POPLA Appeal Premier Park Ltd

askgar

Umkomaas wrote: »

Your GP section above is ok, but can you sharpen up the reasons for the delays? In my view they're a bit 'woolly' - almost 'well this fun day was going on nearby, so that might have contributed ........ ' if you get my drift. You're not far away, but just tighten it.

I'll look at that and make it more it did rather than it could.

Umkomaas wrote: »

Leave out the 'paid-for-time'; I'd change that to 'actual parking time'.

Whoops, cleared a lot of references to paid for time out but missed the obvious ones.

Umkomaas wrote: »

Looking back at your other appeal points. 'No Keeper Liability' appears to be your strongest, but in all honesty, I think it's too rambling and becoming overly complicated, with quotes from here, there and everywhere. Again sharpen it with the critical points, not confuse it with hypotheses. I gave up reading it just over half way through. Sorry!

I took the No Keeper Liability section from the Pepipoo forum post linked above, I'll see how much I can trim from it to make it clearer.

Umkomaas wrote: »

If this is your strongest point, then leave that as the first appeal point - saves the assessor having to go any further.

I'd follow it with landowner authority as lots of PPCs either don't have the paperwork to prove it, or are pretty 'shy' at letting you and POPLA view it. Many fail on this. In my view it's open to less subjectivity and interpretation by the assessor than Grace Periods.

GPs can come next, followed by the remainder.

Save the document as a .pdf file and attach it to the POPLA appeal portal. Put some reference to the attachment in the portal dialogue box like 'Please find attached POPLA appeal for POPLA verification code xxxxx'. In the 'Reasons for Appeal' dropdown box, select 'OTHER'.

Thanks for the advice on the order, I'll get that done as well. I'll get a new version up a little later.

Umkomaas

I took the No Keeper Liability section from the Pepipoo forum post linked above, I'll see how much I can trim from it to make it clearer.

If that point with all its verbiage has previously been successful at POPLA, then do use it.

You might guess that I'm more in favour of sharp, to the point statements. The number of these War and Peace appeals we are asked to go through can really turn my brain to mush. There's thousands of them over the space of a year, and the regulars are at this every day.

Yours was not one of the longer ones. Just a few weeks ago there was one POPLA appeal that was 41,000 words (yep, forty one thousand) long. The will to live fades rapidly!

askgar

Umkomaas wrote: »

If that point with all its verbiage has previously been successful at POPLA, then do use it.

You might get guess that I'm more in favour of sharp, to the point statements. The number of these War and Peace appeals we are asked to go through can really turn my brain to mush. There's thousands of them over the space of a year, and the regulars are at this every day.

Yours was not one of the longer ones. Just a few weeks ago there was one POPLA appeal that was 41,000 (yep, forty one thousand) long. The will to live fades rapidly!

It looks like the Pepipoo template was only written in the last week or so, so unlikely to have ever been used successfully. I'll take a look and see what I can do to it.

askgar

Updated Ordering

I am the registered keeper and I am appealing this parking charge from Premier Park Limited at Hathaway Retail Park Car Park.

To protect the driver, they have not been named.

My appeal as the registered keeper is as follows:

1) Notice to keeper not delivered in compliance with the requirements of POFA.
2) No evidence of Landowner Authority
3) The two BPA 'Observation' and 'Grace' Periods either side of actual parking time were not properly applied.
4) No keeper liability
5) Inadequate signage

Updated NTK Section (now section 1). I trimmed out a little bit at the end as I felt including a selective quote from a document wasn't actually that useful and just cluttered the argument.

1. Notice to keeper not delivered in compliance with the requirements of POFA

In order to rely upon POFA to hold a vehicle's keeper liable for unpaid parking charges, an operator must deliver a notice to keeper in full compliance with all of POFA’s strict requirements. I set out below a non-exhaustive list of reasons why Premier did not comply.

Non-compliance with Paragraph 9 (2) (e)

This Paragraph requires that the notice must state that the creditor does not know both the name of the driver and a current address for service for the driver and invite the keeper:

(i) to pay the unpaid parking charges; or
(ii) if the keeper was not the driver of the vehicle, to notify the creditor of the name of the driver and a current address for service for the driver and to pass the notice on to the driver;

Premier’s notice to keeper does not state that the creditor does not know both the name of the driver and a current address for service for the driver.

