Yup, 'fraid so. outstayed my welcome on the local Morrisons free car park. I've been using it over 35 years and spent thousands in the place, which is a bit of a dump...but handy. Ex Safeways.
Anyway I hadn't noticed the small signs ' fining ' one for more than 2 hours......tough. The first ' ticket came whilst I was in hospital, wifey told me, panicking. I told her to ignore it, she knew the gen from my previous form. They wanted £85...I bet they did ! 2 weeks later, another one, still £85, nice front and back pictures of the Vitara, with the times shown on these two. They film you in and out, haven't got the bottle to have a man put something on the screen.
Next one, no nice pictures this time, came on "20th March......more threatening...good job I'm not a poor old pensioner !.....oh, just a mo, I am ! Nothing to ignore since then, feeling quite neglected now. A friend got one from the same firm, Parking Eye, a few weeks ago. This time for overstaying somewhere in Uttoxeter and initially for £100. He knows the score as well but we haven't compared notes yet as he's on a cruise atm.
Figures released by the DVLA under the Freedom of Information Act indicate that Parking Eye have made over 900,000 applications for owners details. If you knock a number off for non-payers, I would imagine it still tots up to a chunky bit of money at a minimum of £50 a catch for them, for basically doing nothing ! I wish the DVLA would put their prices up a bit or stop doing it.
Nice work if you can get it.
Ted
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I thought the law had changed so the vehicle owner was responsible as in other things, thereby taking the onus away from the parking shark to prove who was driving/parking.
Doesn't the change mean a much more likely outcome in favour of the parking company in the unlikely event it reaches court?
Not as i'm trying to worry you Ted, you can afford that posh lawyer, the one who gets all the other Cheshire millionaire celebs off..:-)
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It has only changed inasmuch as they can now chase the registered keeper if they can't find out who was driving it.
The other aspects of having to take you to County Court and only being allowed to claim back what they've lost, not a penalty, remain the same.
I was taken to court many years ago by an advertising firm producing an in-house local hotel magazine. I signed up for a year at somewhere around £400. When I got the invoice in the post, I found I'd signed for 2 years ! I had the carbon copy I signed..they'd made out a new top copy. It didn't match ! They took me to Preston County Court for over £800. I turned up and exercised my right to have the case transferred to Manchester.
Their solicitor, looked about 17, wasn't best pleased. Especially when I told him to go back to his clients and suggest they dropped the action, being a load of forgers !
They didn't turn up at the case in Manchester and the big man awarded me costs. I think they went out of business a few months later.
I did the breakdown call-out work for the hotel anyway, using the simple method of a few cards behind the counter and a fiver to the receptionist on duty.
Ted
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>>Their solicitor, looked about 17, wasn't best pleased. Especially
>>when I told him to go back to his clients and suggest they dropped the action,
>>being a load of forgers !
>>
That can produce positive results.
I remember talking to a bloke who had a long running saga over botched fitting of double glazing.
To cut a long story short, the cowboys who did it eventually sued him. He wrote to their solicitors and pointed out that their clients were a bunch of lying scumbags, including actual evidence refuting every outright lie they'd told (i.e. the entire case). He went on to suggest that representing a bunch of lying scumbags wasn't doing the solicitors' reputation any good and that they might like to reconsider their position.
He wasn't expecting a response and was thus royally amused when the legal firm dropped their client like a hot rock, leaving the company up the creek over both his and quite a few other cases. The company went pear-shaped shortly afterwards.
He waited a bit and then hired someone competant to refit the, now free, windows......
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Why was your car parked there for that length of time, Ted?
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There is a tram stop right next to this car park, so it is very easy to get confused. You go into Morrisons to buy some grocery stuff and you end up on a tram going into the city centre.
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Really?? They have trams going right down the aisles? :)
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Ted
PE have been quite busy post October 2012 when PoFA came in.
They seem to have been busy chasing those who ignore them and have recently started to churn out court papers (but none of their cases have reached court yet).
However they do seem to seem to becoming badly unstuck at the POPLA appeal stage as it seems very few (if any) of the contracts they hold with landowners allow them to progress cases to court on behalf of the landowner and most of their POPLA appeal cases fold at that point as PE cannot or do not supply a suitable contract therefore the motorist wins.
If you get yourself over to the PPC section at Pepipoo you will find the first page is full of PE "cases" including today another loss for a PE in an overstay situation where they could not prove their case at POPLA.
(here) forums.pepipoo.com/index.php?showtopic=76066&st=20&start=20
General PE advice at the moment is to appeal the nonsense invoice they send and get a Popla rejection code from PE, get some help on Pepipoo and then go to Popla with the contract arguement and win.
As always
Mark
Last edited by: Mark on Tue 23 Apr 13 at 00:38
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Am I alone in thinking that such irritations can be avoided by not overstaying in car-parks which are (like it or not) clearly other people's property ?
Just sayin'......
However, this sort of nuisance is a problem in Aus too, SWMBO fell foul of council parking by parking in the wrong bay in a public car park - the RHS being free for 2 hours, the LHS being chargeable for up to 4 hours and the signage being bloomin' confusing. Ho hum. Never a problem in our days back in Woking where the council have no concept of offering any kind of free parking IIRC ;-)
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>> Am I alone in thinking that such irritations can be avoided by not overstaying in
>> car-parks which are (like it or not) clearly other people's property ?
I think the same way.
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Me too.
We have a Sainsbury right in March town centre but the car park is always full because everyone parks there and goes wandering off around the town and has a coffee in Greggs.
They have now started to enforce the 2 hour limit as anyone who wants to shop at a supermarket uses Tesco on the outskirts of the town.
