PCN for parking on private Car Park

ddbbrrmm2255

Dear Forum users,

I am looking for some advice regarding a PCN (£100 reduced £60) I received in the end of June about staying in a car park operated by Premier Park Ltd..

According to pictures taken upon entering and leaving of the carpark it was determined that I stayed in the car park for 2hrs 35mins.

I stayed in this car park to attend an event dinner of an event I was attending close by at a restaurant next to the car park and I was under the impression that the parking was free for visitors to this event.

Upon further research after receiving the initial PCN it turned out that I should have obtained some sort of voucher from the restaurant which would allow to park free for 2hrs.

I appealed to the initial PCN referring to the confusing system and ambiguous information provided by the restaurant staff and have now received an answer rejecting my appeal but reducing the payment amount to £20. When checking on the online payment system the case had not been updated and it still links to the reduced payment charge of £60 rather than the £20 stated in the mail or the £100 stated in the original PCN. In the mail I received from Premier Park they state the following reason for the rejection of my appeal:

“

Whilst we note the comments and reason for appeal, we can confirm that the vehicle remained on site for 2 hours and 35 minutes with no payment or permit made to authorise your stay. We must advise that this car park is run by Automatic Number Plate Recognition (ANPR) cameras which take a time and date stamped image of the vehicle on entry and exit, measuring the length of time the vehicle remained on site, this information is then cross-referenced with the data from the payment services & permit systems. Due to no payment or permit being found, we can confirm that this PCN has been issued correctly.

We are on this occasion prepared to accept the reduced amount shown above, this is to ensure we comply with section 17.4 Keying Errors of the British Parking Association (BPA) Code of Practice. Please note this offer is without prejudice save as to costs.

You have now reached the end of our internal appeals procedure and therefore you now have two options; you can either pay or appeal to POPLA - you cannot do both:

“

While it seems like a relatively clear case, I do feel that the penalty seems excessive, especially as the carpark was only half-full and I was attending an event at the restaurant associated to the car park and it generally didn’t feel straight forward how things were set up.

As I do not have much experience with these kind of charges I am looking for some initial advice on whether there is any point of appealing to POPLA about this.

Thanks in advance!

Half_way

Was this car park the restaurants car park?

What and where is this restaurant?

This is not a penalty, neither is it a fine

What happened when you complained to the restaurant, and what did you say?

Coupon-mad

No there is no point taking this one to POPLA.

Hate saying this but to be pragmatic I'd ring up and pay £20.

ddbbrrmm2255

@Half_way thanks for getting back to me. 
When I complained to the restaurants they said they couldn't help me as the car park is operated by the Marina and Premier Park and suggested me to appeal the notice. The restaurant seems to be seperate from the marina although it appears to be on the same property. You are right it doesnt say anything about penalty or fine....in fact they call it Parking Charge Notice, which I accidentally mixed up with the Penalty Charge Notice term, using the same abbrevation....sorry about that. 

@Coupon-mad thanks for having a look at this. 
I will follow your advice and just get this sorted now;/