APCOA PN Issued at SouthEastern Rail car park: Blue Badge not registered at Blue Badge portal

Coupon-mad

To the TOC (SouthEastern) first, telling them you are going to involve disability support charities, your own MP (name them)...

...and the Information Commissioner's Office, because this system relies upon excessive camera surveillance 24/7, which deliberately places an extra burden on disabled people that is not required of any other motorist. This is happening just because the operator wants to use a leaner, remote system and not pay for on-foot proper parking management of accessible bays.

Tell the ICO:

The bottom line: this excessive disabled-targeting surveillance and harvesting of 'special category data' from the DVLA (instead of affixing a windscreen PCN on the day) leads to an increased likelihood of multiple tickets by post three weeks later, often issued in batches to Motability vehicle users who may not even have been the driver, causing unnecessary harassment and distress to disabled people.

It is indisputably discriminatory to target users of these bays only. No system should impose barriers that require disabled people to take ANY extra steps that they wouldn't have to take on-street. Councils are not allowed to operate these bays by camera, and disabled people are entitled to a fair expectation that displaying their Blue Badge is enough, as it is on-street. The surveillance is unjustified.

Half_way

Mozart57 said:

Half_way said:

Do all drivers need to register at some sort of portal?

That signage is tiny 

What is meant by a "portal" there is no clear indication of what a portal is, or how to use it/get to it 

Do not identify as to who could have been driving, the vehicle/driver should be able to make use of any reasonable adjustments that they may need or any other occupant of the vehicle may need

By all means, complain to the railway company without referencing who could have been driving, main complaint would be discrimination based on disabled people having to undertake additional onerous and incomprehensible tasks that are not required of able-bodied passengers/service users, and they must remove this APCOA system immediately.

Also post on a rail specific forum here : https://www.railforums.co.uk/forums/disputes-prosecutions.152/

title it something like "Byelaw 14 offence - failure of disabled passenger to register on APCOA portal" 

there are rail industry types who frequent that board and anyone with a so-called railway  byelaw parking charge notice ( or whatever) should also post on there to clog it up 

You also need to complain to your MP, and ay other disability rights organisation you can think of - however be aware that you should post on here who you will complain to first as some may be operating hand in hand with the parking industry

I am thinking to complain to Scope and to Disability Rights UK. Is that OK?

I think it was/is DMUK that was (is?) in cahoots with the parking industry, not 100% sure on this though.

If you are going to send something, please post it on here so it can be seen ( and possibly used as a guide for others) 

And as with any railway so-called bye-law 14 you should also register and post on here, as previous

https://www.railforums.co.uk/forums/disputes-prosecutions.152/

Coupon-mad

I predict that the Rail forums guys won't get it though. They aren't very supportive IMHO.

The ICO will get it - I hope - if the complaint is written in the way I suggest about unjustified surveillance. High time people did this. 

kryten3000

DMUK's relationship with the IPC is distinctly problematic. Very cosy.

Mozart57

Half_way said:

Mozart57 said:

Half_way said:

Do all drivers need to register at some sort of portal?

That signage is tiny 

What is meant by a "portal" there is no clear indication of what a portal is, or how to use it/get to it 

Do not identify as to who could have been driving, the vehicle/driver should be able to make use of any reasonable adjustments that they may need or any other occupant of the vehicle may need

By all means, complain to the railway company without referencing who could have been driving, main complaint would be discrimination based on disabled people having to undertake additional onerous and incomprehensible tasks that are not required of able-bodied passengers/service users, and they must remove this APCOA system immediately.

Also post on a rail specific forum here : https://www.railforums.co.uk/forums/disputes-prosecutions.152/

title it something like "Byelaw 14 offence - failure of disabled passenger to register on APCOA portal" 

there are rail industry types who frequent that board and anyone with a so-called railway  byelaw parking charge notice ( or whatever) should also post on there to clog it up 

You also need to complain to your MP, and ay other disability rights organisation you can think of - however be aware that you should post on here who you will complain to first as some may be operating hand in hand with the parking industry

I am thinking to complain to Scope and to Disability Rights UK. Is that OK?

