Thread: Car towed whilst on holiday - help pls

Hi,

I've just stumbled across this site from a search on Google so I hope I'm posting in the right area.

A friend has been on holiday and has just returned to find his car has been towed away. He has residents parking on the street. His permit was in his car. When he found out it had been towed he rang up and was told that a notice was put on the street whilst he was away saying no parking due to some works being carried out.

Obviously he was away so didn't see the notice. As a result they towed his car and now want almost £1,000 to get it back.

Please does anyone know the legalities on this and what he can do to challenge the charges?

Apparently he was told he was in the wrong as he should have left his car keys with someone to move the car if necessary but firstly there was no-one he could have left the keys with and secondly how was he to know about this as no notice of the works was given!!

Very grateful for any advice anyone can give on how best to deal with this.

Many thx in advance.

Hi,

Many thanks for the reply - it was the public highway, not a private road.

Thanks in advance for any pointers on this.

Can you provide more details, for it to be on the highway and liable for £1000 costs it must have been a VERY long holiday??

There have been a number of similar cases (The TV program Watchdog covered a similar incident in 2008). The outcome was not good - the council asserted that the public have no specific rights to their 'space' and they can suspend parking and residents bays at ANY time, and are not liable. In the case features ir was a leaky gas main and the car was removed and stored running up a huge bill. There was no valid appeal.