Tesco CEO responce

menantoll

Hi All

I'm a long time lurker here and have had a few Tesco/Highview invoices in the past which I have had cancelled. After the last one I wrote to the CEO after the agent who cancelled the invoice told me how to contact them.


Can I have some pointers please to help me respond to this awful reply from Tesco Head office?

Further to your email to Dave Lewis, our Chief Executive, I've now received the confirmation information I needed from Matt Rolland, our Store Manager at Truro.

Car parks adjoining our stores are our own private property. Unfortunately, many of our store car parks were being abused by customers leaving their vehicles for long lengths of time, but not shopping in our stores. This meant that genuine Tesco customers had difficulty obtaining a parking space. We therefore employed the services of Parking Authorities such as Ranger Services in this case, working with the D.V.L.A, to monitor our car parks.

There are notices and clear graphics throughout the car park to advise customers of the free parking time limits and what would happen if a vehicle overstays the time permitted. Fines are only issued after a second overstay.

At Truro store, if a customer can park and be in and out of the store within 30 minutes, they don't have to validate their parking.

In case they're longer than 30 minutes for any reason, there are 10 car park terminals to use to validate their parking. They'll receive a validation bar code when they go through the till and spend more than £3.00. The barcode is printed automatically and they take it to the scanner where they enter your car registration number in order to deter a fine. The total time for free parking from entry to the car park is two hours, providing the bar code has been scanned. If more time is needed in the store, such as shopping with an elderly or disabled person, they need to let our customer service desk know. They'll place the vehicle's registration number on a temporary exemption list, to avoid any further problems.

We believe this is a fair and proven system to ensure car park spaces are always available for our customers. Other businesses in the area use various methods to deal with this problem such as clamps and hand-held devices to record registration numbers.
If we didn't have this system in place, espoecially being a town centre store, people would simply be unable to park in our car park.
I hope this information has been helpful and I'd like to thank you for bringing your views to the attention of our Chief Executive.
Kind regards



Helen Duke

Customer Service Executive to the Board

beamerguy

menantoll wrote: »

Hi All

I'm a long time lurker here and have had a few Tesco/Highview invoices in the past which I have had cancelled. After the last one I wrote to the CEO after the agent who cancelled the invoice told me how to contact them.


Can I have some pointers please to help me respond to this awful reply from Tesco Head office?

Unfortunately, Tesco customer service gets worse especially
in their mini stores

Did you shop in the store ?

menantoll

Every time I use that car park it is to shop there (not anymore). I live only a 10 minute walk from the city center.

My main reason for post is to help me compose a nice long reply and to make sure I don't miss anything. Claiming others still use clamps for example!

beamerguy

menantoll wrote: »

Every time I use that car park it is to shop there (not anymore). I live only a 10 minute walk from the city center.

My main reason for post is to help me compose a nice long reply and to make sure I don't miss anything. Claiming others still use clamps for example!

Then you will have receipts or proof of purchase such as a debi.credit card and or a Tesco's loyalty card.

As they say its for their customers, show them you are a customer
and demand the ticket is cancelled

DoaM

OP doesn't say he has a current ticket - he wrote to Tesco to generally complain after the last one was cancelled. (Is how I read it).

OP - you're right about clamping. This became illegal (for private companies) almost 5 years ago, when the Protection of Freedoms Act 2012 came into force. For Tesco to suggest this is still going on is outrageous. Also neither they nor their agent (parking company) can issue fines - they're merely invoices for an alleged debt.

menantoll

Thanks for your help beamerguy but I think you have misread my post.

The invoice has already been cancelled.

I then decided to have a rant at head office about it and this is their reply which I thought people here may be interested in and could maybe give me some pointers for a reply back.

Edit - Thank you Doam, I missed the use of the word "fine" in the reply. Another reason I posted it. I don't want to miss anything like that.

Half_way

give been given a default fob off, probably prepared and written by the PPC, and further mangled by incompetent customer services.
A few things to note:
The statement could be used against tesco for double dips, and fur disabled customers who may take longer, but will be forced through hoops so as not to get a pcn.
As well as the use of the words: Authorities, and fines.

ANPR in time limited cat parks discriminates by default,
against those who through a disability take longer

beamerguy

menantoll wrote: »

Thanks for your help beamerguy but I think you have misread my post.