I think it was/is DMUK that was (is?) in cahoots with the parking industry, not 100% sure on this though.

If you are going to send something, please post it on here so it can be seen ( and possibly used as a guide for others) 

And as with any railway so-called bye-law 14 you should also register and post on here, as previous

https://www.railforums.co.uk/forums/disputes-prosecutions.152/

I've appealed against the PN. I've also made a formal complaint against APCOA, and to Steve White, MD of Southeastern. I've also written to my MP and two disability charities.

I'll post on this thread as soon as I hear anything. I'll also post then my complaint letter.

Once again, many thanks to all for tremendous and incredibly knowlegeable support.

Mozart57

This is my complaint to Steve White MD of Southeastern, followed by hiw reply:

Dear Mr White

I am furious. I have a disability and a Blue Badge which allows me to access free parking using the Disabled Parking bays at XXXXX. I have used a Blue Badge at this car park many times and have never before experienced discrimination.

On XXXX, I was occupant and registered keeper of vehicle registration XXXX that was parked in the car park in a Disabled Parking bay with the Blue Badge displayed.

On XXXX, I received a Penalty Notice (XXXXX) alleging the contravention of ‘Use of private car park without a valid payment/permit’, which was a matter of surprise and of great concern as I had no idea what it was I was supposed to have done to receive it.

I’ve since established that Southeastern and APCOA now require any disabled person who wishes to access free disabled parking to register on a web portal to access this service. There was no signage at the station indicating this change was coming or that it was now in force, save for extremely small print on a few signs around the car park.

My complaint is:

Southeastern is in breach of the Equality Act 2010

1.    Individuals with protected characteristics under the Act must have equitable access to services compared with those in non-protected groups. This is a legal right and further, such individuals under the act have a legal right to access any ‘reasonable adjustments’ provided by the landholder/client/operator to remove barriers to accessing said services - in this case, disabled parking bays.

2.    Previously, parking in a bay and displaying a Blue Badge was an acceptable means of accessing this service. At the time of the alleged contravention, the vehicle was parked in this manner and met the previous contractual arrangement.

3.    Signage at the car park now stipulates that disabled passengers MUST now be registered on a new portal to access this service. This contravenes the Act because service providers have a duty to make reasonable adjustments to ensure disabled people are not disadvantaged compared to other groups. This means taking steps to remove barriers that protect disabled individuals from accessing services on an equal basis to others, and failure to do so could mean the service provider is unlawfully discriminating against disabled people.

4.    This is plainly the case here where individuals in non-protected groups are able to access parking services either online (making payment on a website, through an app), by telephone (either through a phone call or text message), or in-person by paying at a ticket vending machine. Disabled individuals have no access to in-person service provision as displaying a Blue Badge no longer allows access to the service - they are mandated to register on the portal online to do so.

5.    This represents an unnecessary barrier to individuals with a protected characteristic accessing the service and no reasonable adjustment has been put in place for these individuals to access the service provision in-person despite those in non-protected groups still being able to do so under these changes.

6.    The effect of these new arrangements is that they deny a disabled person their statutory right to access a service and use a reasonable adjustment without penalty, and the evidence is the Penalty Notice I received which is illegal under the Act. The crux of the issue relates to in-person access to services, and unless a reasonable adjustment is put in place to enable this the new arrangements will remain non-compliant and disabled users of the car park are far more likely to receive a Penalty Notice than others.

7.    A further issue is if someone with a disability arrived at the car park, saw that they had to register on the portal in order to use the disabled parking bays and tried to do this whilst they were there (which involves: signing up to the site - registering vehicle details - submitting photos of the Blue Badge - submitting a further request for a permit to be issued to the vehicle - waiting for notification that the permit has been issued), they are entirely reliant upon APCOA promptly processing the registration and issuing the permit. If there were a delay to this (and research suggests processing can take up to 24 hours) they would still receive a Penalty Notice even though they’d signed up.

