NEW ADDRESS HAS JUST INTRODUCED PARKING MANAGEMENT

nosferatu1001

Yes, and any issue is between your landlord and the freeholder. Youre not a party to it. 

Fruitcake

As above, your contract/AST is with whoever you lease the property from, not the MA or the PPC.

tom_cahill

Okay thanks.

I am going to write to each tenant and explain these issues to them so they are aware of this grimy company.

Is there any information you think i should be careful with or that I should omit? I don't want to get myself involved with legal wranglings int eh future - I do not have the time nor the inclination. I just don't want people, including myself, to be scammed.

KeithP

tom_cahill said:

I am going to write to each tenant and explain these issues to them so they are aware of this grimy company.

Is there any information you think i should be careful with or that I should omit? I don't want to get myself involved with legal wranglings int eh future - I do not have the time nor the inclination. I just don't want people, including myself, to be scammed.

Feel free to post your proposed circular here if you wish. I am sure you will get constructive comments.

tom_cahill

Okay sorry for the essay...

___________ have recently appointed Parking Control Management Ltd and I just wanted to make all residents aware of what this immoral company is all about:

 

·       Firstly, if you are a tenant here and signed an Assured Shorthold Tenancy agreement at the beginning of your lease then you might want to check this document to see if it mentions a parking space/parking/any requirement to show a parking permit. If it does not mention this, then any attempt to issue a “fine” against you for “misuse” of the car park is not legally enforceable. Your tenancy agreement cannot be altered after you have signed it by any third party without your consent and agreement. Therefore, any “fine” given to you is null and void as soon as issued.

·       This company is one of many that DOES NOT act in the best interests of the residents it claims to serve. It will complicate matters as much as possible to try to catch you out so that it can fine you £100 or £60 if paid within 14 days (aww, how considerate!) Think about this…potentially £100 for parking outside your own home in a parking space that you are entitled to use??? Insane.

·       An example of this would be the following: let’s imagine you have displayed your permit but it somehow falls off the windscreen and out of sight or that you buy a new car and forget to transfer the permit to the new vehicle. In these circumstances PCM will issue you with a £100 “fine” even if you contact them to explain you are a resident who has a right to park there. They do not care if you are a resident- they just want your money. Let’s now imagine that a relative/tradesman has dashed over in an emergency to help you and they park up for a few minutes without displaying one of their bargain “parking scratch cards”…guess what…if they catch this vehicle then they will give them a “fine”. Surely they will waive the “fine” if I just explain the extraordinary circumstances? Nope…they might knock a bit off but they will still hold your friend/family member/tradesman liable and pursue them.

·       This leads me to the next point – are these “fines” legally enforceable? In short the answer is no in most cases BUT they will take you all the way to court in order for you to prove this. Before they do this they will try the following dirty tactics:

o   Sending threatening letters asking for random sums of money - £100 then £60 then suddenly £180 etc

o   IF this fails they will then send you letters from a “debt collector” claiming they will seize the money soon. They won’t and they aren’t bailiffs so they have no legal power whatsoever. They are just trying to scare you.

o   If this fails, they’ll do the same as above but this time from a different company trying to make you think it has been escalated. It hasn’t, in fact it’s the same company as before but under a different name.

o   If that fails, they will send you a Letter Before Claim which basically means that they will soon be filing a court date and at this point you MUST respond or you could find yourself with a CCJ further down the line (you would only get one if you didn’t pay up within 30 days of it being awarded by a County Court Judge). You can either pay up or advise them that you will see them in court and at this point you need to take legal advice.

o   If you still haven’t been scared into paying up yet they might try one last ploy, and this has happened to me, and they will send you a letter claiming that they HAVE been awarded a CCJ against you, even though they haven’t. Yes, it is legal to downright lie like this in order to scare people into handing over their hard earned money.

o   I suggest you look at the google reviews for this company if you still aren’t convinced of their malice.

 

I apologise for the rant but I have been through this process myself in the recent past and it wasn’t particularly pleasant. However, I am writing to you all out of courtesy to let you know just what type of company _____________ are employing here and so that you can save yourself from potential stress and financial loss in the future.  We are all good people who are just trying to live in harmony and I don’t believe we deserve to lose our time and money just because we wanted to park outside our own homes.

Fruitcake

I think it is a bit too long. (Other opinions are available). I can imagine many residents giving up part way through and not bothering to do anything until it is too late. Yes you need to warn residents in writing, but it needs to be less than one page, but do offer to provide more detailed information as you have already provided above, Include a link to this forum as well, telling them to see for themselves how many millions of PCNs are issued every year.

I think the first two paragraphs are okay, but you need something to grab everyone's attention. Tell them that once rogue non resident parkers have been stopped, the scammers will target residents as they have done all across the country.
Mention the words our MPs across all parties have used to describe these companies; scammers, rogues, and bloodsuckers to name but a few.
Also mention that this company take regularly take people to court, many of whom will have parked in their own space.

tom_cahill

No I agree it is way too long. I just wanted to get my thoughts down on paper. I assume if they've already put signs up it's too late to stop them being brought in?

Umkomaas

tom_cahill said:

No I agree it is way too long. I just wanted to get my thoughts down on paper. I assume if they've already put signs up it's too late to stop them being brought in?

Maybe, maybe not. One thing's for sure, if they start to immediately hassle residents with PCNs (they won't be able to resist), you will be pushing at a very open door. 

Beware any cuckoo in the nest - a Norris Cole - who will be only too pleased to photograph a neighbour's car so that any bounty offered by the PPC can be in his pocket within days!

NeilCr

Have you spoken to your landlord about all this?

They might have more information about the background and whether there was a vote etc. I'd be inclined to do this before putting pen to paper as you might glean something useful

Who owns the freehold of your block? Is everybody a tenant?

ETA

And yes definitely too long.

Coupon-mad

tom_cahill said:

So would the AST agreement have primacy over the agreement between PCM and the management company even if they had balloted the landlords and they had voted in favour of bringing in PCM?

Moot point, because they won't have done.