Non-compliance with Paragraph 9 (2) (f)

This Paragraph requires that the notice must warn the keeper that if, at the end of the period of 28 days beginning with the day after that on which the notice to keeper is given:

(i) the amount of the unpaid parking charges (as specified under paragraph © or (d)) has not been paid in full, and
(ii) the creditor does not know both the name of the driver and a current address for service for the driver, the creditor will (if all the applicable conditions under this Schedule are met) have the right to recover from the keeper so much of that amount as remains unpaid

• The notice to keeper is dated Thursday 22nd June 2017.

• Paragraph 9 (6) states that a notice sent by post is to be presumed, unless the contrary is proved, to have been delivered (and so “given” for the purposes of sub-paragraph (4)) on the second working day after the day on which it is posted.

• If the notice to keeper had been posted on Thursday 22nd June 2017 (which Premier has not proven) it would be deemed to have been given on Monday 26th June 2017.

• The period of 28 days beginning with the day after that on which the notice to keeper is given would therefore cover the period from Tuesday 27th June – Monday 24th July 2017 inclusive.

• According to Paragraph 8 (2) (f), Tuesday 25th July 2017 would be the first day after this period of 28 days i.e. the first day that the right to recover payment from the keeper existed.

The PCN issued states “if within 29 days we have not received full payment or driver details, under Schedule 4 of the Protection of Freedoms Act 2012, we have the right, subject to the requirements of the Act, to recover the parking charge amount that remains unpaid from the keeper of the vehicle.”

This is not consistent with the requirements of Paragraph 8 (2) (f) of Schedule 4 of POFA as demonstrated below:

• The notice to keeper is dated Thursday 22nd June 2017.

• Even if it is assumed that the notice was posted on Thursday 22nd June 2017 and even if the date of posting is not counted, this 29 day period referred to in Premier’s notice to keeper would cover the period from Friday 23rd June – Friday 21st July 2017 inclusive.

• According to Premier, Saturday 22nd July 2017 would be the first day when it would have the the right to recover payment from the keeper

Thus Premier is seeking to claim keeper liability three days too soon.

I draw POPLA’s attention to the reverse of the notice to keeper in which Premier states that if you would like us to review this Parking Charge within 29 days of receiving this letter please either.....

With regard to establishing keeper liability, if Premier had intended to claim that it had the right to recover unpaid parking charges from the keeper if payment had not been made or the driver’s details not been provided within 29 days of receiving this letter, the notice to keeper would have explicitly said so. However, the notice to keeper did not and POPLA has no right to interpret Premier’s statement "if within 29 days" as meaning that this must apply from the date of service rather than the date of posting.

Non-compliance with Paragraph 9 (2) (i)

This Paragraph requires that the notice must specify the date on which the notice is sent (if it is sent by post) or given (in any other case).

Premier’s notice to keeper merely states a “Date” of 11th July 2017 which may or may not have been the date that the notice was actually sent or given. Therefore the notice to keeper fails to specify the date on which it was sent or given.

As a consequence of its failure to comply with POFA, Premier has forfeited its right to use the provisions of POFA to claim unpaid parking charges from me as the vehicle’s keeper and for this reason alone, POPLA must determine that Premier’s claim is invalid.

Should Premier try to suggest that there is any other method whereby a vehicle’s keeper can be held liable for a charge where a driver is not identified, I draw POPLA’s attention to the guidance given to operators in POPLA's 2015 Annual Report by Henry Greenslade, Chief Adjudicator in which he reminded them of a keeper's right not to name the driver whilst still not being held liable for an unpaid parking charge under Schedule 4 of POFA. Although I trust that POPLA's assessors are already very familiar with the contents of this report, for ease of reference I set out a link as follows:

https://popla.co.uk/docs/default-source/default-document-library/popla_annualreport_2015.pdf?sfvrsn=2

Updated GP section, I've removed references to paid for parking, and changed things to sharpen up the reasons (e.g. it was busy because...)

3) The two BPA 'Observation' and 'Grace' Periods either side of actual parking time were not properly applied.

The BPA Code of Practice (CoP) makes it mandatory for operators to allow grace periods at the start and end of parking, before enforcement action can be taken.

The CoP states (my bold):

13.2 You should allow the driver a reasonable ‘grace period’ in which to decide if they are going to stay or go...
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.

