APCOA and Chiltern Railways PCN

AlwaysTrying23

Hi all,

The cowboys are after me again! At least this time I am appealing in the correct fashion in the first instance... 

I received a PCN dated 18/07/22 stating contravention is 'use of private car park without a valid payment/permit'. They have included grainy ANPR evidence showing the time of entry and exit of my vehicle. The carpark is free between the hours of 6:00pm and 2:30am. My vehicle is pictured leaving at 2:43am.

I plan to appeal using the blue text template below and will also be complaining to Chiltern Railways.

My query is at this point, should I ONLY use the blue text template below or is it worth including details around Railway land not being relevant land etc... With this PCN involving ANPR, I plan on removing the bold italic text within the blue text template to make it more relevant. 

When complaining to Chiltern Railways, is it worth simply highlighting that penalising the customer for their vehicle leaving the carpark 13 minutes into a new chargeable day at 2:30am is unreasonable, especially as there would be extremely few vehicles using the car park at that time in the morning meaning no loss would be sustained on their part. I could continue to explain Railway land not being relevant land or should this wait for POPLA complaint stage?

"I dispute your 'parking charge', as the keeper of the vehicle. I deny any liability or contractual agreement and I will be making a complaint about your predatory conduct to your client landowner.

There will be no admissions as to who was driving and no assumptions can be drawn. Since your PCN is a vague template, I require an explanation of the allegation and your evidence. You must include a close up actual photograph of the sign you contend was at the location on the material date as well as your images of the vehicle.

If the allegation concerns a PDT machine, the data supplied in response to this appeal must include the record of payments made - showing partial VRNs - and an explanation of the reason for the PCN, because your Notice does not explain it.

With this PCN implying an alleged overstay of minutes, your evidence must include the actual grace period agreed by the landowner."


Your feedback is appreciated!

Fruitcake

APCOA don't use PoFA compliant NTKs, so use the blue template and add something to the effect that their NTK cannot hold the keeper liable because it is non PoFA compliant, and the land is covered by railway byelaws so is not relevant land, therefore the keeper cannot be held liable.
Removing the paragraph about PDT machines is fine, as long as the driver's identity is not revealed, and the keeper sends the appeal.

Don't mention, "no loss" as that went out with the Beavis case in 2015. The keeper can of course mention lack of grace periods and ANPR inaccuracies, (doesn't record parking time, banned by the government for use in council car parks because it is not fit for purpose, inaccurate clocks etcetera) but APCOA are easy to beat anyway as long as the driver is never identified.

AlwaysTrying23

Hi all,

I complained to Chiltern Railways and after days of going back and forth, they refused to cancel the PCN as no train was disrupted enough to force my vehicle to run over the allocated parking period. 

It is therefore a good thing I also emailed the ‘blue text’ template to appeal officially with APCOA as instructed. Below is what I sent and their associated reply:

“I dispute your 'parking charge', as the keeper of the vehicle. I deny any liability or contractual agreement and I will be making a complaint about your predatory conduct to your client landowner.

There will be no admissions as to who was driving and no assumptions can be drawn. Since your PCN is a vague template, I require an explanation of the allegation and your evidence. You must include a close up actual photograph of the sign you contend was at the location on the material date as well as clear images of the vehicle.

As your allegation involves an alleged overstay of minutes, your evidence must include the actual grace period agreed by the landowner.

Conversely, since Railway bylaws apply, it would be more effective to cancel at this stage”

REPLY

“ Thank you for your letter received on 13 August 2022 regarding the above Parking Charge Notice.

At the time the ANPR cameras observed the vehicle they noted that it had used the car park without a valid payment, therefore it was parked in breach of the terms and conditions of the car park and a Parking Charge Notice was issued. It is the motorist's responsibility to ensure that they read the terms and conditions on the signage in the car park and that they have a valid payment for the entire time that they use the car park.

In your appeal you have stated that you want to see proof that APCOA Parking has the required authority to operate and issue PCNs at this site.

The agreement that APCOA Parking has in place with the landowner is a commercially sensitive document and therefore will not be provided as evidence in this appeal response. However, if the matter proceeds for legal action all relevant documentation will be provided to the court.

As a gesture of goodwill, we have cancelled the Parking Charge Notice on this occasion.”

My second win thanks to the amazing people on the forum. Please keep up the great work! 

Coupon-mad

Haha, what a contradictory load of template paragraphs!  Nicely done:

The agreement that APCOA Parking has in place with the landowner is a commercially sensitive document and therefore will not be provided as evidence in this appeal response. However, if the matter proceeds for legal action all relevant documentation will be provided to the court.

As a gesture of goodwill, we have cancelled the Parking Charge Notice on this occasion.”