Parking stories in the News/media

Nellymoser

Half_way said:

Nellymoser said:

Smart Parking expert parking management fails to identify 'double dipping' incidents at Elms Parade shops in Botley.

Drivers who visit the area twice in a day say they are receiving pcns from Smart even though they are not staying beyond the 2hr free parking limit.

Oxford West and Abingdon MP Layla Moran raised concerns with Mace Group, the West Way developers, to understand what steps are being taken to resolve issues there. 

The MP added: "More widely, Parking operators and their practices are an issue across the constituency. Parking management is a wild west with a lack of regulation, and we will continue to push to ensure fair and consistent practices are adopted for all."

https://uk.news.yahoo.com/oxford-mp-raises-parking-concerns-150000150.html

Time the IPC and BPA organised for their members a training event on how to perform pcn manual checks as outlined in own CoP.

Its about time that anyone who allows a ppc onto their land is made responsible and liable for things like double  dips, and PPCs and their directors/management banned from accessing DVLA data

Agree, it's an ideal solution, strangely one the Government doesn't want to consider. 

Half_way

Nellymoser said:

Half_way said:

Nellymoser said:

Smart Parking expert parking management fails to identify 'double dipping' incidents at Elms Parade shops in Botley.

Drivers who visit the area twice in a day say they are receiving pcns from Smart even though they are not staying beyond the 2hr free parking limit.

Oxford West and Abingdon MP Layla Moran raised concerns with Mace Group, the West Way developers, to understand what steps are being taken to resolve issues there. 

The MP added: "More widely, Parking operators and their practices are an issue across the constituency. Parking management is a wild west with a lack of regulation, and we will continue to push to ensure fair and consistent practices are adopted for all."

https://uk.news.yahoo.com/oxford-mp-raises-parking-concerns-150000150.html

Time the IPC and BPA organised for their members a training event on how to perform pcn manual checks as outlined in own CoP.

Its about time that anyone who allows a ppc onto their land is made responsible and liable for things like double  dips, and PPCs and their directors/management banned from accessing DVLA data

Agree, it's an ideal solution, strangely one the Government doesn't want to consider. 

another solution would be a complete ban on the use of ANPR for the generation of parking charge notices. 
it could still be used for basic monitoring, and with some payment methods (with some consumer focused failsafes) ie pay at pay machine systems on exit 

Nellymoser

And more 'double dipping' this time from Civil Parking Ltd at McDonalds in Poole

https://uk.news.yahoo.com/mans-10-minute-mcdonalds-parking-154909859.html

Tim Govier parked 10mins in McDonalds car park returning later in the day to use the drive-thru. Civil Parking Ltd accused him of parking for more than three hours.

The McDonald's manager told Tim at least 16 other people had also been affected by this error.

That's 17 people at one site who should NOT have had keeper details requested by Civil Parking Ltd and released by DVLA. 

IT'S TIME THIS WAS STOPPED. PPCs repetitive errors need penalised and a financial payment should automatically be awarded to the registered keeper.

MothballsWallet

Nellymoser said:

Half_way said:

Nellymoser said:

Smart Parking expert parking management fails to identify 'double dipping' incidents at Elms Parade shops in Botley.

Drivers who visit the area twice in a day say they are receiving pcns from Smart even though they are not staying beyond the 2hr free parking limit.

Oxford West and Abingdon MP Layla Moran raised concerns with Mace Group, the West Way developers, to understand what steps are being taken to resolve issues there. 

The MP added: "More widely, Parking operators and their practices are an issue across the constituency. Parking management is a wild west with a lack of regulation, and we will continue to push to ensure fair and consistent practices are adopted for all."

https://uk.news.yahoo.com/oxford-mp-raises-parking-concerns-150000150.html

Time the IPC and BPA organised for their members a training event on how to perform pcn manual checks as outlined in own CoP.

Its about time that anyone who allows a ppc onto their land is made responsible and liable for things like double  dips, and PPCs and their directors/management banned from accessing DVLA data

Agree, it's an ideal solution, strangely one the Government doesn't want to consider. 

Because it would affect a lot of their political donors.

What, me, cynical?

Coupon-mad

This poor chap - a paying patron - has a default CCJ from Euro Car Parks:



https://www.bridportnews.co.uk/news/25524060.eype-car-park-driver-warns-parking-fines-euro-car-park/



"Gabriel Grew-McEvoy insists he paid for a ticket at Eype car park but is now being asked to fork out 'an extreme amount' of money amid claims he didn't park in a designated spot.

