Private parking charges - Supreme Court decision changes the law

[Bear]

See: Speeding Fines/Scameras. Buck's gotta stop somewhere, and after endless faffery, registered keeper it is. Think of the car as your sexorgans - if you let someone else play with them irresponsibly, there are going to be consequences.

[dugong]

Right and wrong.  They have NEVER been allowed to charge disproportionate amounts (it's not a fine, only the State can fine you).   They still aren't allowed to do that.  They are allowed to have a business that is based on charging people for parking like cunts.    85 quid is a reasonable amount to charge someone who parks like a cunt.

 

Solution: do not park like a cunt.  Then you pay nothing.  Park like a cunt, pay up.  Simples.

Ponderous legal tracts tend to be off-putting for lay folk. Never, ever skim read (I got the hang of it after my third pass). Conclusion: I am mildly thick.

 

I find £85 for an hour's over stay wildly disproportionate. A proportionate fee(in need of a better term) would be whatever the hourly rate is for parking. Less incentive for these tin-pot chancers(who have never altered time stamps on photos, for example) to stay in business. Charge according to whatever billing structure you have for the time lost, pursue if not paid in 28 days. Far fairer.

 

That's what I have a problem with, and what I suspect the saner members of peebumwillypoo (copyright Breadvan72) take issue with. The principle of protecting private landowners from being stiffed is relatively sound.

[Guest Breadvan72]

Is there any one on peebumweewillyploppybumpoo who is not a paid up, carpet chewing, frothing, tinfoil nutjob loonatron?   Or else a ballsaching jobsworthy I know my rights cardigan wearing stamp collector micropedant and taker of points?   

[dugong]

Is there any one on peebumweewillyploppybumpoo who is not a paid up, carpet chewing, frothing, tinfoil nutjob loonatron?   Or else a ballsaching jobsworthy I know my rights cardigan wearing stamp collector micropedant and taker of points?

Varies.

[NorfolkNWeigh]

Does this mean old penalty notices that seemed to have gone away, will be chased with renewed vigour?

 

I'm thinking of a £100 penalty I received in June for an undisclosed misdemeanour in a Southampton docks car park . It was a put your reg in to the machine and pay £3.50 for an hour thing. I'm pretty sure I was only there for about 35/40 mins, but ticket long discarded when the £100 bill came through, with no details or number or address to appeal to for more info, so I binned the fucker.

Sound legal reasoning, I think you'll find.

Got a follow up after a week or so threatening consequences, then nothing. Should I be booking an £800 ticket to Rio to avoid this possibly coming back to bite me on the arse?

[Louise2cv]

£85 is a lot of money, but unfortunately if you are dealing with people who take step ladders to measure the letters on a sign they accept that they had previously read and understood because they think they should be entitled to use and/or abuse somebody else's property and/or goodwill, then the charge has got to be large enough to be a deterrent. Of if you like airy fairy fluffy spin, see it as an incentive to GET BACK WHEN YOU SHOULD.

 

All you have to do as a driver is park your car in a box, or by a kerb, make a note of how long you are permitted to stay and leave the space before your time runs out. It's not hard is it?

 

And IMO, this current climate of "parking companies are nasty evil money grabbers, do this that and the other to scupper them" just devalues genuine appeals (eg the forum member who got a ticket for parking in a loading bay when he was loading).

[catsinthewelder]

I find £85 for an hour's over stay wildly disproportionate. A proportionate fee(in need of a better term) would be whatever the hourly rate is for parking. Less incentive for these tin-pot chancers(who have never altered time stamps on photos, for example) to stay in business. Charge according to whatever billing structure you have for the time lost, pursue if not paid in 28 days. Far fairer.

 

The only parking eye style operation we have here is the local Aldi,  I like it as I don't need to fanny about with change then take my ticket to the till to get 50p back.  I find that the 2 hour limit means that I can find a space on all but the busiest Saturday,  do my shopping there and still have time to nip accross the road to Tesco for anything that Aldi arn't stocking this week.  I can't think of any reason why people would legitimately need to park there for longer.   I do know that if Parking Eye were only allowed to charge £1 an hour for longer stays that I would struggle to park there at all during the day.

[Pete-M]

I've always ignored any private parking letters. Always will.

[Louise2cv]

I've never had a private parking letter.

 

*just saying*

[dugong]

I've never had a private parking letter.

