Government Consultation on the level of private parking charges - NOW OPEN!

onlyfoolsandparking

What happens if somebody DOES follow their rules but God forbid they still get a parking invoice which just to help you a little happens far too frequently for it to be any sort of genuine error, what's your stellar advice then?

let me guess, 'Should have parked somewhere else'

Johno100

AdrianC said:

Herzlos said:

AdrianC said:

It's a no-win situation.

Landowners need some way to prevent the terminally entitled from extracting the michael. Their options are severely limited.

Absolutely, but it's not these parking paracites who have form for issuing spurious invoices for anything they can, and once the problem parkers have gone they turn on the residents to try and get their money.

So what other alternatives do landowners have?

There's a huge distinction between parking on private land they have no right to and inconveniencing people, and stopping in an empty car park to respond to a phone call, or parking at the wrong side of a car park, or parking outside a shop and crossing to go to a cash machine before going in, and so on.

If a landowner doesn't want you to park somewhere then gate/fence off your land, not allow it to be used as a honeypot by PPC parasites.

If you are operating a car park and you want to charge for its use, then install barriers and use the pay on exit model, people are only charged for the time they spend there and evasion of parking charges is minimal. And why isn't that very popular with land owners and particularly PPCs? Because there is very little money to be made.

AdrianC

Johno100 said:

AdrianC said:

Herzlos said:

AdrianC said:

It's a no-win situation.

Landowners need some way to prevent the terminally entitled from extracting the michael. Their options are severely limited.

Absolutely, but it's not these parking paracites who have form for issuing spurious invoices for anything they can, and once the problem parkers have gone they turn on the residents to try and get their money.

So what other alternatives do landowners have?

There's a huge distinction between parking on private land they have no right to and inconveniencing people, and stopping in an empty car park to respond to a phone call, or parking at the wrong side of a car park, or parking outside a shop and crossing to go to a cash machine before going in, and so on.

If a landowner doesn't want you to park somewhere then gate/fence off your land, not allow it to be used as a honeypot by PPC parasites.

If you are operating a car park and you want to charge for its use, then install barriers and use the pay on exit model, people are only charged for the time they spend there and evasion of parking charges is minimal. And why isn't that very popular with land owners and particularly PPCs? Because there is very little money to be made.

So you'd have every shop or pub or other business install pointlessly expensive infrastructure to dissuade their legitimate trade... merely because there's a handful of the terminally entitled...?

Jenni_D

AdrianC said:

Johno100 said:

AdrianC said:

Herzlos said:

AdrianC said:

It's a no-win situation.

Landowners need some way to prevent the terminally entitled from extracting the michael. Their options are severely limited.

Absolutely, but it's not these parking paracites who have form for issuing spurious invoices for anything they can, and once the problem parkers have gone they turn on the residents to try and get their money.

So what other alternatives do landowners have?

There's a huge distinction between parking on private land they have no right to and inconveniencing people, and stopping in an empty car park to respond to a phone call, or parking at the wrong side of a car park, or parking outside a shop and crossing to go to a cash machine before going in, and so on.

If a landowner doesn't want you to park somewhere then gate/fence off your land, not allow it to be used as a honeypot by PPC parasites.

If you are operating a car park and you want to charge for its use, then install barriers and use the pay on exit model, people are only charged for the time they spend there and evasion of parking charges is minimal. And why isn't that very popular with land owners and particularly PPCs? Because there is very little money to be made.

So you'd have every shop or pub or other business install pointlessly expensive infrastructure to dissuade their legitimate trade... merely because there's a handful of the terminally entitled...?

You mean like LOTS of retail car parks do already? 🙄

Marvel1

It's quite simple to follow the rules - time limit it's free, don't abuse it.

10 mins driving around to look for a space! Come off it!

Pay and display - clue display the ticket.

I completed the consultation and stated I fully agree and if anything the penalty should be increased.

Appeal, maybe more leniency if enter the wrong reg mark by 1 digit.

Herzlos

AdrianC said:

So what other alternatives do landowners have?

Bollards, barriers, clear signage?

AdrianC said:

Park on somebody else's land, follow their rules... or park somewhere else.

That's the crux of it; you need to know the rules to determine if you want to park there, and parking companies are very bad at making the rules clear. They'd rather watch you walk off the site and break a rule to send you a made up £100 bill than yell "Hey, you can't do that". It's all about entrapment by the same people who used to hide behind hedges and pounce out with clamps.

If they did an honest job in a reasonable way I'd be 100% behind them, but they don't.

Herzlos

Marvel1 said:

Pay and display - clue display the ticket.

There's a car park somewhere that is essentially 2 different car parks with payment systems with a fairly subtle dividing line. So you go in, park, grab a ticket from the first machine you see and voila, invoice, because you went left instead of right.

Marvel1 said:

10 mins driving around to look for a space! Come off it!

With the ANPR system used to control that, many people who visit the same car park multiple times (such as using the free drop off to drop someone off and collect them later) are given invoices for enormous stays that never happened.

The appeals systems aren't regulated and are completely bent. None of the parking companies follow the rules properly (because there's no money in it) which is why they almost all lose a properly defended court hearing.

The current system is not fit for purpose.

I'm all for problem parkers being dealt with properly, but if you have a look at the parking forum it's full of people who've been tricked and essentially send a fraudulent invoice with menaces.

Jenni_D

Marvel1 said:

It's quite simple to follow the rules - time limit it's free, don't abuse it. [1]

10 mins driving around to look for a space! Come off it! [2]

Pay and display - clue display the ticket. [3]

I completed the consultation and stated I fully agree and if anything the penalty should be increased.

Appeal, maybe more leniency if enter the wrong reg mark by 1 digit.

[1] Agreed, and nobody is suggesting people should abuse the use of private land.

[2] The 10 minutes also includes the time needed to read and understand the T&Cs the driver is expected to be contractually bound to. In many cases some of the terms are held on a website; in most the text on signs is small and difficult to read, as well as being lengthy ... the average person can read at 200 words per minute; 1000 words on a sign (which is on the short side actually) would take 5 minutes to read.

And don't forget that at busy times it can easily take several minutes to find a parking space ... and ANPR cameras do not manage parking, they merely record time on site. (Contractual terms on signs are for parking not presence on site).

[3] Which most people do ... but the tickets are often designed to be flimsy and easily flipped by either the driver closing the door, or even the parking "warden" bouncing the car to make it flip or fall off the dash. (There's a reason why there's an expression called "fluttering tickets" and is one of the main reasons for PCNs being issued for "Failure to display"). The parking companies could easily resolve such issues - but they won't as it impacts their revenue, even though the driver paid and displayed!

It is clear that you don't understand what consumers are facing ... just pray that you never get a PCN yourself.