Mr Grew-McEvoy is the latest motorist to find himself targeted by the car park operator Euro Car Parks. While the terms and conditions of the car park state that 'vehicles must be parked within marked bays,' Eype car park is comprised of grass and gravel, with no delineated parking bays.

During his visit to Eype to meet with friends, Mr Grew-McEvoy claimed the parking machine was not working and he struggled to pay via mobile due to a poor signal.

His payment did eventually go through and showed up on his bank statement. He said he challenged the initial charge and got no response and has now been sent a county court judgment (CCJ)."

And he does.

The letter pictured is a CCJ so he must have missed or ignored a Claim Form. And it looks more like a 5 minute rule case than 'parking in the wrong place' which would be highly unusual for an ANPR firm.

The BPA must be so proud.

Coupon-mad

Yet another McDonalds one, not sure if we have posted it already as there are too many!

https://www.stokesentinel.co.uk/news/stoke-on-trent-news/mcdonalds-drive-thru-diner-slapped-10573657.amp

McDonald's drive-thru diner slapped with £170 parking fine

A McDonald's diner has been threatened with legal action after getting a parking fine for taking longer than 20 minutes to eat his meal at a drive-thru. Ed Chatterton was slapped with the hefty bill for eating his £7.19 Chicken Selects meal too slowly at the West Midlands branch.

He's now been threatened with court proceedings despite receiving no notification of the fine in the post - until debt collectors got in touch. The letter from Trace said the original fine of £60 had now risen to £170 and he now faced possible legal action: "the clock is ticking as soon as you enter the drive-thru, the only way around it is to go inside to put your registration details in, but when you're having a drive-thru you wouldn't know."

Ocean Parking wittered some old crap to the journalist (not worthy of repeating here).

The BPA must be so proud.

Coupon-mad

Feethams again, featuring horrifically aggressive ex-clampers Excel Parking Services

https://www.thenorthernecho.co.uk/news/25542699.couple-fined-machine-error-darlington-car-park/

"A couple who were slapped with a fine after a “machine error” at a problem-plagued Darlington car park are warning other drivers after a six month battle. They said they paid £7.50 for a 24-hour ticket but were unknowingly refunded by Apple Pay two minutes later; and despite attempts to fix the issue, were eventually handed a parking charge notice.

Former software engineer John, from Hertfordshire, who was visiting the town for a friend’s memorial service, said: “I didn’t see anything until the next day. When we left the car park to go to the service, I was looking through Apple Pay and noticed the payment just said refunded.”

John said he called Excel via its helpline but claims the operator told him he could not pay the money right then. He has branded the system “not fit for purpose”.

Quelle surprise...following a story in The Telegraph, the PCN was quashed by Excel.

They now want to warn other drivers of the car park, which has been marred by complaints in recent years over fines and its previous strict time frames to pay up.

A spokesperson for independent appeal service, the International Parking Community (IPC), said it is investigating what measures can be put in place to prevent this happening again.

YEAH RIGHT...

Nellymoser

Think it's beyond the capabilities of the IPC to investigate what measures can be put in place to prevent this happening again. Repetative problems at Feethams have been going on for years MPs must be sick to death telling Will Hurley CEO and Founder of the IPC about them.

Nellymoser

SHAMED...Sainsbury's store in Beeston Nottingham 

Multiple new signs appeared across their car park informing customers the max stay had changed. One of the signs read: "To make it easier to find a space we have reduced the maximum stay on the car park to two hours."

Following backlash from customers the store was found to be breaching it's lease agreement by reducing customer free parking from 3hrs to 2hrs.

After the Council pointed this out to the store Sainsbury’s said "We are working to restore the signage to reflect the three-hour free parking policy as soon as possible, and we can reassure customers that they will not be charged for parking for up to three hours."

So why was the change made Sainsbury’s? Numerous customers reporting difficulties finding a parking space OR not enough pcns being issued by Euro Car Parks?

https://uk.news.yahoo.com/sainsburys-store-reverses-parking-decision-030000176.html

Umkomaas

So why was the change made Sainsbury’s? Numerous customers reporting difficulties finding a parking space OR not enough pcns being issued by Euro Car Parks?

Hmmmm. Let me have a think about that! 🤔