Data Protection Question

Mark_Sheffield

Hi All need help.
Ref: Parking Charge Notice Flora Street Retail Car Park.
Not Parking in Bay, there for 10 minutes for a bottle of milk not in anyones way.

Gone through appeal and lost!
Rang the parking company and they said I could still pay £60.00 (rip off but could not be bothered to argue) passed to auto payment that wanted £100.00 so refused and rang back person on phone still said £60.00 and I can pay over the phone but it would be an unsecure payment so I refused.

Sent letter for copy of the recording as they state they record everything. VCS (the parking company) now want £10.00 to release the recording.

I ma now prepared to go to court if required and fight this but should I pay the £10.00 to get the recording or just state they must save the recording just in case I need it at a later date.

Any advice would be most helpful.

Thanks in advance

Mark

waamo

Personally I don't see what use the recording has at this stage. Even if they did take you to court I doubt anything in it would be useful.

Loadsofchildren123

Any request made for information held under the data protection act is liable for a £10 charge. So for example if you asked your bank for copies of old bank statements they would be entitled to charge you £10.


However, I'd say that this is not a request for information under the DPA, but is a request for pre-action disclosure in relation to contemplated proceedings, and is not therefore liable to any charge. They are obliged to produce it under the old Practice Direction - Pre-Action Conduct and the new Protocol for Debt Claims and are not entitled to charge, and you could force them to do so under rule 31.6.

Timothea

As the PPC has agreed to accept £60, send them a cheque for this amount, attached to a covering letter that says something like this: "Regarding your PCN number 99999999 dated 99/99/9999, please find attached a cheque for £60 in full and final settlement of this matter. This discounted rate was agreed with [whomever you spoke with] by phone on [date and time]."

The bold text is the important bit. This only works with a cheque.

Of course, one might ask why you want to pay this charge when there are still ways to beat this?

System

Flora Street is a hot spot for VCS as the signs and road markings are unclear. Suggest you get pics of the location, where you parked and the signs there. They keep changing them.

File them and keep them as they may try a claim in a year or two.

Personally I wouldn't offer them anything as it smacks of guilt whereas they have a lot of issues with the layout here. And lost.

RobinofLoxley

Why do you want a recording and why on earth are you even thinking of paying these scammers VCS.

There have been several cases re Flora Street Retail Park, it is a well known trap for the unwary.
Have a look at this recent thread :

https://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/discussion/5720109

I take it the car had one of the myparkingcharge.co.uk notices placed on the windscreen. The general consensus is not to log on the website and give them any information, just wait for the NTK to arrive in the post and take it from there.

Read the newbies thread at the top of the first page to learn about the whole private parking ticket 'game' and how to deal with it. In particular everything in respect of IPC members as VCS are.

No one should ever phone a parking company, you will get nowhere with them and there is the danger of giving them information you shouldn't, such as the name of the driver.

Coupon-mad

So glad you DIDN'T pay this charge to ex-clampers, to line Simon Renshaw Smith's pockets (Excel & VCS owner):

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2713705/The-parking-ticket-fat-cats-one-s-chum-Prezza-two-drive-Aston-Martins-Meet-men-ve-millions-motorists-misery.html

Don't offer anything, stop taking the bait, and ignore them unless you get a Letter before Claim from VCS, shrieking about court after 14 days 'without further notice' or a dodgy letter from BW Legal paying lip service to the pre-action protocol.

Either of those should be batted away with a version of the LBC reply you will find if you search this sub-forum (not the whole of MSE nor all forums) for the word 'immune' and look for October/November 2017 posted examples of such a reply. Come back and show us first, to make sure it looks right.

I am now prepared to go to court if required and fight this

Good!

but should I pay the £10.00 to get the recording

No, you don't need it because defending the entire, ludicrous claim will NOT involve wanting to pay £60, nor trying to prove that side of things.

Expect a claim in 2018, but expect to be able to win it, as we do 99% of the time here when posters stick around and are fully coached right up to a hearing.

Forget them for now. Compliments of the season, for swerving a scam and not paying.

KeithP

So we now have two threads on this.

Here is the first: Parking Ticket Offer to Pay