Please Help with (NOT SO) Smart Parking PCN

W00DY

Hey guys,

Great forum, some really useful info gleaned. I'm just wondering if you can help, offer some advice on an issue currently unraveling...

So my 80 something neighbour (let's called him Mr X!), proper nice bloke and heart of gold drove to Melton Mowbray in Leicestershire to visit the Cattle Market on Tuesday 24th May 2016. The normal car park was full so he drove over the road and into what used to be the Co-op car park, they closed in January.

He drove in, parked in a bay and went to the machine. He read what he interpreted to be: Enter the numbers from your registration and money for time wanted. He inputted '04' into the machine, put £1 and received a ticket which he displayed on his dashboard. £1 was for up to 2 hours. He left, came back after shopping and exited the car park well within the 2 hours.

Fast forward to the 27/05/16 and Mr X receives the following:

He is utterly stunned and concerned so comes to me for some help. I went to the car park and took photos of the signage and machine, as displayed here:

I then made an online appeal on his behalf, tried to keep it brief but this is what I wrote word for word:

"A car park ticket was legitimately purchased for this vehicle at the CO-OP car park in Melton Mowbray, on the understanding that the numerical digits of the vehicle registration were required. Therefore '04' was inputted into the machine and a ticket was purchased for up to a 2 hour stay, having paid £1. This ticket was purchased for vehicle FM04 ***. A copy of the purchased car park ticket receipt is attached to this appeal.

Thankfully Mr X had kept his ticket, something I don't normally do! Here is a copy of it:

We waited, hoping and thinking surely that all will be fine. However, this letter has now been received:

Please can anyone help and advise as to what to do next?! I'm concerned we've only until the 12th July to get this sorted...?!

W00DY

Ahhh can't add pictures as I'm a new user!!

W00DY

Please would anyone who reads this allow me to send them a PM with links to photos of the PCN etc, they're all on photobucket ready to go with the [IMG][/IMG] tagged so should be very quick and will go some way to explaining my post!! Thank you

Coupon-mad

We don't need to see the PCN or letter as Smart are so easy to beat at POPLA, as long as the driver wasn't identified.

But if you wish to show a picture link, just change the http to hxxp.

Can I check you did NOT choose 'driver' in the drop-down menu when you submitted that appeal?

W00DY

Editing photos - apologies

W00DY

Hi Coupon Mad,

Thanks for your rapid reply. I've copied the 11 photos in a post above with the hxxp instead, hope that's okay.

Really trying hard to cast my mind back to when I filled out the online appeal and struggling to even remember the option of even entering a driver... :-/

Darn it I hope I haven't wrecked our chances of a successful appeal. Do you know if there is anyway of finding out? In the comments section I put:

"A car park ticket was legitimately purchased for this vehicle at the CO-OP car park in Melton Mowbray, on the understanding that the numerical digits of the vehicle registration were required. Therefore '04' was inputted into the machine and a ticket was purchased for up to a 2 hour stay, having paid £1. This ticket was purchased for vehicle FM04 ***. A copy of the purchased car park ticket receipt is attached to this appeal."

I do recall doing some research prior to doing the online appeal and being careful not to identify the driver. Really can't remember though that option...

Quentin

You need to edit your photos so that they are truly anonymous.


(You can easily be identified by the PPC eg, exact times, ticket no/postcode etc)

W00DY

Quentin thank you, I'll do that now

W00DY

Okay so I've gone to Smart Parking's website and done another appeal with reg and PCN number, it merely asks for personal details, in their words so that they can respond to the appeal. There is no drop down or question or anything to do with identifying the driver. In the reasons for appeal box, I did not identify the driver so as far as I can see, NO driver has been identified. The 2 pictures from the ANPR camera also do not identify the driver. I obviously did not submit this appeal, it was just to see what the process was again. So phew, the driver as far as Smart Parking are concerned is ?????????

Coupon-mad

Oh good! In that case, the keeper should win hands down because when you compare the NTK to paragraph 9 of the POFA (llinked in the NEWBIES thread) you will see the NTK can only hold a driver liable, not a keeper, due to the wording used.

Search 'Smart POPLA' to find other ones recently drafted, with 'no keeper liability' being POPLA appeal point #1. Adapt one or two into a version to suit this case and show us the draft, first.

W00DY

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