Pat
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>> full because everyone parks there and goes wandering off around the town and has a
>> coffee in Greggs.
March is a classy place for those who haven't been there.
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"March is a classy place for those who haven't been there."
Doesn't have the sophistication of nearby Wisbech :-)
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Slight thread drift. Some places depend on tourism and make this clear by their parking charges. I can't cut and paste the prices but Alnwick (Harry Potter Castle) has seriously cheap parking as they want people to go there; except to the Infirmary and the GP surgery, obviously!
en.parkopedia.co.uk/parking/alnwick/
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Careful Meldrers thats common sense thinking, actually help make somewhere attractive to solvent people (customers with money to spend) by making it easy and cheap to park?
It'll never catch on, but some town centres might give this a bit of thought before they close forever...:-)
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I got one of these in a retail car park - didn't realise you had to "buy" a free ticket (First 2 hours free but only if you had the ticket on show). Had just spent £600 on a TV in the local Comet. Came out to find the ticket on the car, took the TV straight back inside for a refund (they had no notices on the door warning that it was a ticketed car park) and then enjoyed great amusement at the ensuing stream of threatening letters.
Somehow - and I don't know how - they got my mobile number and started calling me on that. I told them that I didn't know the person in question and that I'd received a lot of calls from other companies chasing money. I think at that point they moved me to the "write off" list and the letters stopped.
I wouldn't be concerned even if they had a photo of me standing next to the car - as Ted says, they'd have to prove material loss in Court and I doubt the judge would have much regard for their view that they'd been cheated out of £85.
Last edited by: Fursty Ferret on Tue 23 Apr 13 at 09:10
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>>
>> It'll never catch on, but some town centres might give this a bit of thought
>> before they close forever...:-)
>>
The worst council-run parking scam I ever saw was in Hillingdon. Their car parks near stations used to charge 20p a day[1] and were always full of commuters. They jacked the rates to eye-watering proportions[2], producing empty car parks and surrounding streets chock-full of parked cars.
You can guess what comes next. Yes, a residents' parking scheme billing every home a three figure sum each year for the privilege of continuing to park where they always had done......KA-CHING!
[1] A fair rate, providing sufficient income to pay for the maintenance of the car parks.
[2] Even including a sliding scale based on time stayed. The logic of this, for a car park aimed specifically at someone dropping their car in the morning to get the train and returning at the end of the day, escapes me entirely.
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>> You can guess what comes next. Yes, a residents' parking scheme billing every home a
>> three figure sum each year for the privilege of continuing to park where they always
>> had done......KA-CHING!
A borough and indeed nation reduced to stealing as much money as possible from its own people to keep the whole leaking ship afloat.
The value of land and a constantly increasing urban area and population means space and therefore parking will always be at a premium.
What i can't understand is why computer linked jobs for office wallahs can't be home based for at least part of the working week.
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>> The worst council-run parking scam I ever saw was in Hillingdon. Their car parks near
>> stations used to charge 20p a day[1] and were always full of commuters. They jacked
>> the rates to eye-watering proportions[2], producing empty car parks and surrounding streets chock-full of parked
>> cars.
>>
>> You can guess what comes next. Yes, a residents' parking scheme billing every home a
>> three figure sum each year for the privilege of continuing to park where they always
>> had done......KA-CHING!
>>
>> [1] A fair rate, providing sufficient income to pay for the maintenance of the car
>> parks.
>>
>> [2] Even including a sliding scale based on time stayed. The logic of this, for
>> a car park aimed specifically at someone dropping their car in the morning to get
>> the train and returning at the end of the day, escapes me entirely.
Can sort of see both sides of that one. Agree, no excuse for three figure charge for a resident permit though. At most should be cost of running the system.
Is Hillingdon the station that signed off the M40/A40 for park and tube to London? From that point of view there's a rationale for keeping the price realistic. The market rate for commuter station parking is between £5 and £10. Just over £8 now at Northampton.
That's a lot of revenue for Hillingdon's CT payers to lose. It also incentivises those from nearby stations in same zone and out towards Denham/Beaconsfield to drive there instead of using the local BR/LUL station. Indeed, for those working or shopping in Hillingdon it's almost certainly cheaper to park at the station than in the centre. There are ways of tying a cheaper rate to rail ticket, easy with modern machines and ANPR surveillance at entry/exit but if charge is less than market it's still drawing in use from other stations.
Sliding scale in commuter car park makes sense after 09:30 for part time workers and to encourage flexi workers to travel post peak.
Last edited by: Bromptonaut on Tue 23 Apr 13 at 11:11
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Hillingdon is right beside the A40 just after the M40 ends, current cost is £6 per day on weekdays. no discount for multi day stays or season tickets etc.
But the underground ride Hillingdon - Aldgate (other end of the line) is £10 a day, pretty reasonable.
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>> Hillingdon is right beside the A40 just after the M40 ends, current cost is £6
>> per day on weekdays. no discount for multi day stays or season tickets etc.
>> But the underground ride Hillingdon - Aldgate (other end of the line) is £10 a
>> day, pretty reasonable.
Yup used it for my Games duties when I was at Wembley. Gets pretty full pretty quickly tho.
Last edited by: Zero on Tue 23 Apr 13 at 14:32
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The Volvo V40 has a clip for parking tickets so Volvo presumably expects V40 owners to regularly get parking tickets!
:-D
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>> The Volvo V40 has a clip for parking tickets so Volvo presumably expects V40 owners
>> to regularly get parking tickets!
>> :-D
Based ont he average age and driving abilities of Volvo drivers I think its for the Disabled badge.
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Not another private parking ticket ! - -