 

*just saying*

Had three, paid none. Challenged two on reasonable grounds without a POPLA appeal and was let off. Ignored the third. They're welcome to come and argue the toss with me in person - although my landlord will need a new front door by the time I'm finished. £95 for a two minute over stay is ludicrous; the BPA make up rules for lip service and then ignore them (see also: insurance ombudsman). I struggle to take milquetoast organisations posing as 'moderators' seriously.

 

As a result, I tend to avoid PPC-controlled car parks like the plague.

[wuvvum]

I have mixed feelings about this.  On the one hand, many private parking companies seem to be underhanded tossers who will bend the rules to breaking point and beyond to make a quick buck.  On the other hand, they are sometimes the only line of defence against, as Breadvan says, the "Republic of Me" selfish cunts who seem to make up the majority of 2010s society and who have no respect or consideration for anyone else or their property.

[Guest Breadvan72]

Some of the finest phrasing ever has come from the minds of Judges crafting an exceptional put-down.

 

True, if I have leisure later I might select a few for the edification of the mischievous.  Meanwhile, this from Beavis etc is rather good, although not a put down

 

3. The penalty rule in England is an ancient, haphazardly constructed edifice which has not weathered well, and which in the opinion of some should simply be demolished, and in the opinion of others should be reconstructed and extended. For many years, the courts have struggled to apply standard tests formulated more than a century ago for relatively simple transactions to altogether more complex situations. The application of the rule is often adventitious. The test for distinguishing penal from other principles is unclear. As early as 1801, in Astley v Weldon (1801) 2 Bos & Pul 346, 350 Lord Eldon confessed himself, not for the first time, “much embarrassed in ascertaining the principle on which [the rule was] foundedâ€Â. Eighty years later, in Wallis v Smith (1882) 21 Ch D 243, 256, Sir George Jessel MR, not a judge noted for confessing ignorance, observed that “The ground of that doctrine I do not knowâ€Â. In 1966 Diplock LJ, not a judge given to recognising defeat, declared that he could “make no attempt, where so many others have failed, to rationalise this common law ruleâ€Â: Robophone Facilities Ltd v Blank [1966] 1 WLR 1428, 1446. The task is no easier today. But unless the rule is to be abolished or substantially extended, its application to any but the clearest cases requires some underlying principle to be identified.

[Bren]

I have mixed feelings about this.  On the one hand, many private parking companies seem to be underhanded tossers who will bend the rules to breaking point and beyond to make a quick buck.  On the other hand, they are sometimes the only line of defence against, as Breadvan says, the "Republic of Me" selfish cunts who seem to make up the majority of 2010s society and who have no respect or consideration for anyone else or their property.

 

This is a reflection of how utterly fucking awful society has become - being selfish is ingrained in many people nowadays. I deal with Bar room lawyers (much of the public)everyday who think they know everything but in reality could'nt find their own arse with both hands.

 

Sometimes the little guy needs his arse kicking.

[Pete-M]

Society was crippled by the claim culture. People seem incapable of holding their hand up and admitting that they've got something wrong. It's all somebody else's fault.

 

Having said that, the parking firm who tried to charge me for visiting a drive through McDs late at night and overstaying slightly can FRO.

[Bobthebeard]

I must admit that I tend to side with Louise 2cv on the subject of parking in these situations.

Two hours for free is surely plenty of time to do whatever shopping you need to do in a retail park. Overstaying is taking the piss. Commit the crime, pay the fine etc.

After all, we have all driven round and round busy car parks looking for a space.

[scaryoldcortina]

I agree as well, despite my ongoing battle over a parking ticket. The appeals procedure is supposed to be for genuine cases of wrongly issued tickets, be it either council or private because mistakes happen. For example, last christmas the camera monitored 2 hour stay car park at a local retail park issued 150 tickets in two hours because it was taking so long for cars to get out of the carpark. Nobody's fault. These people had a genuine grievance and deserved their tickets quashed.

 

My appeal is pretty simple, I was parked legally despite the 5 minute rule which isn't signed anywhere and is buried in a subsection on the council website. I don't even like the fact that I'm now having to question the bay markings as well because it seems like "getting away with it" rather than them agreeing I wasn't at fault.

[warren t claim]

undisclosed misdemeanour in a Southampton docks car park .

Done a few of those myself. The trick is to flash your reversing lights.

[NorfolkNWeigh]

It's not going to sound any better if I explainI was picking up 2 old ladies from the Cruise terminal ,is it?

[Matt]

I find £85 for an hour's over stay wildly disproportionate.

 

Because it's not meant to be (or so I'd bet).