For the avoidance of doubt, the second 'grace' period of at least ten minutes (not a maximum, but a minimum) is in addition to the separate, first grace/observation period that must be allowed to allow the time taken to arrive, find a parking bay, lock the car and go over to any signs to read & observe the signage terms, before staying.

Kelvin Reynolds of the BPA says there is a difference between ‘grace’ periods and ‘observation’ periods in parking and that good practice allows for this:

http://www.britishparking.co.uk/News/good-car-parking-practice-includes-grace-periods

Good car parking practice includes ‘grace’ periods

“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.”

The BPA’s guidance defines the ‘grace period’ as the time allowed after permitted or paid-for parking has expired but before any kind of enforcement takes place.

The observation period (at the start)
The BPA (Kelvin Reynolds is the Director of Policy & Public Affairs) is on record as shown above, as saying that the 'observation period' at the start might take one person five minutes, but another person 10 minutes, depending on various factors.

On the day in question Hathaway Retail Park was exceptionally busy, due to a family fun day at the local park with no public parking of its own, on a day with exceptionally good weather.

http://www.neeld.co.uk/family-fun-day-2017/

Given the nature of the day, finding a space would have taken an extended period of time, due to the large number of families with young children traversing the car park, and the large number of cars blocking the car park waiting for spaces.

How would it occur to any reasonable person to account for the time taken to get into the busy car park when ensuring they were back at their car within the maximum parking period?

The grace period (at the end)
The BPA CoP allows a MINIMUM of ten minutes just to leave, the car park, given the day in question mentioned above, leaving the car park would have taken just as long as entering the car park, and as such it is not unreasonable to expect that more than ten minutes were taken, simply getting to the exit of the car park and having to wait for both families and other cars to clear the road.

The ANPR photos on the PCN show an arrival time of 13.06 and a departure time of 16.28. Taking both BPA 'Observation' and 'Grace' Periods into account and considering the location of the car park, and the exceptional volume of people and cars in the car park due to the event on the day in question, I contend that the PCN was not properly given.

Umkomaas

Look fine to me now.

askgar

The appeal is in, I will update this thread with progress.

askgar

askgar wrote: »

I have sent messages to the landowners and shops, but not had much luck (most of the shops just say nothing they can do as the parking is sorted by the retail park, not the shops), unfortunately, I've been away most of the summer so had little time to actually sort the appeal and it's now due on Friday so need to get this prepared.

Just done some additional research and found a named person to email from the site agents, I'm hoping that might have better luck than the email to an office instead.

Well, I definitely wish I'd taken that route earlier...

Dear X,

Y has passed your email to me for attention.

We have been in touch with Premier Park Ltd and can confirm that this PCN has now been cancelled.

Please accept our apologies for the inconvenience caused.

With kind regards

Z

I guess I should expect them to just cancel the POPLA appeal or something now, obviously, I'll keep an eye out and make sure it actually does happen.

askgar

Does this sound right?

X,

Premier Park have contacted us this morning to say that they have tried to cancel the PCN but because you have notified POPLA they are unable to until you withdraw your complaint.

Please can you let me know when you have done this and I will advise Premier Park that they can try again?

Thanks and regards

Z

That sounds like rubbish to me, I've said I'm happy to do this, but I'd like direct confirmation from Premier Park that they will cancel the ticket before I go ahead because I know that if I just withdraw my complaint from POPLA and they don't cancel the PCN I'll end up having to fight a battle I would rather avoid.

Silverscreen_2

askgar wrote: »

Well, I definitely wish I'd taken that route earlier...



I guess I should expect them to just cancel the POPLA appeal or something now, obviously, I'll keep an eye out and make sure it actually does happen.

Hi,

Can I just ask what reason did you give the the landowner for the ticket to be cancelled? I'm in a similar situation and your thread is very helpful to me but i have a few days before the POPLA code expires and would like to try and get it cancelled if I can instead of going to POPLA.

Umkomaas

Silverscreen wrote: »

Hi,

Can I just ask what reason did you give the the landowner for the ticket to be cancelled? I'm in a similar situation and your thread is very helpful to me but i have a few days before the POPLA code expires and would like to try and get it cancelled if I can instead of going to POPLA.

If you've only got a few days to get your POPLA appeal in, I'd make that as your absolute priority. Complaining to the landowner can be undertaken once your POPLA appeal has been submitted.

Any more queries about your own case should be raised on your own specific thread - not this one.