Paid, displayed, but only partial plate

Same_same

I’d like to hear how you progress with this. I have a similar situation with this operator.

Been offered £20 penalty on appeal. They claim this is inline with BPA Code of Practice.

Unfortunately I didn’t keep the ticket, but they haven’t stated whether it was a minor or major miskey of VRM.

Thoughts?

Coupon-mad

They will sue, so it's up to you whether to pay £20 to make it go away or whether to crack on with POPLA.

Mildly_Miffed

Sorry for the delay in this...

Today is the last day for the £20 offer. Looks like I forgot to pay it. Oops.

POPLA appeal it is going to be. I've got a bit confused by the POPLA wording suggestions - my original NTK does include the 29 day keeper POFA wording. Is the terms and conditions angle the best one?

D_P_Dance

I would not pay even £20 for a minor keying error.  The fact that they have offered it would weaken their case imo.  and even if  they do take you to court and win, they are still going to be out of pocket.

Mildly_Miffed

While typing that, I received a delayed reply from the BPA.

"You did the right thing by appealing to the operator (One Parking Solutions). They have correctly followed our code of practice which sets out how operators should deal with keying errors, in the case where the motorist has paid for the parking.

The Code states that Major Keying Errors, (entering the first three digits of a VRM is an example of a major keying error), should be dealt with at the appeal stage.  If the motorist has paid for the parking but made this mistake it is appreciated that a cost to the operator has incurred, for processing the PCN, including a fee paid to DVLA  to obtain the keeper details.

We believe that it is reasonable for the operator to recover some of these costs by making a modest charge to the motorist of no more than £20. The operator has followed the guidance in the Code of Practice."

(It was the last three - CDE of AB12CDE - not the first, which is what's explicitly requested by the driver's home area pay and display machines.)

This now makes me wonder if the £20 may be the correct solution. What to do?

Umkomaas

If you've got the resolve, the time, the resilience and the willingness to do lots of research and drafting of a POPLA appeal (with only a 50:50 chance of success these days), and if you fail, months, if not years, of uncertainty as to when (not if) a court claim will drop through your letterbox, then the months of work to defend it (look at some of the huge threads here to see the amount of work) to save yourself 20 quid, carry on - but if it goes to POPLA, it's £100, if it goes to court (and you lose), you'll be looking at £200. 

Mildly_Miffed

Umkomaas said:

If you've got the resolve, the time, the resilience and the willingness to do lots of research and drafting of a POPLA appeal (with only a 50:50 chance of success these days), and if you fail, months, if not years, of uncertainty as to when (not if) a court claim will drop through your letterbox, then the months of work to defend it (look at some of the huge threads here to see the amount of work) to save yourself 20 quid, carry on - but if it goes to POPLA, it's £100, if it goes to court (and you lose), you'll be looking at £200. 

Thanks... I think.

Paid. Reluctantly. B'stds.

Umkomaas

Well it's now out of your hair. In extremis this could have dragged on for up to 6 years. It could have ended up consuming you. It's hard to put a price on peace of mind. 

Coupon-mad

Mildly_Miffed said:

Umkomaas said:

If you've got the resolve, the time, the resilience and the willingness to do lots of research and drafting of a POPLA appeal (with only a 50:50 chance of success these days), and if you fail, months, if not years, of uncertainty as to when (not if) a court claim will drop through your letterbox, then the months of work to defend it (look at some of the huge threads here to see the amount of work) to save yourself 20 quid, carry on - but if it goes to POPLA, it's £100, if it goes to court (and you lose), you'll be looking at £200. 

Thanks... I think.

Paid. Reluctantly. B'stds.

We did tell you that the £20 was correct under the BPA CoP.  What the BPA said was not news.  But get your own back in a more important way.

Please do us and yourself (and the driving public) a favour and stick around on this forum every week - at least for the Summer - to ensure you see when the Government publish and open the final Technical Consultation.

We will be talking about it and the public will have about 4 weeks we think, to tell the MHCLG what you think about the level of parking charges, that the MHCLG has admirably decided already will start at £50 (50% discount) and not £100:

Outcome of 2020 Consultation:

https://www.gov.uk/government/consultations/parking-code-enforcement-framework/outcome/parking-code-enforcement-framework-consultation-response

Planned Summer 2021 additional Public Consultation:

https://www.gov.uk/government/news/government-to-open-technical-consultation-on-fairer-parking-charges

It's not open yet but please keep check here to see when it is.  We need real people like you to counter the spamming that happened last time from the industry.

Mildly_Miffed

Coupon-mad said:

Please do us and yourself (and the driving public) a favour and stick around on this forum every week - at least for the Summer - to ensure you see when the Government publish and open the final Technical Consultation.

We will be talking about it and the public will have about 4 weeks we think, to tell the MHCLG what you think about the level of parking charges, that the MHCLG has admirably decided already will start at £50 (50% discount) and not £100:

(I can't post links, even in quotes)

It's not open yet but please keep check here to see when it is.  We need real people like you to counter the spamming that happened last time from the industry.

I will do.