 

You are a parking control business owner. The end goal of a business is to make money and being the CEO you want as healthy a wage as possible (see: greedy society mentioned above). While in a meeting discussing what the deterrent fee for 'customers' overstaying or failing to pay should be, do you choose:

 

A ) A charge based on what a ticket costs/the hourly rate.

 

B ) As much as you can get away with (probably with advice from your legal team).

 

or

 

C ) A not unsubstantial amount of money but noticeably less than option B.

 

It's a pretty obvious choice when you think of it that way isn't it? £85 is as proportionate as smearing dog shit in someone's face for doing 61 in a 60.

[Luxxo Waftybarger]

I draft and sometimes litigate business to consumer contracts for a living. This is going to make it so much easier for our clients. Interesting how the judiciary are going the opposite direction to the legislature on this sort off stuff. Wouldn't be suprised of a different decision post consumer rights act.

[Skizzer]

 

I draft and sometimes litigate business to consumer contracts for a living. This is going to make it so much easier for our clients. Interesting how the judiciary are going the opposite direction to the legislature on this sort off stuff. Wouldn't be suprised of a

 

OK, own up, who used the Lawyer-O-Zap ray gun on Luxxo?

[colnerov]

 Hi, do I understand it right that the £85 was the charge for overstaying the free period? Whether it was the 1 Hr in question or if they had stayed all day and still been £85. The saying 'hung for a sheep as for a lamb' springs to mind.

 

 Colin

[Bobthebeard]

Hi, do I understand it right that the £85 was the charge for overstaying the free period? Whether it was the 1 Hr in question or if they had stayed all day and still been £85. The saying 'hung for a sheep as for a lamb' springs to mind.

 

Colin

Yep. An overstay = £85

[garbaldy]

So what your actually saying is leave it in the car park for a month or two to get your moneys worth.

[Bobthebeard]

So what your actually saying is leave it in the car park for a month or two to get your moneys worth.

Cheap storage with CCTV...

[jakebullet]

Hmmm. Now the parking lot have an official license to print money, what defence have you got when they say our camera had you entering at 2pm Thursday, and you left at 3pm Friday? I'm thinking if you're a fat knacker who goes to mc D's every day and they 'lost' you going out on Thursday.

[anonymous user]

A very good friend of mine had a parking charge a little while ago for not purchasing a ticket in a Brecon car park; I knew he had bought a ticket as he purchased it in front of me, he had not overstayed as my ticket had been purchased about ten minutes earlier and I didn't get one. I suggested he challenge it as he still had the ticket in the car (It was easy to find amongst the rest of the detritus as it was the only Brecon car park ticket as he lives in Cheshire). On closer inspection, the reason for his parking charge was that the knob had put the wrong registration down for the ticket, as he had just changed his car. Fortunately the parking company accepted his apologetic argument (and admission he was a knob) and cancelled the charge.

[Mr A Lawrence]

I'm currently in dispute with aldi and parking eye over a £70 unenforceable "speculative invoice" for overstaying 20mins due to my disabled wife not being able to get round the store in the allotted time.

 

General consensus is, don't admit who the driver is and ignore the invoice...

 

After a while and a few pestering letters they give up and move onto the next one hoping that'll get paid.

 

The issue I have is that I was photographed going in and coming out, nothing of us sat in the car waiting for her meds to kick in then her struggle to get round the shop and back to the car.

 

Also, the sign is in a place that, as you drive into the car park, your looking left away from it, to avoid cars coming out.

 

I don't have much time for people like the woman mentioned who sounds like she knew the restrictions but went ahead!

 

The parking eye v's beavis case is well documented and is currently going to the Supreme Court.

[Mr A Lawrence]

I must admit that I tend to side with Louise 2cv on the subject of parking in these situations.

Two hours for free is surely plenty of time to do whatever shopping you need to do in a retail park. Overstaying is taking the piss. Commit the crime, pay the fine etc.

After all, we have all driven round and round busy car parks looking for a space.

My charge was for overstaying 20mins over the hour n half limit but due to the wifes disability, it contravenes the equality act 2010 on the grounds that an able bodied person could get round in that time.

 

Not everyone "takes the piss"!

[mercrocker]

As a result, I tend to avoid PPC-controlled car parks like the plague.

 

My sentiments entirely....Semantics can be argued incessantly but for me.............and I suspect many others....Big Yellow sign saying blah blah blah £85 is a big yellow sign saying Fuck Off and Shop Somewhere Else.  And I do.  Every single time.  Best "fine" avoidance policy I know of.