10min overstay with parking eye

kaytata_2

hi all

just drafted my initial letter to parking eye and it seems so simple, but im terribly nervous about saying too much or not enough

would someone kindly look over my letter


Location Ilford Retail Park, IG1 1NF
Parking Eye ticket on 27th December 2016


Dear Sirs

re. PCN no xxxxxx

I challenge this 'PCN' as keeper of the car.

Your ‘PCN’ states that the vehicle was in the car park for 2 hours and 10 minutes.

The provision of the images does not indicate that the vehicle was parked for that specific time. Given that no evidence has been provided as to the trustworthiness of the timing system used to generate the date stamps attached to the photographs, 11 minutes is perfectly within scope of both the MINIMUM grace periods and potential error in time recording.



The British Parking Association code of practice states:

13 Grace periods

13.4 You should allow the driver a reasonable period to leave the private car park after the parking contract has ended, before you take enforcement action. If the location is one where parking is normally permitted, the Grace Period at the end of the parking period should be a minimum of 10 minutes.


The suggested minimum 10 minutes should be extended when taking into consideration, the car park in question is known to be busy; serving two national supermarkets and a fitness first gym thereby requiring additional time to enter, find an empty parking bay, unload children and buggies, and reverse the procedure as well as load shopping and exit the car park when leaving.


The alleged contravention occurred right in the middle of christmas and new year; the busiest shopping period of the year and there is only one entrance and exit for the three retailers that the car park serves; resulting in queues entering and exiting the car park

Moreover, I believe that your signs fail the test of 'large lettering' and prominence, as established in ParkingEye Ltd v Beavis. Your unremarkable and obscure signs were not seen by the driver, are in very small print and the terms are not readable to drivers.

Further, I understand you do not own the car park and you have given me no information about your policy with the landowner or on site businesses, to cancel such a charge. So please supply that policy as required under the Consumer Contracts (Information, Cancellation and Additional Charges) Regulations 2013.

There will be no admissions as to who was driving and no assumptions can be drawn. You must either rely on the POFA 2012 and offer me a POPLA code, or cancel the charge.

Should you obtain the registered keeper's data from the DVLA without reasonable cause (e.g. if you do not fully comply with the BPA Code of Practice in terms of signage at this site, for example) please take this as formal notice that I reserve the right to sue your company and the landowner/principal in your contract, for a sum not less than £250 for any Data Protection Act breach.

For the avoidance of doubt, I do not give you consent to process data from the DVLA relating to this vehicle, whether you have already obtained it or not.

I have kept proof of submission of this appeal and look forward to your reply.

Yours faithfully,




ANY GOOD?

Redx

the opening paragraph mentions two overstay times , one 10 and the other 11 minutes , they cannot both be correct so make sure they are BOTH what is stated on the NTK ITSELF

and add BPA CoP clause #13 to that paragraph , before the full copy and paste explanation which is below it

then its good to go

submit it on the PE site and choose KEEPER from the menu

do not name the driver nor infer who was driving , to anyone

The_Deep

Read this


http://parking-prankster.blogspot.co.uk/2014/03/waiting-for-space-is-not-parking.html

kaytata_2

thank you!


well they wrote 10mins in the letter. but the time stamp shows 11mins and something seconds. i'll write 10mins as they wrote 10mins


cheers

Redx

write approximately 10 or 11 minutes then

kaytata_2

apologies, not sure why its put in loads of breaks between lines. iv tried editing, and reposting but neither works.


Hi All back with popla draft for review/comments please



Ilford Retail Park, IG1 1NF
Time in Car Park: 2 hours 10 minutes

A notice to keeper was issued on xxx to me, as the registered keeper of xxxx, for allegedly overstaying in a free car park at Ilford Retail car park by approximately 10 minutes. I appealed directly to ParkingEye, however the appeal has been rejected.


