Parking Eye & Popla

pnh1234ard

Following a day out on the 26th December 2017 two weeks later I received a parking charge notice from Parking Eye. I visited their website and using the PCN found further details of the offence with a photo of my car both entering and leaving the Valentine shopping car park in Lincoln and time of entry and departure. I was fined £85 for over staying a 3 hour free car parking limit by 13 minutes. The tone of the letter from PE was quite stern and threatening implying with reference to a recent law case that went in their favor that unless I paid within 28 days they would be forced to take the matter to the courts and debt collectors would be appointed to recover the fine and all legal costs. I was outraged and did some research found a useful template in these forums and used this to make a formal appeal to POPLA. PE is owned by Centrica and they pay the car park landlords £1,000 a month so that they can earn money through car park fine charging any over stayers. So they automatically send out these sorts of threatening letters with absolutely no concern on who they maybe targeted at, the old, the infirm, those with learning difficulties and there is absolutely no discretion..One minute over the free period and you get fined. Whats my advice, well be honest, you know if you really abused the system or where caught out unfairly. If you were caught out unfairly, then the key is to get the 10 digit POPLA reference number that PE must give you and launch an appeal first to PE ideally on their website rather than writing so you get an e-mail confirmation. They will naturally reject your appeal, give you the the POPLA code, make sure you get it, they have to give this to you, and launch an online appeal to POPLA which may take a few weeks to get a formal judgement.. The key here is to be honest, use the template and base your appeal on facts..The PE car park cameras does not record 'actual parking time', you have 10 mins grace period on entering a paid car park to find and pay at a meter, and another 10 minutes grace period to leave. Remember PE can only fine you for 'actual parked time' infringement, they naturally can't record how long you were parked for only the time when you entered and then left the car park. If it was a very busy shopping day then state that it was, include any receipts from the shops which you used as evidence that you were a genuine customer. Remember its the facts that the POPLA body will look at not emotions and you have at least 10 minutes grace period on top of the free parking time although PE will never disclose this fact to you but it is the agreed car park industry time. If there are further issues as regards signage location, visibility, clarity then state it...Try using the word 'reasonable' where ever you can, your appeal should be based on a 'reasonable' time to enter and leave the car park...if there were relevant mitigating events that caused you delays then state them as long as they were outside your control. Read through your appeal before submitting it and remember you have a set time to lodge one, I believe it is 28 days. What grieves me most is that many people will simply panic and pay what they are being charged especially the vulnerable because PE is basically a bully!...So as long as you have a genuine reasonable grounds for your over stay it is worth making an appeal...The templates here in these forums are helpful, but make sure you don't simply copy and paste, tailor them to your own specific situation and use facts which work in your favour such as the grace period time limit. Good Luck!

Coupon-mad

pnh1234ard wrote: »

Following a day out on the 26th December 2017 two weeks later I received a parking charge notice from Parking Eye.

I visited their website and using the PCN found further details of the offence with a photo of my car both entering and leaving the Valentine shopping car park in Lincoln and time of entry and departure.

I was fined £85 for over staying a 3 hour free car parking limit by 13 minutes.

The tone of the letter from PE was quite stern and threatening implying with reference to a recent law case that went in their favor that unless I paid within 28 days they would be forced to take the matter to the courts and debt collectors would be appointed to recover the fine and all legal costs. I was outraged and did some research found a useful template in these forums and used this to make a formal appeal to POPLA.

PE is owned by [STRIKE]Centrica[/STRIKE] Capita and they (sometimes, only known in the Beavis case in fact) pay the car park landlords £1,000 a month so that they can earn money through car park fine charging any over stayers.

So they automatically send out these sorts of threatening letters with absolutely no concern on who they maybe targeted at, the old, the infirm, those with learning difficulties and there is absolutely no discretion..One minute over the free period and you get fined.

Whats my advice, well be honest, you know if you really abused the system or where caught out unfairly. If you were caught out unfairly, then the key is to get the 10 digit POPLA reference number that PE must give you and launch an appeal first to PE ideally on their website rather than writing so you get an e-mail confirmation. They will naturally reject your appeal, give you the the POPLA code, make sure you get it, they have to give this to you, and launch an online appeal to POPLA which may take a few weeks to get a formal judgement.

The key here is to be honest, use the template and base your appeal on facts..The PE car park cameras does not record 'actual parking time', you have 10 mins grace period on entering a paid car park to find and pay at a meter, and another 10 minutes grace period to leave.

Remember PE can only fine you for 'actual parked time' infringement (not true in fact, sadly POPLA do uphold some 'total stay' arguments), they naturally can't record how long you were parked for only the time when you entered and then left the car park.

Good advice here:
If it was a very busy shopping day then state that it was, include any receipts from the shops which you used as evidence that you were a genuine customer. Remember its the facts that the POPLA body will look at not emotions and you have at least 10 minutes grace period on top of the free parking time although PE will never disclose this fact to you but it is the agreed car park industry time.

If there are further issues as regards signage location, visibility, clarity then state it...Try using the word 'reasonable' where ever you can, your appeal should be based on a 'reasonable' time to enter and leave the car park...if there were relevant mitigating events that caused you delays then state them as long as they were outside your control.

Read through your appeal before submitting it and remember you have a set time to lodge one, I believe it is 28 days. no-one tells you, but you had 33 days, in fact

What grieves me most is that many people will simply panic and pay what they are being charged especially the vulnerable because PE is basically a bully!..

same here, can't stand a bully

So as long as you have a genuine reasonable grounds for your over stay it is worth making an appeal...no, it is always worth an appeal and fighting ANY ticket, regardless.

The templates here in these forums are helpful, but make sure you don't simply copy and paste, tailor them to your own specific situation and use facts which work in your favour such as the grace period time limit. Good Luck!

Some good advice, I have added some comments and made paragraphs or we can't read it.

The_Deep

13 minutes would appear to fall within grace periods, read the BPA Code of Practice.

This is an entirely unregulated industry which is scamming the public with inflated claims for minor 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 lose most of them, and have been reported to the regulatory authority by an M.P. for unprofessional conduct

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.