Smart Parking fine

ph85fre

hello,

can anyone please help me regarding a parking ticket that was wrongly issued from Smart Parking, that I disputed but which has now turned in to a battle with them and me receiving letter after letter from a debt collectors and now Gladstones Solicitors contacting me threatening court action. We appealed to SMART parking and they denied our appeal and now we do not know how to resolve the issue but do not want to pay them a penny as we 100% did not park in the area they are claiming we did. I will explain below what happened:

I was going to ASDA in Poole and looking for a space, iInitially I drove in and out of what I now know is the Lifeboat Quay carpark, which is connected to the ASDA carpark. But I realised I was far away from ASDA and there were no spaces anyway so I didn't park there and I drove out of this area and closer to ASDA, finally parking in the ASDA carpark. I didn't drive through any barriers to get in or out the carpark.

When I finished in ASDA, I decided to walk back over to Costa and get food and drinks, which is within the Lifeboat Quay carpark. I put my order in and was waiting ages so decided to go grab the car from ASDA and pull up outside, run in and grab the food before driving out again. So basically, the camera caught me entering the first time, leaving to go in to ASDA and then entering again to pull up outside Costa and then leave again.

The ticket came through and they have basically missed out the two pictures in the middle of the sequence and taken the first picture and the last picture (there would have been 4 in total) and taken the timings from it and said I was in the car park from 08:38:24 until 09:25:31 when actually I was probably in the car park from 30 seconds in total!!

I failed to write this in my first appeal to Smart Parking because I didn't believe this is what could have happened, silly me thinking their technology wouldn't be wrong. I also thought it was a mistake I had made in the ASDA carkpark as not being from the area, I figured it must just have been that, sent them my proof I was there shopping etc and didn't hear from Smart parking for ages and thought they were happy. It turns out this is exactly what has happened and on their letter back to me, Smart Parking tell me that, it is due to my entering the Lifeboat Quay carpark that my car was captured, not ASDA.

Can anyone advise as to what I should do now, as I do not want to go to court or for my credit rating to be affected but I also do not want to pay them as I did not park in their carpark and to charge 160 pound is totally not right! I have called citizens advice and looked for advice everywhere but am getting nowhere

Quentin

First edit your post to remove details of who was driving.


Everyone is politely asked to read up in the newbies faq thread before starting a thread.


There you will find advice on what to do about threatening letters from debt collectors (ignore) and solicitors (only take action if you get a letter before court action or correspondence from court)


If you do get a court claim then you may have to go to court, but that doesn't affect your credit rating


It only gets affected if you ignore court and get a judgement in default or lose in court, and don't pay up the amount in the judgement within a month

System

ph85fre wrote: »

So basically, the camera caught me entering the first time, leaving to go in to ASDA and then entering again to pull up outside Costa and then leave again.

My local Lidl has a 90 minute maximum stay then no return within 1hr. So pop into Lidl, pop out then return a short while later and you could be stung with a charge.

I would check whether or not there are any notices about not returning within a certain period in addition to the length of time you're allowed to stay.

Quentin

Very hard to prove anyone returned within an hour to any car park - same car could do so, but who knows if the driver was the same?

ph85fre

Thank you- I will continue reading the thread and I appreciate your advice.

Coupon-mad

What happened when you complained to Asda's Head Office about this harassment? Do so immediately, and assertively.

Please also complain to your MP, as per this:

https://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/discussion/comment/72869191#Comment_72869191

There is no need to panic. Smart did try a couple of small claims and then gave up and discontinued them when they saw a decent defence. You have also done nothing wrong and may be able to counter-claim for breach of the DPA, as a double visit is not a contravention and Smart should have spotted this and not obtained your data from the DVLA at all.

The Gladstones letter may well be a debt collector 'front' using Gladstones notepaper, you know - you can tell, if the letter asks for payment to the debt collector!

But I think to knock this on the head, as well as complaining to:

Asda Head Office
Your MP (please do)
The ICO (online report, please do - and it might give you evidence to claim for compensation!)

...you should be replying to Gladstones in this vein (I hope when you appealed you wrote 'we' and did not admit who the driver was?):

https://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/discussion/comment/72786361#Comment_72786361

You will have to change it to suit, such as change 'your company' and 'you' to 'your client' and 'they' in sentences like this one, so it's not 100% right to copy completely:

When your company issues a 'parking charge' you do not use Schedule 4

Then obviously remove the entire section (in quotes at the bottom here) and instead, set out the double dip situation, that two visits cannot be merged as if they were one. This is bordering on fraud to demand money under these circumstances, and certainly negligent, in failing to exercise due diligence in checking the ANPR images properly to discount two visits. After all, this is a known issue of ANPR systems, as highlighted by the BPA themselves:

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''

And a similar situation was the subject of an ICO complaint about ParkingEye:

http://parking-prankster.blogspot.co.uk/2015/10/parkingeye-subject-to-data-protection.html

This is the bit to comlpletely remove and replace with the stuff above, of course:

Finally, I will also submit that you have hereby been informed by this letter, that a passenger in the vehicle that day has a heart condition, and was taken ill by a prolonged bout of sickness.

I need not explain further, other than to point out the fact that a person with a heart condition meets the definition of disability under the Equality Act 2010 (EA) and any delay in leaving was as a direct result of a medical emergency. Should you fail to cancel the charge, Civil Enforcement Ltd - and the person making the decision to proceed with a claim, whose name must appear on your letter of reply, along with their reasons for disregarding the EA - will be held corporately and personally liable for a failure to make a reasonable adjustment for a disabled person. This will of course add further costs, echoing Blamires - which also included a four figure claim for discrimination - in terms of the sum sought in compensation for distress and harassment under the EA.