I write to you requesting this fine be cancelled, for the following reasons:

• Parking Eye have completely failed to observe and acknowledge the BPA’s Grace Period of a minimum of 10minutes.
• ANPR Accuracy and Compliance
• No evidence of Landowner Authority
• The signs in this car park are not prominent, clear or legible from all parking spaces or at the entrance

1. Parking Eye have completely failed to observe and acknowledge the BPA’s Grace Period of a minimum of 10 minutes.



The BPA Code of Practice sets a MINIMUM ten minutes grace period as well as a second ten minutes grace period to exit. Kelvin Reynolds of the BPA stated:


“An observation period is the time when an enforcement officer should be able to determine what the motorist intends to do once in the car park. The BPA’s guidance specifically says that there must be sufficient time for the motorist to park their car, observe the signs, decide whether they want to comply with the operator’s conditions and either drive away or pay for a ticket,” he explains. “No time limit is specified. This is because it might take one person five minutes, but another person 10 minutes depending on various factors, not limited to disability.”
Source: www.britishparking.co.uk/News/good-car-parking-practice-includes-grace-periods



The suggested minimum 10 minutes should also have been extended when taking into consideration, the car park in question is known to be busy; serving two national supermarkets and a fitness first gym thereby requiring additional time to enter, find an empty parking bay, unload children and buggies, and reverse the procedure as well as load shopping and exit the car park when leaving.


- The alleged overstay was for approximately 2hrs and 10 minutes as stated in the invoice produced by Parking Eye.


- The driver returned to the vehicle and attempted to leave within the two hour free parking time.


- The alleged contravention occurred right in the middle of the busiest shopping period of the year


- There is only one entrance and exit for all the retailers that the car park serves; resulting in queues entering and exiting the car park


- There are single vehicle lanes i.e. no room for cars to pass side by side in most lanes, thereby causing frequent multi vehicle blocks and queues during busy periods.

Parking Eye have not kept to the BPA Code of Conduct, nor have they acted fairly given the particulars listed above..

2. ANPR Accuracy and Compliance



I require ParkingEye Ltd to 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 ParkingEye Ltd must produce evidence in response to these points and explain to POPLA how their system differs (if at all) from the flawed ANPR system which was wholly responsible for the court loss by the Operator in ParkingEye v Fox-Jones on 8 Nov 2013. That case was dismissed when the judge said the evidence from the Operator was 'fundamentally flawed' as 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 Ltd in this case to show evidence to rebut this point: 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 this Operator in this car park is just as unreliable as the ParkingEye system in the Fox-Jones case and I put this Operator to strict proof to the contrary.

In addition, the unreliable/unsynchronised ANPR system used, and lack of information about the use of data, is not compliant with the BPA Code of Practice, which contains the following:


''21 Automatic number plate recognition (ANPR)
21.1 You may use ANPR camera technology to manage, control and enforce parking in private car parks, as long as you do this in a reasonable, consistent and transparent manner. Your signs at the car park must tell drivers that you are using this technology and what you will use the data captured by ANPR cameras for.

21.2 Quality checks: before you issue a parking charge notice you must carry out a manual quality check of the ANPR images to reduce errors and make sure that it is appropriate to take action. Full details of the items you should check are listed in the Operators’ Handbook.


21.3 You must keep any ANPR equipment you use in your car parks in good working order. You need to make sure the data you are collecting is accurate, securely held and cannot be tampered with.


21.4 It is also a condition of the Code that, if you receive and process vehicle or registered keeper data, you must:

• be registered with the Information Commissioner
• keep to the Data Protection Act
• follow the DVLA requirements concerning the data
• follow the guidelines from the Information Commissioner’s Office on the use of CCTV and ANPR cameras, and on keeping and sharing personal data such as vehicle registration marks.''

In my opinion, the system does not operate in a reasonable, consistent and transparent manner, and I have reason to believe that, potentially, every section of paragraph 21 is breached here. Unless the Operator can show documentary evidence otherwise, then this BPA Cop breach would also point to a failure to comply with the POFA 2012 (keeper liability requires strict compliance), a failure to comply with the ICO terms of registration and a breach of the CPUTR 2008 (claiming to comply with the BPA Code of Practice when I believe it is not the case). This Operator is put to strict proof to the contrary.


