Parking fine from Minster Baywatch

Frank47

My wife and me stayed In Southport for 2 nights 29th August 2022. We parked on a church carpark; we have parked before on this site but then it was only payable via coins in machine £6-50 for 24 hrs. This time it had been changed to a machine and for 24hrs it was £8-50 Paid first day then again, the next day both tickets were clearly displayed on my dashboard. about 2 to 3 weeks, we got a PCN with a fine for £60 if we paid in 14 days otherwise it would increase to £100. Explained that I didn't have the tickets as wasn't in the habit of collecting outdated tickets They rejected my explanation stated they could only find one payment against my car despite 2 payments being taken out. Suggested I appeal to Popla which must have taken 6 weeks and, despite my wife managing to upload copy of payments made they ruled in favour of Minster. I wrote a review against Popla expressing my feeling re how they could rule against me when I have produced evidence, their reply was, we had contravened operators? rules as we hadn't produced evidence to them, explained that money had been paid and taken out of my account he also advised that maybe we had missed a digit or number as far as I am aware I typed the same registration in both day's. I have got to 75 and never used one of these machines and won't be using them again. Would you please advise me if it is worth pursuing, Thank you

Fruitcake

It is not a fine.

Plan A is always to complain to the landowner and your MP.

If possible, get photos of the site and signage.

If that fails then ignore debt collectors but do not ignore a letter of/before claim or a court claim, which is quite likely with this outfit. If that happens, come back to this thread.

Coupon-mad

Just ignore Minster Baywatch. No paying them and please do NOT be spooked by debt demand letters.  No-one is coming knocking.

Come back to us if you get a Court Claim.

Frank47

Thank you for the advice this fine is dominating mine and my wife's days. I am angry that they can just fine me without even Interested when you try to explain eg that I paid contactless via debit card, their response being that I didn't provide evidence. One again thank you for responding with helpful advice

Frank47

Just to add I tried to get in touch with the Church whose car park I parked on but there is a statement on their site which states, they have nothing to do with any disputes as it? belongs or maybe land is rented to Minster Baywatch

Grizebeck

Its not a fine. Why do you keep refering it to as do when previously advised.
You still get in touch with landowner any statement is rubbish
It should be doninating anyones day
Again perspective is needed

Coupon-mad

Frank47 said:

Just to add I tried to get in touch with the Church whose car park I parked on but there is a statement on their site which states, they have nothing to do with any disputes as it? belongs or maybe land is rented to Minster Baywatch

Which is exactly what someone said last week, and we pressed them to cancel anyway, and the landowner cancelled it.

In the POPLA Appeal evidence did MB include an image of all payments made at the machine that day?  Could you see a close match to your VRM?

Frank47

I wondered the same thing myself! It's not a large carpark and not everyone parks for the full day, surely it wouldn't take long to work out who's cars were parked there that day. At no point did either MB or popla mention anything about that it could be a typing error when keying my reg in, When I posted review on Popla is when they mentioned "it could have been that" All MB said was that I had not complied with parking regulations but no actual reason.

Coupon-mad

But I asked "In the POPLA Appeal evidence did MB include an image of all payments made at the machine that day?  Could you see a close match to your VRM?"

MB must have, otherwise how did they prove you apparently DIDN'T Make two payments?

Frank47

MB State they could find only one payment that matched my car. In the letter they sent there was NO evidence of me contravening any rules/regulations only a photo shot of my car. I checked with my bank and TWO payments had been taken from my bank account on the same day. So, in answer to your question NO MB did not show any images of any payments. I also wrote to the church, although they have not acknowledged my letter only to say all car parking issues are dealt with MB and not them. Thank you for the reply

Coupon-mad

So, in answer to your question, NO MB did not show any images of any payments.

Send MB a SAR (to their DPO, as shown in the second post of the NEWBIES thread) and ask for the machine records that include your two payments - one having a small typo but easy to identify by their Fuzzy Whitelist technology offered by their ZatPark system - or the log showing the single payment, if they allege there was only one.  The other number-plates can be half redacted but must be shown sufficiently to eliminate a close match VRM, and this log must cover all machines at the location and all payments made between (time of arrival) and (time of leaving).