£100 fine for 10 mins in EURO CAR PARKS whose pay-meters did not recognise registration plate number

Fruitcake

Use all the template PoPLA appeal points that are available from the third post of the NEWBIES, including all the ones I listed, plus the very long inadequate signage point from the NEWBIES.
Do use the terms, frustration of contract and, void for impossibility, because I believe they both have specific meanings in law.

As for their comment that you should have paid by 'phone, this was not a viable option because the ANPR system had not recognised your VRM. Correctly entering it into a pay by 'phone app would still have resulted in their system not matching it to the VRM the ANPR had interpreted when it converted the image from the camera via character recognition software to the incorrect VRM recorded on their system.
In any case, you had spent so much time trying to get their unfit for purpose system to recognise the real VRM instead of the false one generated by their system, that you had already exceeded any consideration or grace period, so left the car park without parking.

Covid regs permitting, get pics of the site and signage in the same light conditions as that of the alleged event.

brianposter

OP, you are feeling far too guilty about this. How do ECP know that you even had a phone ?

The facts are that you went to park your car, THEIR payment system repeatedly failed to function and you left. That you were only there for 10 minutes is perfectly good evidence to support your story.

ECP are wasting your time and you need to write in those terms. You do not need any excuses.

KeithP

Maz_77 said:

Hi KeithP , thanks for the information.  I am not sure I found the correct Newbies page...

And I have yet to find the Newbies Sticky link that has been mentioned in this thread [If you could send a link(s) to this it would be much appreciated?].

You were given a link to the NEWBIES thread by @Ralph-y in the very first reply you received on this thread. You just need to scroll down to the third post on that NEWBIES thread for guidance on how to create a winning PoPLA appeal..

Maz_77 said:

Lastly, is there any standard information on each point that I could paste into my letter & if so, where might I find this please? 

Yes there is.
There are paragraphs just waiting to be copied from that third post in the NEWBIES thread.

Coupon-mad

HouseTargaryen said:

You write a lot, but 99% of what you say has no bearing on the fact you left your car on their car park knowing you didn't pay. You should have just drove out and found somewhere else to park. If I walk in to Tesco and their self service machine isn't working, checkouts are closed and no staff in sight, do I take my sandwich and walk out their shop? No. And if I did, not only would I have to pay for it, I may get a criminal record.

Could you avoid giving wrong advice on a parking board that has regulars who are helping people backed by real knowledge?  Thanks.

Luckily for the consumers in this Country, Sir Greg Knight (who was behind the change in law that is this year seeing a statutory Code of Practice finalised to rein in rogue parking firms and dodgy, or just plain unfair practice) doesn't agree with you about a car park where the machines are not working:

https://hansard.parliament.uk/commons/2018-02-02/debates/CC84AF5E-AC6E-4E14-81B1-066E6A892807/Parking(CodeOfPractice)Bill

Sir Greg Knight:
If there are a number of payment machines and one of them is not working, that is not an excuse, but if there is only one machine or all the machines are out of order, that ought to be a perfect defence. The company operating the car park has in effect invited the motorist on to the car park to park the car on payment of a fee, and if it is not going to facilitate payment, it should not be able to extract a penalty.

Rip-offs from car park cowboys must stop.  Most parking operators have nothing to fear from the Bill, but we must stop unscrupulous operators who are undermining the whole sector with their bad practices.

The proposals in the Bill form a framework for action. If it is approved, it will require the Government to create a new mandatory code of practice across the private parking sector, which will end inconsistent practices and unfair treatment of British motorists. It will ensure that the terms under which private parking is provided, including the rights and obligations of each party, are fair, clear and unambiguous.

 Just be lucky you don't have a criminal record for your act and pay up. 

LOL, luckily, no-one would be that daft.

Umkomaas

@Maz_77, you could do worse than adding the quote from Sir Greg Knight (kindly shown by @Coupon-mad above) into your POPLA appeal. Let's see how they deal with that, and if they reject it, well I'm sure we'll want to show Sir Greg just what POPLA make of his democratically elected point of view!  This is the quote:

Sir Greg Knight:
If there are a number of payment machines and one of them is not working, that is not an excuse, but if there is only one machine or all the machines are out of order, that ought to be a perfect defence. The company operating the car park has in effect invited the motorist on to the car park to park the car on payment of a fee, and if it is not going to facilitate payment, it should not be able to extract a penalty. 

Rip-offs from car park cowboys must stop.  Most parking operators have nothing to fear from the Bill, but we must stop unscrupulous operators who are undermining the whole sector with their bad practices.

The proposals in the Bill form a framework for action. If it is approved, it will require the Government to create a new mandatory code of practice across the private parking sector, which will end inconsistent practices and unfair treatment of British motorists. It will ensure that the terms under which private parking is provided, including the rights and obligations of each party, are fair, clear and unambiguous.

Half_way

HouseTargaryen said:

You write a lot, but 99% of what you say has no bearing on the fact you left your car on their car park knowing you didn't pay. You should have just drove out and found somewhere else to park. If I walk in to Tesco and their self service machine isn't working, checkouts are closed and no staff in sight, do I take my sandwich and walk out their shop? No. And if I did, not only would I have to pay for it, I may get a criminal record. Just be lucky you don't have a criminal record for your act and pay up. 

This advice from House targaryen is not only wrong, but potentialy harmful, please be aware that this is an open forum, and people with vested interests such as those invovled with the un regulated private parking industry read and sometimes post on here, as well as the usual trouble makers

D_P_Dance

What HW is saying is that some PPCs have been known to come on here to deliberately misinform.  

fisherjim

HouseTargaryen said:

You write a lot, but 99% of what you say has no bearing on the fact you left your car on their car park knowing you didn't pay. You should have just drove out and found somewhere else to park. If I walk in to Tesco and their self service machine isn't working, checkouts are closed and no staff in sight, do I take my sandwich and walk out their shop? No. And if I did, not only would I have to pay for it, I may get a criminal record. Just be lucky you don't have a criminal record for your act and pay up. 

And you write very little but all of it is garbage, you obviously read very little also as the OP did nothing wrong and tried very hard to pay for their parking.

As for your final statement if you have no idea what you are talking about try filling your lockdown time somewhere where you have a modicum of knowledge.

MothballsWallet

brianposter said:

OP, you are feeling far too guilty about this. How do ECP know that you even had a phone ?

The facts are that you went to park your car, THEIR payment system repeatedly failed to function and you left. That you were only there for 10 minutes is perfectly good evidence to support your story.

ECP are wasting your time and you need to write in those terms. You do not need any excuses.

OP: as @brianposter said, and it's also not a legal requirement for a driver to have a phone, not everyone does.

It took a long time before my mum bought a simple mobile phone to keep in the car so she could call for assistance from the AA (she was a member at the time) if she needed it.

D_P_Dance

Is this perhaps not a matter for Trading Standards?