PCN from MET - complaint to McDonalds

applesponge

Evening,

I've received a PCN as the registered keeper of a vehicle, which was parked in a McDonalds car park for almost 40 mins longer the maximum permitted.

The driver was inside the McDonalds for the duration of the time the car was parked, for a work meeting (classy!), and could provide receipts or bank statements to the store to prove as such, if necessary.

Therefore, the obvious route to take here is contacting McDonalds to request they get the PCN cancelled, lest the driver stop frequenting the restaurant, and encouraging others to do the same.

However, the driver doesn't live near the store in question, and travelling there to complain to the manager would probably cost more in petrol than the PCN amount.

So my question is - what's the next best route to complain to McDonalds? Most the threads I've read on here suggest emailing them is fruitless. Phone? Facebook? Other?

Ta in advance!

:beer:

Umkomaas

Try any/all of them until you get success. We have no 'magic route'. Let us know which you were able to access and if you had any result.

Fruitcake

As above, but don't miss the appeal deadline. Use the template from the NEWBIES thread within the appeal window.

applesponge

Sound advice thanks, I'll get started and report back if I have any success.

Is it okay to reveal who the driver is in correspondence with the retailer? Or could that come back to bite them later?

Umkomaas

applesponge wrote: »

Sound advice thanks, I'll get started and report back if I have any success.

Is it okay to reveal who the driver is in correspondence with the retailer? Or could that come back to bite them later?

I'd be careful, because it's not beyond the bounds of possibility that the retailer simply copies the letter to the PPC asking them for comments, or to deal with it.

But I would try not to be too 'wooden' by saying 'the driver did this', 'the driver did that' as the retailer might draw conclusions, not to your advantage.

Better perhaps - 'a vehicle I was travelling in to your premises was issued with a parking charge .......'

The_Deep

So my question is - what's the next best route to complain to McDonalds? Most the threads I've read on here suggest emailing them is fruitless. Phone? Facebook? Other?

If they have Facebook/TtripAdvisor pages write bad stuff on them. Twitter, local paper/radio station, Head Office, MP.

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 they will be out of business by Christmas.

Coupon-mad

Or just say 'We want to complain and our whole family is incensed to think we got a PCN for daring to visit McDonalds...blah blah ''we'' did this...

BTW don't bother with Head Office of McD's, go in and speak to the Franchise Manager, waving a copy of the offending PCN (keep the original at home). Some of them cancel these every week, some don't.

applesponge

Unsurprisingly, no success via Facebook, phone or email.

I'm in the general area of the store for work on Weds, so might pop in with my letter and receipt to try in person.

If no luck, then I'll submit the first appeal.

Is it 28 days from date of issue of notice to appeal? i.e. if issue date is 6th June, I can appeal until 4th July? I'm about to leave the country until July 1st, so will submit the appeal when I get back if so.

Umkomaas

A windscreen ticket - day 26 (if the PPC allows online appeal) or around day 24 if by snail mail (with free Certificate of Posting from your Post Office counter).

A notice through the post as a result of a camera/ANPR capture, do it asap, but no later than the PPC's 28-day deadline.

applesponge

It was a notice through the post. Is it definitely 28 days from their date of issue of notice, rather than date of the 'incident'?

As mentioned, will be out of the country for next couple of weeks - don't want to appeal then miss out on time to put my popla argument together while I'm away.

Coupon-mad

Why not just appeal before you go, why on earth is this being debated?

Even if they come back within days with a POPLA code, you'd have a month to do POPLA.