Car lease company paid private parking company's parking charge & sent me the invoice to pay them.

Kim_13

MobileSaver said:

sjs2013 said:

This is the part of the rental agreement they're referring to as their authority to act on my behalf.

 All charges and legal costs for any congestion charge, road-traffic, parking offences or any other offence involving the rental vehicle, including costs from the vehicle being clamped, seized or towed away. You will accept that we will pay and recharge with a reasonable administration fee.

The above agreement section is vague at best & does not cover private parking scenarios.

As has been said already, I genuinely don't understand what you think is vague; that clause specifically states what will happen if you break any parking rules. (Perhaps you are wrongly assuming an offence can only be criminal when in fact they can be civil as well?)

I'm normally pretty gung ho with legal disputes but I certainly wouldn't feel confident challenging this one in court.

Having said that, it does seem an unwise business policy by the lease company; they end up paying what could be significant amounts to unvetted third-parties and then end up being piggy in the middle if the lessee disputes the charges. Why they don't just charge a reasonable admin fee and simply pass on the lessee's details is beyond me.

As the OP mentions having bought a ticket and that the photos taken by the PPC didn’t cover the area where the ticket was displayed, it’s more likely than not that they didn’t break any parking rules, and that the PPC were creative in what they photographed to make them look guilty. Where the lessee has broken clearly displayed terms, then I’d say it would be reasonable for the lease co to pay whether there might have been another way to squash the invoice or not and to recharge that cost, but the lease co hasn’t even asked the lessee for a copy of their ticket or evidence of having paid (which would wheedle out those who think they can just do whatever they please and take no responsibility.) That the clause was vague might be the only way to get the racket in court, on the basis that the interpretation most favourable to the party who didn’t draft the agreement would apply. Innocent until proven guilty, and until guilt is admitted or established there is no offence.

It would be a reasonable assumption that a majority of new/new ish cars are likely to be on finance or leased, and with lease companies just paying it’d be a lucrative scam (do they assume that their lessees will not admit to driving and that the invoice will bounce back to them? Meaning they then take the hit on those that are PoFA compliant and would have to absorb man hours without payment of administration fees to challenge those that were not.)

How long are lease agreements anyway? 3 years? You’d have thought they could define what a reasonable administration fee was for that period, cite it in the lease and not be so vague. 

Jenni_D

MobileSaver said:

sjs2013 said:

This is the part of the rental agreement they're referring to as their authority to act on my behalf.

 All charges and legal costs for any congestion charge, road-traffic, parking offences or any other offence involving the rental vehicle, including costs from the vehicle being clamped, seized or towed away. You will accept that we will pay and recharge with a reasonable administration fee.

The above agreement section is vague at best & does not cover private parking scenarios.

As has been said already, I genuinely don't understand what you think is vague; that clause specifically states what will happen if you break any parking rules. (Perhaps you are wrongly assuming an offence can only be criminal when in fact they can be civil as well?)

I'm normally pretty gung ho with legal disputes but I certainly wouldn't feel confident challenging this one in court.

Having said that, it does seem an unwise business policy by the lease company; they end up paying what could be significant amounts to unvetted third-parties and then end up being piggy in the middle if the lessee disputes the charges. Why they don't just charge a reasonable admin fee and simply pass on the lessee's details is beyond me.

I suggest you re-read the terms as written ... they certainly do not clearly cover private parking invoices. If they wished for the terms to do so then this would have been clearly written - it is not. Therefore the contra proferentem doctrine applies.

born_again

As the lease co actually own the car. Then they are free in many ways to do what they want when faced with these invoices. Looks like this is simply paying & bill the driver. 

sjs2013

born_again said:

As the lease co actually own the car. Then they are free in many ways to do what they want when faced with these invoices. Looks like this is simply paying & bill the driver. 

In that case their contract should've said "We as the owner/RK will do whatever we wish to do & you as a driver pay us for that". 

Then I don't think many people will sign that & get their car.

born_again

sjs2013 said:

born_again said:

As the lease co actually own the car. Then they are free in many ways to do what they want when faced with these invoices. Looks like this is simply paying & bill the driver. 

