Popla refuse appeal

jimmy9220

Approx 10 months ago my grandmother stopped in a parking eye car park for 11 minutes whilst looking for the sign for parking, finding it, and finding her glasses to read it (silly it sounds I know) but eventually decided the price was too high and left. Parking eye then issued a pcn via number plate recognition. Appeal to parking eye was rejected so appealed to popla. Popla took around 7 months as they put the case on hold pending beavis 's parking eye decision. Just had a letter before a 2 week holiday saying the appeal is rejected as 11 minutes is too long a grace period, and beavis vs parking eye defeated gpeol argument. What can we do? It says we have to pay within 14 days but due to a holiday we can't, and besides, we don't want to.

Any advice is much appreciated

Fruitcake

The decision is binding on the operator, not on the motorist. Therefore there is no requirement for your grandmother to pay. This may however result in a court case, but this is winnable.

All is not lost at this point however.

I would complain to PoPLA lead assessor and the ISPA (PoPLA "watchdog") that there are two grace periods in accordance with the BPA CoP. One before the alleged event, of undefined length, and one after the event of at least ten minutes.
I would also point out that your grandmother needed extra time in accordance with the BPA CoP (and possibly the Equality Act 2010) if she suffers from certain medical conditions including any that affect mobility and/or memory.)

You should also complain to the landowner about the disgraceful treatment of an elderly person. (Assumptions being made that she is in fact "elderly." Apologies if this is not the case.)

Redx

chances are it was WH that refused the appeal , as in WHOPLA , not POPLA

grace periods apply both before AND AFTER the parking period, so the decision is potentially flawed

jimmy9220

Thanks guys for your advice. How do I go about complaining to the lead assessor? Is there information on the popla site? Also, the letter states to pay in 14 days. Will this be put on hold if a complaint is made?

Thanks again

Redx

please confirm if it was actually POPLA (the Ombudsman Service) that issued the refusal (which I doubt)

or if it was WRIGHT HASSALL acting on behalf of the BPA on all the adjourned cases (like yours) ?

I suspect the latter, in which case you cannot complain to popla as they will have had no input at all

Fruitcake

jimmy9220 wrote: »

Thanks guys for your advice. How do I go about complaining to the lead assessor? Is there information on the popla site? Also, the letter states to pay in 14 days. Will this be put on hold if a complaint is made?

Thanks again

As Redx has said, it depends which body did the PoPLA reject.

As already said, the decision is not binding on the motorist so the fourteen days is irrelevant as there is nothing to pay, ever, unless a judge says so.
That doesn't mean it won't go to court, but a robust complaint about the decision will help her case.

You haven't said whether your grandmother had a condition covered by the EA 2010 that would mean she needed more time. This could be a physical or mental problem, and it doesn't matter whether she has or hasn't got a blue badge.

jimmy9220

Hi, we got a letter from wright hassall saying they would be dealing with the appeal which I complained to popla about and to the sra due to conflict of interest, sra ruled there was no issue and popla said the same. However the letter with the rejection of the appeal does not mention wright hassall, only popla so I'm not sure who it's from.

My grandma has no medical condition, she just needs glasses to read far away that she didn't have with her.

Thanks guys

Umkomaas

However the letter with the rejection of the appeal does not mention wright hassall, only popla so I'm not sure who it's from.

Post a link to a copy of the letter here. Host it on Photobucket or Tinypic (or similar), copy the URL, paste into a reply on this thread, but change the http to hxxp to create a dead link (which a regular will convert to a live one). Newbies don't have photo posting privileges until they've got around 20 posts to their name.

beamerguy

jimmy9220 wrote: »

Hi, we got a letter from wright hassall saying they would be dealing with the appeal which I complained to popla about and to the sra due to conflict of interest, sra ruled there was no issue and popla said the same. However the letter with the rejection of the appeal does not mention wright hassall, only popla so I'm not sure who it's from.

My grandma has no medical condition, she just needs glasses to read far away that she didn't have with her.

Thanks guys

It's very interesting that the SRA said that ?
They said in the past that there was no proof that Gladstones ran the IPC.

Is the SRA AN "OLD BOYS CLUB" ..... and really not in the interests of the public, they have fallen into disrepute for backing an industry of scammers

Umkomaas

WH 'Conflict of Interest'. I think they declare this where a POPLA appeal is relating to a PPC they represent when pursuing motorists in either a debt collection or legal capacity.

PE have no need for them in either.

Redx

seems to me this is not a POPLA decision , its a WHOPLA decision

therefore you would not be able to complain to the popla lead adjudicator about it because I dont think they were involved, like I clearly stated earlier

POPLA (ombudsman service) do not take this long to deal with appeals

if WH had declared a conflict of interest then the new popla would have taken over, which we have seen one or two it recently happened to, but that scenario would be extremely unlikely for a Parking Eye appeal as they do their own legal work