Parking Eye are taking me to County Court (and I haven't done anything wrong!!!!)

Castle

GeorgeKnows wrote: »

ParkingEye complies fully with the Data Protection Act 1998. All personal data is processed fairly and lawfully and we satisfy 2 conditions of Schedule 2 of the said Act, those being:

1. The data subject has given his consent to the processing.
2. The processing is necessary—
(a) for the performance of a contract to which the data subject is a party

Given that the data subject is the Registered Keeper, who may not be the Driver then clearly they cannot comply with these conditions.

Geoff1963

Has Parking Eye ever explained how double-dipping would cope, if say a pigeon flew in front of the lens, obscuring the number plate at the first exit and / or second entrance ?
I'm thinking of writing to them as a concerned citizen, wanting to understand how their equipment avoids such mistakes. If a response already exists, can someone publish it, please ?

Umkomaas

I'm thinking of writing to them as a concerned citizen, wanting to understand how their equipment avoids such mistakes.

Let us know what they say. The pigeon hypothesis has never been tested.

This could open a whole new can of worms.

mr_rusty

Although it may not be totally persuasive, do you have location tracking on your phone turned on? If you have e.g.android and this turned on google maps "my timeline" will have recorded your movements.

Geoff1963

Here's the sort of thing I'm thinking of putting to them :

A car enters the car park at T1, and leaves at T2 ; so its duration is T2-T1. A five year-old could work that out.
If I was billing people, or detecting duty evasion, or even looking out for criminals ; 99 % would be good enough. If the ANPR said "don't know" 1 % of the time, then at most 2 % of the durations are unknown, so I lose up to 2 % of revenue. It is mainly a deterrent, to ensure most people pay / leave within the free time, so that doesn't really matter.

A car enters at T1.
It enters AGAIN at T2.
It leaves at T3.
Common sense says it must have left sometime between T1 and T2, so it had 2 visits : the second duration was T3-T2,the first duration is unknown.
However, if the ANPR system keeps counting from T1 to T3, it gives the situation so often described on these posts.
Now a 99 % accuracy, means 1 % of double-visitors could get a very big ( and unjustified ) bill ; and the burden of proof is unfairly on them, to show the vehicle was somewhere else.

The safeguards would include :
a) Resetting the duration clock to 0 on every entry, because a leaving event must have been missed.
b) Checking all the vehicle leaving photos, which didn't give a valid ANPR reg, in case they might have been the vehicle in question ; and giving the visitor the benefit of the doubt.
c) Correlating the ANPR to site CCTV, so : the CCTV shows how long it was there, and the ANPR is just a close up of the reg.

The assessment of risk would include :
1) What percentage of leaving photos are bad ? How many vehicles are therefore thought to be parked for days ( and are clearly not there ) so the clock has to be reset ?
2) What percentage of entry photos are bad ? How often is a vehicle thought to have arrived on site out of nowhere ?
3) 14 hours might be feasible, but how long is judged to be an unbelievably long stay ? 2 days, a week ? After how long does the company judge it must be mistaken about a double visit, so doesn't pursue the keeper ?

Another way to "lose" a leaving photo, is if the vehicle has broken down, and is recovered off the site by a breakdown truck. When the repaired vehicle visits the next morning, ANPR might say they stayed overnight.

It would be more difficult if only photos with ANPR-judged valid reg, are kept.

Anything else I should add ?

Coupon-mad

Have you read this archive blog about the flaws inherent with ANPR, by the Parking Prankster?

http://parking-prankster.blogspot.co.uk/2014/02/how-parking-operators-use-anpr.html

And the BPA article where they admit that ANPR has this flaw re double dip visits?

http://www.britishparking.co.uk/Other-Advice#4

As with all new technology, there are issues associated with its use:

a) Repeat users of a car park inside a 24 hour period sometimes find that their first entry is paired with their last exit, resulting in an ‘overstay’. Operators are becoming aware of this and should now be checking all ANPR transactions to ensure that this does not occur.

b) Some ‘drive in/drive out’ motorists that have activated the system receive a charge certificate even though they have not parked or taken a ticket. Reputable operators tend not to uphold charge certificates issued in this manner...

Did you see the BMPA summary of the proposed new BPA CoP to be brought in soon, this year?

https://bmpa.zendesk.com/hc/en-us/articles/115002770209-BPA-Code-of-Practice-Revision-May-2017

Quality checks: before you make a vehicle keeper detail request to the DVLA 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. On receipt of the data from the DVLA further checks must be undertaken.

Not in the CoP yet, but coming soon.

Geoff1963

I'm wondering what Parking Eye say about it.

Coupon-mad

They will say 'sod off, our ANPR system is just like that used by NATO and Buckingham Palace.'

GeorgeKnows

Hi all,

Another BUMP!

I'm yet to send anything back to Parking Eye. The only proof which backs my story is text messages between my girlfriend and I, and a text from my Manager at the time.

I haven't had any further correspondence from Parking Eye, or the County Court. It's been over a year since the alleged violation, and a couple of months since their last correspondence.

Any idea what the next steps are, or if they've just forgotten about it?

Help and info appreciated!

Coupon-mad

Maybe they've forgotten about it. Let sleeping dogs lie unless you get a claim, as bargepole said:

bargepole wrote: »

Let them issue a Court Claim, then defend it using the information available on the Newbies thread (read it all).

Your evidence should easily mean they are laughed out of court, and make sure you claim all your costs.

Then issue a claim against PE for breaching the Data Protection Act, and include Welcome Break as second defendant. A claim for £750 seems appropriate, make the bar stewards pay.