Right to park on freehold deeds - potential infringement

pretamang

what are they actually charging for? Is it a fee to park or a contribution to maintenance costs, are you obliged to contribute to these costs?

ThisIsWeird

BasilFawlty said:

I'm thinking now of writing to the neighbours. I learned yesterday however that a few have paid up. Save for a few, they're not a bright bunch if they're happy to pay for something they already have the right to use.
How do I approach the management company. I have to give them a reasonable time to respond and remove the bollards, but let's face it, that ain't happening. So when they don't, what then.
Where do I stand legally if I do remove them? Contractual breach would be a civil matter but short of physically removing the bollards, how do I enforcement my civil rights. Would it be criminal damage in any case to remove them?

Most likely, yes.

You first need to be certain of your rights; to park without hindrance and without cost (I guess 'cost' could, in itself, be considered a hindrance!) I strongly suggest you get this bit 100% right...

You then need to inform the new ManCo of these facts, and give them a reasonable time to correct their error.

Finally, you give them a date upon which you will have the right to remove their obstacles yourself, employ a contractor to do so - for which you'll sue them for the cost, or possibly you'll have the option to charge them parking fees if your car has to be located elsewhere.

I think that's the gist - but you'd be nuts to follow what I say without proper legal advice. For this, ask your sensible neighbours - one of them is bound to have LegProt.

The LP won't cost them anything. 

Most likely they'll first just guide their client on what to do, and ensure they are on the correct, legal, path. I'd imagine the LP will ask for a copy of the deeds to confirm the situation is as described. They may ask for further info such as info governing the possible rights of this new ManCo - do they somehow have powers that override that of the Freeholders? The client/your neighbour will likely have to do some of the initial legwork - getting that info, checking things out, passing it on to the LP team, for which you can all assist. 

Provided that what you understand to be the facts of this matter are correct, this should then be very straight-forward to sort out, and very enjoyable too.

BasilFawlty

pretamang said:

what are they actually charging for? Is it a fee to park or a contribution to maintenance costs, are you obliged to contribute to these costs?

They charge for a contribution for maintenance costs. Its historically been a reasonable amount even though there has never been any maintenance carried out.

This parking charge is separate. They wrote to residents offering to provide reserved parking (I never received a letter). A week later the bollards went up.

BasilFawlty

ThisIsWeird said:

BasilFawlty said:

I'm thinking now of writing to the neighbours. I learned yesterday however that a few have paid up. Save for a few, they're not a bright bunch if they're happy to pay for something they already have the right to use.
How do I approach the management company. I have to give them a reasonable time to respond and remove the bollards, but let's face it, that ain't happening. So when they don't, what then.
Where do I stand legally if I do remove them? Contractual breach would be a civil matter but short of physically removing the bollards, how do I enforcement my civil rights. Would it be criminal damage in any case to remove them?

Most likely, yes.

You first need to be certain of your rights; to park without hindrance and without cost (I guess 'cost' could, in itself, be considered a hindrance!) I strongly suggest you get this bit 100% right...

You then need to inform the new ManCo of these facts, and give them a reasonable time to correct their error.

Finally, you give them a date upon which you will have the right to remove their obstacles yourself, employ a contractor to do so - for which you'll sue them for the cost, or possibly you'll have the option to charge them parking fees if your car has to be located elsewhere.

I think that's the gist - but you'd be nuts to follow what I say without proper legal advice. For this, ask your sensible neighbours - one of them is bound to have LegProt.

The LP won't cost them anything. 

Most likely they'll first just guide their client on what to do, and ensure they are on the correct, legal, path. I'd imagine the LP will ask for a copy of the deeds to confirm the situation is as described. They may ask for further info such as info governing the possible rights of this new ManCo - do they somehow have powers that override that of the Freeholders? The client/your neighbour will likely have to do some of the initial legwork - getting that info, checking things out, passing it on to the LP team, for which you can all assist. 

Provided that what you understand to be the facts of this matter are correct, this should then be very straight-forward to sort out, and very enjoyable too.

Thank you for that

ThisIsWeird

BasilFawlty said:

pretamang said:

what are they actually charging for? Is it a fee to park or a contribution to maintenance costs, are you obliged to contribute to these costs?

They charge for a contribution for maintenance costs. Its historically been a reasonable amount even though there has never been any maintenance carried out.

This parking charge is separate. They wrote to residents offering to provide reserved parking (I never received a letter). A week later the bollards went up.

Have there been any parking issues before then - residents taking up too many spaces, outsiders doing ditto - or have there always been enough spaces for you all?

Could they have been responding to complaints from other residents about lack of parking? Then came up with this solution - but you missed out on the comms, somehow?

KittenChops

@Basil_Fawlty

From my very basic understanding, your rights cannot be removed without you having expressly agreed to that - and a private parking company (many of them are run by the people who used to run the now banned clamping companies - so they're basically scammers who send speculative invoices masquerading as "penalty" charge notices when they are actually "parking" charge notices) have no right to do such a thing without the express agreement of the land owner - who has no right to allow it.

Might be a good idea to have a look at the parking sub forum on here - perhaps post there too (or gets mods to move this thread perhaps?).  There are some incredibly knowledgeable people over there who will know exactly what you need to do to sort this


ETA - calling @Coupon-mad

BasilFawlty

ThisIsWeird said:

BasilFawlty said:

pretamang said:

what are they actually charging for? Is it a fee to park or a contribution to maintenance costs, are you obliged to contribute to these costs?

They charge for a contribution for maintenance costs. Its historically been a reasonable amount even though there has never been any maintenance carried out.

This parking charge is separate. They wrote to residents offering to provide reserved parking (I never received a letter). A week later the bollards went up.

Have there been any parking issues before then - residents taking up too many spaces, outsiders doing ditto - or have there always been enough spaces for you all?

Could they have been responding to complaints from other residents about lack of parking? Then came up with this solution - but you missed out on the comms, somehow?

Potentially, but the solution in my mind isn't to infringe upon my rights and ask for my money to get it 'back'.

If they'd numbered spaces and divided them equally among residents, bollarded them, and given access to residents only then thats different IMHO

ThisIsWeird

BasilFawlty said:

ThisIsWeird said:

BasilFawlty said:

pretamang said:

what are they actually charging for? Is it a fee to park or a contribution to maintenance costs, are you obliged to contribute to these costs?

They charge for a contribution for maintenance costs. Its historically been a reasonable amount even though there has never been any maintenance carried out.

This parking charge is separate. They wrote to residents offering to provide reserved parking (I never received a letter). A week later the bollards went up.

Have there been any parking issues before then - residents taking up too many spaces, outsiders doing ditto - or have there always been enough spaces for you all?

Could they have been responding to complaints from other residents about lack of parking? Then came up with this solution - but you missed out on the comms, somehow?

Potentially, but the solution in my mind isn't to infringe upon my rights and ask for my money to get it 'back'.

If they'd numbered spaces and divided them equally among residents, bollarded them, and given access to residents only then thats different IMHO

I agree. Just wondered if there's a different angle to the cause, other than they are trying to pull a fast one. Perhaps they thought they were doing what the residents wanted.
Even if so, it sounds clumsy at best.

Grizebeck

Definitely parking sub group!

BasilFawlty

How to get this moved over to parking?