In that case their contract should've said "We as the owner/RK will do whatever we wish to do & you as a driver pay us for that". 

Then I don't think many people will sign that & get their car.

How many actually read the T/C?

Jenni_D

Regardless, if the T&Cs are ambiguous (which these are - as written; if the OP would actually say who the lease co. is then we'd be able to check them fully) then, as I said before, contra proferentem comes into play so the interpretation that favours the party that didn't write the terms (the consumer in this case) shall take priority.

Also, for all the reasons that @Fruitcake stated earlier in this thread.

sjs2013

born_again said:

sjs2013 said:

born_again said:

As the lease co actually own the car. Then they are free in many ways to do what they want when faced with these invoices. Looks like this is simply paying & bill the driver. 

In that case their contract should've said "We as the owner/RK will do whatever we wish to do & you as a driver pay us for that". 

Then I don't think many people will sign that & get their car.

How many actually read the T/C?

Unfortunately not many people read TCs. Hence the 'unfair terms in contracts' regulations come in to protect them to some degree. OTOH we consumers should be more aware too to be on the safer side. 

MobileSaver

Jenni_D said:

MobileSaver said:

sjs2013 said:

This is the part of the rental agreement they're referring to as their authority to act on my behalf.

 All charges and legal costs for any congestion charge, road-traffic, parking offences or any other offence involving the rental vehicle, including costs from the vehicle being clamped, seized or towed away. You will accept that we will pay and recharge with a reasonable administration fee.

The above agreement section is vague at best & does not cover private parking scenarios.

As has been said already, I genuinely don't understand what you think is vague; that clause specifically states what will happen if you break any parking rules. (Perhaps you are wrongly assuming an offence can only be criminal when in fact they can be civil as well?)

I'm normally pretty gung ho with legal disputes but I certainly wouldn't feel confident challenging this one in court.

Having said that, it does seem an unwise business policy by the lease company; they end up paying what could be significant amounts to unvetted third-parties and then end up being piggy in the middle if the lessee disputes the charges. Why they don't just charge a reasonable admin fee and simply pass on the lessee's details is beyond me.

I suggest you re-read the terms as written ... they certainly do not clearly cover private parking invoices.

That is your opinion but I and others completely disagree; several people have said the clause is vague but no-one has explained why they think it's vague.

If a bill is received from a parking company for breaking parking rules then on what basis do you think this is not clearly covered by "parking offences or any other offence involving the rental vehicle"?

I totally understand that if you were dealing directly with the parking company then you'd challenge the "speculative invoice" and look for 101 ways to get out of paying but if ultimately if you did break the rules then the parking invoice needs paying and in the case of this leased car the extra admin fee needs paying too.

Jenni_D

But the OP clearly declares that they didn't break the rules (whatever they allegedly were).

But to address your question:

All charges and legal costs for any congestion charge, road-traffic, parking offences or any other offence involving the rental vehicle, including costs from the vehicle being clamped, seized or towed away. You will accept that we will pay and recharge with a reasonable administration fee

I've highlighted the critical term ... no offence has occurred; the OP has allegedly breached a contractual term with the parking operator - that is not an offence in any understanding of the word. The way terms are written are key, and the Man on the Clapham Omnibus would not adjudge offence to relate to a contractual matter. I'm pretty sure @Fruitcake had already addressed this?

MobileSaver

Jenni_D said:

I've highlighted the critical term ... no offence has occurred; the OP has allegedly breached a contractual term with the parking operator - that is not an offence in any understanding of the word. The way terms are written are key, and the Man on the Clapham Omnibus would not adjudge offence to relate to a contractual matter.

Again, I completely disagree. Many companies have a contractual term for their employees that drinking on the job is a sackable offence... do you think the Man on the Clapham Omnibus would agree with your narrow interpretation of "offence" and let the drunk employee off? (We'll assume for impartiality that the drunk employee wasn't the driver of the aforementioned Omnibus. )