I have appealed against the Penalty Notice.

In addition to this formal complaint to you, I have made a complaint to APCOA about its predatory conduct and the distress this has caused me. I am also involving Disability Rights groups, The Information Commissioner’s Office and XXXXX, the Member of Parliament for XXXXX.

Yours sincerely,

XXXXX

********************************

Good evening XXXXX

 

I am sorry to learn of your complaint.

 

As you are now aware, we have introduced ANPR car parking at many of our stations in line with other car park providers. For those eligible blue badge holders, parking remains free but requires you to advise us on your registration number (or numbers) as the technology cannot process a displayed badge only a registration number.

 

These changes were discussed with our accessibility panel, subject a full EQIA and introduced with a number of reasonable adjustments put in place. It is our intention that you will be able to continue to park, free of charge at your station, and that we are able to ensure that disabled parking spaces are used only by those eligible.

 

I have cc our customer services team who will be in touch with you.

 

Kind regards

 

Steve

Mozart57

I heard yesterday that APCOA have been told to cancel the PN. Letter below.

Dear Mr XXXXX,

We refer to your recent correspondence relating to Penalty Notice XXXXXX. We have carefully reviewed your appeal and the evidence provided, taking into consideration all the points you have raised and, on this occasion, we have decided to cancel this Penalty Notice.

We have liaised with Southeastern Trains (SET) regarding your case and have been advised to cancel this Penalty Notice.

I can see that you have registered your Blue Badge on the Blue Badge Portal and your vehicle ‘XXXXX’ is now covered to park at XXXXXX, and other APCOA managed Southeastern Sites for Free. Whilst your Blue Badge has been registered on the Portal, please continue to display this within your vehicle when parked on-site. As this Penalty Notice has been cancelled, there is no further action required by you at this time.

Yours Sincerely,
Appeals Department

Mozart57

I'm not sure if this is the best place to post this as not many people will see it, but I would like to say what a brilliant forum this is and how fantastic it is to have this access to expert advice and the various templates.  Without it, I and many others who have benefitted from it would be quite defenceless against these rogues.

Coupon-mad

Well done on getting it cancelled.

However, APCOA have given their motives away by saying, effectively:

"we're shifting the burden to disabled motorists and making those persons jump through more hoops than able-bodied motorists and we're making our most vulnerable service users more likely to get PCNs. Our excuse is we want to use ANPR everywhere (because it's cheap AI with no meaningful human involvement) which can't check Blue badges. And we really, really want to get DVLA data as a first resort because that's immediate and easy for us but not immediate nor easy for you".

1. Ask them for a copy of the EQIA.

2. Ask them what their justification was and is, for harvesting 'special category' data as a first resort?

3. Ask them how long cars stay 'registered' for. If it's only a year or two, how will motorists be reminded when this 'code' system is due to expire for each person?

4. How exactly does this system protect accessible bays from a non-disabled person who could 'register' a relative's Blue badge as a one-off step then park free in APCOA disabled bays at any SouthEastern station?

5. How many PCNs have been issued specifically for use of disabled bays without registering, since this system changed and how many were paid? {Oh wait...they actually can't tell which PCNs are for using a Blue Badge bay now, can they?! This makes it even worse}.

----------

Please do stick around on the forum and be ready to answer the Government's questions in the imminent Public Consultation. If there are questions about camera use and/or disabled motorists' experiences I think you should tell them what APCOA are doing.

Not checking Blue Badges "because ANPR can't" isn't a lawful justification for camera surveillance nor getting DVLA data as their first resort. Think how many elderly people have just paid up, thinking it's a fine or bill and that it's their fault for not seeing small print on a sign they had no reason to walk over to.

kryten3000

They also miss the vital point that a Blue Badge belongs with the individual it is issued to and can be used by that individual in ANY vehicle. There is no link between badge and VRM other than this entirely artificial one cooked up by APCOA.

I have also recently seen charges issued where CCTV used to check if a badge was displayed, which in itself is problematic but at least shows that it is possible.