The invoice has already been cancelled.

I then decided to have a rant at head office about it and this is their
reply which I thought people here may be interested in and could
maybe give me some pointers for a reply back.

Edit - Thank you Doam, I missed the use of the word "fine" in the reply. Another reason I posted it. I don't want to miss anything like that.

Ah OK. my experience of Tesco is they actually hold customers
in contempt and fail to understand that it's the customers money
that keeps them going.
Maybe a letter to Dave Lewis CEO saying that the letter you
received is an insult to a paying customer and asking what
reason he would suggest for you to remain a loyal customer.

Mind you, that's if he bothers to read letters and they are
picked up only by his "Customer Service Executive to the Board"
who are probably simple robots with no idea how their salaries
are paid

Tesco customer service is simply junk

menantoll

so I sent the below off before posting here, sorry should have mentioned this in my OP, though my intention is still to send a fuller reply.

When I have more time I may reply in full to the whole of your email but I'd like to point out a obvious lie you have made and give you a chance to correct it.

"Other businesses in the area use various methods to deal with this problem such as clamps"

This was made illegal by The Protection of Freedoms Act 2012. Nearly 5 years ago!

Using this 5 year old lie to justify allowing Highview to rip off your genuine customers says it all to me. Yes, rip off your genuine customers. Once the rouge parkers have moved on, not denying they didn't exist, then Highview's only income stream is from your genuine customers.

There are many alternative ways to protect your car park AND customers but unfortunately for you they are not free.

Very disappointing reply.

Regards

And I just received a reply.

Thank you for your further email. I'm very sorry you are unhappy with my response as there was absolutely no intention of causing you any further annoyance.

No-one has lied to you I assure you and I can only report the information I receive. Also no one is ripping anybody off. There's no need or intention to do so. Our genuine customers know the free parking time limits at our Truro store and for those who don't, there's plenty of signage information to make them aware. This system is how we monitor our car parks, but I can't confirm the same for anyone else.

Parking charges are not issued unless drivers overstay the time limit, and then only on the second occasion. Also. funds from any parking charges are received by the D.V.L.A. not the Parking Authority.

Given the clear information available, the onus is on the customer to ensure they don't run the risk of receiving a fine if they want to park at our store. As I've also explained, if their visit to the store should inadvertently extend the free parking time, we have a safe process in place to ensure no fine is given.

We have indeed tried several alternative ways to monitor our car parks and as you say none of them are free, including this one. However to offer our customers the convenience of parking right outside our store to do their shopping, we have to have a system in place that can be controlled. Free parking in any town centre is very limited as you'll agree and we at least offer up to two hours. I'm very sorry if this doesn't sit well with you.

The first acknowledgement email I was sending to you co-incided with the reply from the store so they were both sent together. I wanted to ensure you had all the information available as quickly as possible, hence my emails in reply to yours.

I hope this has now fully clarified the matter for you.

Thank you for bringing your further views to the attention of our Chief Eecutive.

Umkomaas

Parking charges are not issued unless drivers overstay the time limit, and then only on the second occasion.

Ask them how they know it's a second occasion, who logs the details, how long are they kept for before the slate is 'wiped clean'. There's a Data Protection Act angle here. Don't say that, just ask a very innocent question.

Ask also what happens in the case of two different drivers - you one week, your other half a couple of weeks later?

Also. funds from any parking charges are received by the D.V.L.A. not the Parking Authority.

Utter rubbish! The Parking 'Authority' (jeez, what are they on?) pays the DVLA £2.50 for the keeper's details, then pockets the rest. The DVLA do not receive any funds from any parking charges.

Redx

there is so many things wrong with thei letters/emails its unbelievable

HIGHVIEW has no authority, its a Private Parking Company , nothing more

they call these charges "fines" , neither Tesco nor Highview have the authority to issue "fines", only "INVOICES"

the vast majority of any parking charge income is kept by Highview , it is certainly not all passed on to the DVLA

clamoing was made illegal in england and wales (truro being in england0 in 2012 , so why are they alleging that they can break the law ?

did they get their template reply in 2010 ? or 1910 ?

if data is being retained by them or their parking company as regards car park monitoring for second time rule breakers , they are breaking the D.P.A. , so thats another law allegedly broken

clearly they have no idea what they are talking about and should take legal advice