UK parking management ltd

Briefcase1983

Hi
My partner receive a parking charge notice from ukpm.
She lives in Essex and her car is registered in Essex, however the parking charge took place in Kent. She has never been to this place. She contacted them and asked for all the photos and one of the vin number as she was worried about it. They could only provide one photo of the front of the car with no parking signs around or any evidence of where the photo was taken. She contacted them and they basically said she had to pay. She called the police who said her car may of been cloned and issued her a crime reference number. She sent this with a letter explaining everything to them and they then wrote back asking for more evidence and that she still needed to pay. We then decided to ignore any further correspondence from them. They have now passed it to DRP to recover the money. And they have somehow got her down at my address and all now sending letters to my house and not my partners registered address.
Should I just carry on ignoring these letters or should we write write back to them or phone them?
I am getting sick of the harassment. Surely providing a crime numbers shows the police have taken it seriously and it should be cancelled.

Redx

IGNORE drp, like post #4 of the NEWBIES FAQ sticky thread tells you to do

if she gets a formal LBC or an MCOL in the post within 6 years then come back for advice once more

nothing will stop the debt collector letters

The_Deep

Challenge them to take this to court. Warn them that, if they lose, you will be seeking unreasonable behaviour costs.

This is an entirely unregulated industry which is scamming the public with inflated claims for alleged breaches of contracts for alleged parking offences, aided and abetted by a handful of low-rent solicitors.

Parking Eye, CPM, Smart, and another company have already been named and shamed, as has Gladstones Solicitors, and BW Legal, (these two law firms take hundreds of these cases to court each year). They nearly always lose, and have been reported to the regulatory authority by an M.P.

Hospital car parks and residential complex tickets have been especially mentioned.

The problem has become so rampant that MPs have agreed to enact a Bill to regulate these scammers. Watch the video of the Second Reading in the HofC recently.

http://parliamentlive.tv/event/index/2f0384f2-eba5-4fff-ab07-cf24b6a22918?in=12:49:41

and complain in the most robust terms to your MP. With a fair wind most of these companies may well be put out of business by Christmas.

Fruitcake

It is unlikely that the vehicle has been cloned.

Many parking scammers use ANPR to take images of vehicle number plates. It is so flawed that the UK Government has banned its use for car park monitoring on Council and Local Authority land, but parking scammers use the flaws to generate spurious parking charge notices.

What will have happened in your case is that the ANPR camera will have captured an imperfect image of someone else's number plate. It will then have been digitally altered to create a completely different VRN.

This will be due to there being perhaps, dirt, a screw, reflection, shadow, a crack, or some other imperfection on the number plate. Alternatively it may have misread O for 0, or I for 1.

Have a good look at your partner's number plate and compare it to the image supplied by the scammers. Look for any discrepancies. For example, does one have a GB emblem and the other not? Do they have garage names on them and if so are they the same, or is the writing the same length?

You should both make separate complaints to your MPs as advised by The Deep.

Also complain to the DVLA that the company has falsely altered someone else's VRN and thus breached their KADOE contract with the DVLA, and breached the DPA by applying for your partner's data.


These are some of the comments made by the MPs in Parliament concerning the unregulated parking industry (Feb 2018):

https://hansard.parliament.uk/commons/2018-02-02/debates/CC84AF5E-AC6E-4E14-81B1-066E6A892807/Parking(CodeOfPractice)Bill

''Rip-offs from car park Cowboys must stop''; unfair treatment; signage deliberately confusing to ensure a PCN is issued; ''years of abuse by rogue parking companies''; bloodsuckers; ''the current system of regulation is hopeless, like putting Dracula in charge of the blood-bank''; extortionate fines; rogue operators; ''sense of injustice''; unfair charges and notices; wilfully misleading; signage is a deliberate act to deceive or mislead; ''confusing signs are often deliberate, to trap innocent drivers''; unreasonable; a curse; harassing; operating in a disgusting way; appeals service is no guarantee of a fair hearing; loathed; outrageous scam; dodgy practice; outrageous abuse; unscrupulous practices; ''the British Parking Association is as much use as a multi-storey car park in the Gobi desert''; and finally, by way of unanimous conclusion: ''we need to crack down on these rogue companies. They are an absolute disgrace to this country. Ordinary motorists and ordinary residents should not have to put up with this''.

These are the exact words used, so you should quote them to your MP in a complaint and ask him/her to contact Sir Greg Knight MP if he wants further information about this scam.

[Deleted User]

Depending on what she drives or whether your respective phones have location tracking turned on, you may well be able to prove you are elsewhere. Similarly office timesheets or credit cards etc may assist to prove you were elsewhere.

I don't think you should immediately supply that, but you should request an enhanced image of the numberplate. There's usually enough to ascertain colour & type even if the whole car has not been observed.

As regards correspondence, write to nominate the correct residential postal address as the "address for service." Post which continues to be sent to the wrong address is, strictly speaking, not served/valid.

Fruitcake

Actually I would want to see the "unedited" image before it was doctored by the ANPR computer programme. In other words the actual original image captured by the camera, not after it had been modifed. I doubt that it actually exists, but if it ever got to court it would cause problems for the scammers if they were asked to produce it.

The_Deep

you may well be able to prove you are elsewhere.

But why should you need to prove anything?

Coupon-mad

To avoid a distressing court case.

The keeper should email the DVLA with her evidence (not a crime number, she'll have a Police 'incident number' but it's still evidence) and complain to her MP as well, and get this cancelled that way.

[Deleted User]

you may well be able to prove you are elsewhere.

But why should you need to prove anything?

Err because if you supply that now, there's a good chance that the hourly rates on your unreasonable costs claim are likely to start from now too.

Not guaranteed, but if through willful blindness they continue pursuing a bad claim, they deserve to get burned.