or otherwise should be drawn therefrom.

The above notice alleges that Mr chippy_76 contravened byelaw 6.3 of the Newcastle Airport Byelaws in relation to an incident that occurred on <insert date>. The byelaw in question establishes that to "Wait in, leave or park a vehicle where waiting or parking is prohibited by notice." is an offence. Furthermore it is clear that such an offence may only be committed by the driver. The byelaws make no provision for any penalty so incurred to be enforced against the registered keeper nor does it establish any keeper liability.

With this in mind Mr chippy_76 therefore asserts that he has committed no offence and invites you to contact the driver in relation to the matter.

Yours faithfully

chippy_76

bod1467

As you're representing a company you'll need to get MSE permission to post.

keithlml

Hello
Not sure if this is the correct place but, iI have been reading posts as I have just received a PCN from UK Parking Parking Patrol Office (heading on on top). Ltd below on payment slip.

Exactly as Vehicle stopped to pick up someone who had wandered out of airport car park (tired of waiting) and on to roundabout near entrance to airport. driver delayed on A1 roadworks.
Two photographs showing car only 2 seconds apart as the driver (not saying who driver was) stopped and picked up person standing there.
The posts all offer technical advice but as my letter does not offer PopLa options company is listed as Ltd on paperwork etc. WHat are my options? Just returned from holiday and find I have only 3 days left to appeal.
Anne Robinson on Watchdog has experts on YouTube clips (may be outdated?) saying throw this away, ignore but your posts stae in places do not ignore appeal etc.
Can anyone offer me simple advice as this is definitely a pick up not parking situation 10 seconds maximum?
Keithlml