fine from smart parking

bella980

Hi
Im new and i may be posting this in the wrong place so forgive me if i have. I need advice please on wording my appeal to smart parking. The letter i received today with photos of me entering car park at 12:46:39 and leaving at 13:50:56 is stating i have either over stayed by 56 seconds or been there to long before getting a ticket. I remember it was busy, the parking attendant was up on the wall waving cars to spaces and also looking for change in Mothers purse as i only had notes. I walked to the payment machine, which took me a few seconds to figure out what to do and then got ripped off by not getting change out of the £2 i put in when it gave me 1 hour for £1.50 :mad:. I still had the ticket in the car and noticed today that had put an R at the front of my reg but apparently its the time I stayed. The ticket says i paid for it at 12:50 and the photo says i left at 13:50:56 so are they charging me for the time before or after and what do put in the appeal. Hope this makes sense.....many thanks

The_Deep

Read what an MP recently said in the House of Commons about Smart Parking.

Pete Wishart (SNP, Perth):

"I am sick and tired of receiving emails from people complaining about the behaviour of parking companies, telling me that they will never again visit Perth city centre because of the negative experience they had when they had the misfortune to end up in a car park operated by one of these companies. I have received more complaints about one car park in the city of Perth than about any other issue. That car park is operated by the lone ranger of the parking cowboys: the hated and appalling Smart Parking—I see that many other Members are unfortunate enough to have Smart Parking operating in their constituencies. It has reached the stage where one member of my staff now spends a good part of each day just helping my constituents and visitors to my constituency to navigate the appeals process.
…
The BPA does not have the ability to regulate these companies and has shown no sign whatsoever that it is trying to get on top of some of the sharper practices. The BPA gives a veneer of legitimacy to some of the more outlandish rogue operators by including them in their membership, allowing them to continue to operate. The Bill will oblige operators such as Smart Parking to amend their practices."

Why not complain to your own MP as it is the will of Parliament that these scammers be put out of business.

Hopefully that will take place in the near future. The Bill has passed through the HOC without hitch, and goes to the Lords soon. In the meantime involve your MP, the poor dears are buckling under the weight of complaints about these scammers.

This is an entirely unregulated industry which is scamming the public with inflated claims for minor breaches of alleged contracts for alleged parking offences, aided and abetted by a handful of low-rent solicitors. Is has been suggested by an MP that some of these companies may have connections to organised crime.

Parking Eye, CPM, Smart, (especially Smart}, and others have already been named and shamed in the House of Commons as have Gladstones Solicitors, and BW Legal, (these two law firms take hundreds of these cases to court each week), hospital car parks and residential complex tickets have been especially mentioned. They lose most of them, and have been reported to the regulatory authority by an M.P. for unprofessional conduct

The problem has become so widespread that MPs have agreed to enact a Bill to regulate these scammers.

Sir Greg Knight's Private Members Bill to curb the excesses, and perhaps close down, some of these companies passed its Third Reading in late November, and, with a fair wind, will become Law next year.

All three readings are available to watch on the internet, (some 6-7 hours), and published in Hansard. MPs have an extremely low opinion of the industry. Many are complaining that they are becoming overwhelmed by complaints from members of the public. Add to their burden, complain in the most robust terms about the scammers.

Redx

they dont have pictures of you, they have pictures of the vehicle entering and leaving, and they have traced the vehicle keeper to you , hence this pcn (they monitopr vehicles, not people)

appeal as KEEPER using the blue text template appeal from the NEWBIES FAQ sticky thread near the top of this forum, no additions or subtractions

no blabbing about who was driving either

the DRIVER drove on the day and parked

the KEEPER received this NTK in the post, so the KEEPER is appealing it

KeithP

As the registration number was recorded wrongly, for whatever reason, I think you'll find that they are saying that no fee was paid for a car with your registration number.

Anyway, that's not important at this time.

Read post #1 of the NEWBIES FAQ sticky thread where you will find an already written for you blue text template appeal.

Send that appeal unchanged - no additions or alterations necessary.

Send it as the keeper.


But before you do that you need to edit your post to remove clues to the driver's identity.

It was the driver who parked the car and it was the keeper who received the PCN through the post.

There is no place for the word 'I' when describing events on the day.

The parking companies are know to trawl this forum just waiting for people to trip themselves up and can try and use your posts against you.

bella980

Hi
Thanks for the help. What happens next? I've sent the template through the appeal page so do I wait to find out what exactly they are fining me for or do I write to my MP anyways. I'm not letting them get the better of me especially when my daughters fiance has just told me he got fined for parking with a wheel on the white line of the parking bay...and paid it...
Also, i did call them earlier before coming on here and the woman said she couldn't find the pcn on the system, probably because of the error with the extra letter in the reg so i dont know if it will be logged as a call or not. I had to say it was me driving as the car isn't in my name. i also cant find how to edit my posts.

Coupon-mad

I've sent the template through the appeal page so do I wait to find out what exactly they are fining me for

What's next, is complain to your MP to add to the weight of Parliamentary disgust about this industry.

Sit tight re the appeal and Smart will most likely cancel later this month. They don't like seeing the MSE template appeal as they know you'd win at POPLA, so they often fold!

my daughters fiance has just told me he got fined for parking with a wheel on the white line of the parking bay...and paid it...

Daft. He needs to learn!

I am currently appealing a Council PCN for my DD's boyfriend and he trusts me to win it. Neither he nor my DD would ever pay a PCN, private or Council, without looking into appealing it first. Young people need to know how to beat scams to keep money in their pockets.

Also never to phone parking firms!

i did call them earlier before coming on here and the woman said she couldn't find the pcn on the system, probably because of the error with the extra letter in the reg so i dont know if it will be logged as a call or not. I had to say it was me driving as the car isn't in my name.

Ouch. Oh well, let's hope Smart can't remember that you phoned. They have proved not to be very smart at all so I expect they'll have no clue.

You can edit your post when NOT looking at the forum on a phone!

bella980

Thanks for all the info again, i will write to my MP tomorrow. Im on my laptop and cant find edit anywhere.

KeithP

bella980 wrote: »

Im on my laptop and cant find edit anywhere.

At the bottom of every post you have written there is an edit button.



Can you work out which one it is?

bella980

Dur...thanks