3. No evidence of Landowner Authority


As ParkingEye Ltd does not have proprietary interest in the land then I require that they produce an unredacted copy of the contract with the landowner. The contract and any 'site agreement' or 'User Manual' setting out details including exemptions - such as any 'genuine customer' or 'genuine resident' exemptions or any site occupier's 'right of veto' charge cancellation rights - is key evidence to define what ParkingEye is authorised to do and any circumstances where the landowner/firms on site in fact have a right to cancellation of a charge. It cannot be assumed, just because an agent is contracted to merely put some signs up and issue Parking Charge Notices, that the agent is also authorised to make contracts with all or any category of visiting drivers and/or to enforce the charge in court in their own name (legal action regarding land use disputes generally being a matter for a landowner only).

Witness statements are not sound evidence of the above, often being pre-signed, generic documents not even identifying the case in hand or even the site rules. A witness statement might in some cases be accepted by POPLA but in this case I suggest it is unlikely to sufficiently evidence the definition of the services provided by each party to the agreement.

Nor would it define vital information such as charging days/times, any exemption clauses, grace periods (which I believe may be longer than the bare minimum times set out in the BPA CoP) and basic information such as the land boundary and bays where enforcement applies/does not apply. Not forgetting evidence of the various restrictions which the landowner has authorised can give rise to a charge and of course, how much the landowner authorises this agent to charge (which cannot be assumed to be the sum in small print on a sign because template private parking terms and sums have been known not to match the actual landowner agreement).


Paragraph 7 of the BPA CoP defines the mandatory requirements and I put this operator to strict proof of full compliance:


7.2 If the operator wishes to take legal action on any outstanding parking charges, they must ensure that they have the written authority of the landowner (or their appointed agent) prior to legal action being taken.

7.3 The written authorisation must also set out:


a) the definition of the land on which you may operate, so that the boundaries of the land can be clearly defined


b) any conditions or restrictions on parking control and enforcement operations, including any restrictions on hours of operation


c) any conditions or restrictions on the types of vehicles that may, or may not, be subject to parking control and enforcement


d) who has the responsibility for putting up and maintaining signs


e) the definition of the services provided by each party to the agreement


Parking Eye have not demonstrated that they had authority to issue parking notices for this site on the date that the PCN was given, and they have not provided a copy of the contract which would allow me to determine my liability and/or to request cancellation of the charge. Despite my request, Parking Eye have not provided me with a copy of the contract with the landowner or on site businesses, as required under the Consumer Contracts (Information, Cancellation and Additional Charges) Regulations 2013.


4. The signs in this car park are not prominent, clear or legible from all parking spaces or at the entrance



In addition, the signs at Ilford Retail car park are not prominent, clear or legible from the majority of parking spaces. The signs and the machine tariff board were contradictory and crowded with different terms, so this is not an example of ‘plain intelligible language’, contrary to the Consumer Rights Act 2015:


68 Requirement for transparency (1) A trader must ensure that a written term of a consumer contract, or a consumer notice in writing, is transparent. (2) A consumer notice is transparent for the purposes of subsection (1) if it is expressed in plain and intelligible language and it is legible.


The signs are sporadically placed, indeed obscured and hidden in some areas. They are unremarkable, not immediately obvious as parking terms and the wording is mostly illegible, being crowded and cluttered with a lack of white space as a background. It is indisputable that placing letters too close together in order to fit more information into a smaller space can drastically reduce the legibility of a sign, especially one which must be read BEFORE the action of parking and leaving the car. I put the operator to strict proof as to the size of the wording on their signs and the size of lettering for the most onerous term, the parking charge itself.


Given the above, I hope that you are able to cancel the unreasonable invoice received from Parking Eye on this matter.

Redx

the trick is to save as a notepad file , open in notepad and copy and paste from notepad

Coupon-mad

Looks OK in the main but short in terms of the 'unclear signs' point and it misses out the ones mentioned here:

https://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/discussion/comment/72132442#Comment_72132442

HTH

Laughingbear

Hi, Currently going through dsimilar with P.E.


Did you win your case?

Ralph-y

sadly the OP has not posted here since February


if you have a query then please have a read through the newbies thread

https://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/discussion/4816822

and then start a new thread ....

good luck

Ralph:cool: