PCN Cancellation Success - Lidl BlackBird Hill

thepeopleschamp

Wanted to report a successful PCN cancellation after receiving one at Lidl BlackBird Hill - Wembley as I had overstayed for 14 minutes.
I initially spoke to the store who advised to ring Lidl Customer Services. I decided to email instead and got a response from them saying they couldn't help and to go through Athena.
I sent another email this time addressed to the CEO explaining that I'm a loyal customer and they cancelled for me with the following response:

Re: Your Contact


Thank you for taking the time to contact our CEO. I have been asked to reply on his behalf.

I was sorry to learn that you received a parking charge. I appreciate this may have been frustrating for you.

Lidl is a national retailer. As such, we have stores in locations with limited parking space and in common with many of our competitors, our store car parks are abused to a significant and detrimental extent. We have therefore judged it necessary to take measures so that our stores parking facilities are available first and foremost to our customers.

In order to ensure that sufficient parking spaces are available at all times to our customers, Lidl employs third party contractors to monitor and control our car parks. So far, this service has proved reliable and effective in reducing car park abuse and in freeing up spaces for our customers.

In light of your comments, on this occasion only, I have requested that the parking charge is cancelled. Athena will confirm the cancellation in writing in due course.

Thank you again for contacting us.

Yours sincerely,
For and on behalf of Lidl Great Britain Limited


Kayleigh Hogg
Customer Service Management

Redx

What they fail to address is why genuine customers are targeted and why they restrict the time to a foolish 90 minutes instead of say 3 hours like my local Morrisons where ecp monitor the car park, plus where you can ask the customer service desk to add more time on if needed

Or why the same customer service she works for initially rejected the first email and then did a u turn on the second email

Umkomaas

It's only the approach to the CEO - Christian Haertnagel - that will gain any success with a Lidl/Athena parking charge. Well done on eventually getting there. The other two approaches have always been reported here as failures.

fisherjim

So if you are queuing again and their tills are so congested you will be going over the time limit, present the manager with a trolley full produce ask him to re-stock it as they will give you a PCN and walk out.


But otherwise well done.

beamerguy

In light of your comments, on this occasion only, I have requested that the parking charge is cancelled. Athena will confirm the cancellation in writing in due course.

Well done, the CEO is the way to go.

The comments above are a copy and paste we have seen before.

"on this occasion only" ....... That means if you continue to shop at Lidl and get another ticket, they will not help you.

Fancy Lidl attempting to treat their customers like children

thepeopleschamp

Redx wrote: »

What they fail to address is why genuine customers are targeted and why they restrict the time to a foolish 90 minutes instead of say 3 hours like my local Morrisons where ecp monitor the car park, plus where you can ask the customer service desk to add more time on if needed

Or why the same customer service she works for initially rejected the first email and then did a u turn on the second email

I mentioned in my email that there is an Asda down the road which allows 3 hours and that these parking firms are giving Lidl a bad reputation

thepeopleschamp

Here is the email I sent the CEO

Dear CEO Haertnagel

I find this response from your customer service team very disappointing and feel like it is a lazy and automated response not taking in consideration any of my points which have been raised.
I am a loyal Lidl customer despite having other stores such as Asda and Tesco within a 1 mile radius of the Lidl store and on this occasion nearly £85 was spent in the store yet I was issued a PCN for overstaying for 14 minutes. As you are aware a shop visit can sometimes take longer than 90 minutes especially when you take in account the time to park, pick up items, queue at the checkout and then load shopping in the car and exit the car park. On this occasion I had two other family members who also carried out their shopping as we decided to car-share as we are conscious of our environmental responsibility.

I had a PCN issued when parked at an Iceland store and they were able to cancel it when I approached them directly. These private parking firms are giving your supermarket a bad reputation and if stores like Iceland have the authority to cancel then I don’t see why you cant take such action. Please re-consider and ask Athena to cancel as the parking firms never cancel tickets when appealing.



Kind Regards

jackyboyw

I'm in the same boat, what information did you provide to the CEO in your email? Thanks.

Coupon-mad

But it's right there shown! Read it.

jackyboyw

I mean exactly what info.. number plate? case ID, PCN number etc or just my name.

Coupon-mad

Obviously the PCN number or how can they cancel it?