ukpc parking notice - failure to display my valid parking permit for the second time

[jojo71]

I am undecided on my course of action and wondered if anyone has been through a similar experience. This is the second time that i have had a parking notice from ukpc.

I work for an organisation that leases several parking places in a car park monitored by ukpc. I was given a parking permit to use a specific space in the car park in July 2012. In August I forgot to display my permit and received a parking notice for £90. The human resources manager at my workplace sent an appeal on my behalf verifying that i had a permit. I assumed this was being dealt with so thought no more about it. 2 weeks later i received a reminder letter for the parking charge. I phoned the consumer helpline who said they had not received the appeal. They suggested that i send another online appeal, i asked them to make a note of my call but was told they could not as they only had a read only screen!!!! I tried to appeal the decision on there online website several times as suggested but the website would not let me submit the appeal. I e mailed them after searching for an e mail address and stated my problem. Once again I received no response. I then downloaded an appeals form and sent my appeal with a copy of my parking permit by post. A week later i received a final reminder but assumed that they had not got round to looking at my appeal so i ignored it. I then got a letter from their debt recovery department demanding £150 pound and a threat of court action. I phoned them and relayed my story so far stating that as far as i was concerned my appeal had not been dealt with.. The guy i spoke to was uninterested in my appeal but i would not give in and refused to pay the costs. He was sick of me and told me to send him my permit to his e mail address which he gave me. The e mail address turned out to fake. I was furious and found a general e mail to info@ukpc. I e mailed them the case so far in detail. I then got a phone call from the guy whilst i was at work, who i had spoke to from debt recovery previously, offering a one off payment of £50. i refused, argued with him and told him to get lost. 2 days later i received a letter stating that as a good will gesture if i paid £15 the case would be dropped. I was so fed up by then i paid it. This process began in August and didnt end until November and was a nightmare. However, i find myself in the same position once more as last week. I didnt realise my permit had fallen off the dash board and was on the floor!!!!!! I have another £90 fine!!! I dont know what to do and have read all the ukpc issues on here and have not found any similar to mine. I know im a fool for not checking it was displayed that day(like i have done every day since the last incident). Sorry for the long drawn out story but i felt some of the issues i mentioned may help others. Any advice on my current situation???

[i hate bailiffs]

It is not a fine

ignore them and there begging letters asking for money

 

If you wanted a peaceful life you could pay them

but please remember to pay my fee first of £200

[havinastella]

HI and welcome to CAG

 

I have moved your thread to the correct forum

[havinastella]

And claim your £15 back!

[Sidewinder]

YOU HAVEN'T BEEN FINED! You have been sent a speculative invoice and fell for it once already - don't do it again. As you found last time there is no internal appeals procedure - it exists purely to verify that they are harassing the right person, so they ramp up the pressure until you contribute to their Christmas fund. send a single line letter, not an appeal, stating that you will not be paying their invoice as you hold a permit for the space in question.

 

Then IGNORE everything else that they send - the letters, threats etc will eventually stop!

[dx100uk]

oh and when you get your £15 back

 

buy a blank line inserter

 

dx

[leonmassey]

As per others comment, if you want to have fun send them a letter informing tgem that you have a permit and also issue them with an invoice to cover your "admin costs", everytime they send you a letter respond right back with yet another invoice ). See it as a game.

[johnjordan]

oh and when you get your £15 back

 

buy a blank line inserter

 

dx

 

lol

[jojo71]

Thanks for all the above comments. I'm confused as to what to do.... I know how ruthless they are and how they don't give up! They know due to my previous dealings with them that i have a permit as do the staff they employ. they check the cars daily apart from this week when no one has parked in there due to the fact they cannot get in due too 2 feet of snow that has not been cleared this week. im having to park 15 mins away from work as a result!!! I was thinking of sending this... what do u all think

 

I am appealing this parking ticket due to the fact that i have a valid parking permit for the use of space number 10 in Patent street car park, which my emplyer leases for my vehicle only. I have been parking in the same space for the last 6 months which your parking staff are obviously aware of as i assume permits are checked on a daily basis. On the day of the parking notice i placed the permit on the dashboard as usual. On returning to the car later that day i found the permit in the footwell. Obviously it had either blown off when i closed the car door or slipped off at some point. I feel the parking notice is unfair and unjust as the parking staff know my car well and that i have a valid permit. Another point i wish to make is that i have been unable to use the car park this week due to the car park not being cleared of heavy snow. This is unacceptable as my company leases spaces for myself and other staff to use.

Bad idea??????

[johnjordan]

Read the previous posts again. IGNORE UKPC. They will give up when they realise that you are not the mug they hope you are.

 

They have absolutely no authority to fine you, only the police or councils can fine you. What UKPC have done is to send you a piece of paper with an amount of money shown on it which they hope you will be fool enough to pay.

 

Now go to bed, forget about UKPC. In a couple of months after a stream of letters, some threatening court action etc, all meaningless, they will forget about you and go after some other poor s*d.

[jojo71]

ok thanks. these [edit] psychologically harass you in your [edit] sleep. they are the [edit]..

 

just like the [edit] governments that let them!!

 

ill try to hold out, but court action is something i don't want and thought that if i responded they might be more favorable with my case.

 

However im dreaming that they have morals lol!

 

Does anyone know the outcome of the trading standards case against them??

 

companies like this really need to be taken down!

[johnjordan]

There won't be any court action. To take court action they have to show that they have suffered a financial loss by you not showing your pass. It's not their car park, you have a permit (doesn't really matter even if you don't), what financial loss have they suffered?

 

Now listen to what people who have dealings with these **** every day say and ignore UKPC and their empty threats.

[jojo71]

ok.. u mean ignore and do not send an appeal at all..... based on the grounds they have suffered no financial loss,....

[jojo71]

why has my post been edited... surely im allowed to relate it to politics! whats with the freedom of speech... we dont live in America yet! [EDIT]

[dx100uk]

please if you wish our help abide by the rules of this forum.

 

there is no need to swear nor use vailed swearing to express yourself.

 

dx

[jojo71]

ok. lol. i didn't realise the word conservative was a universal swear word but i will keep that in mind in future.

[dx100uk]

sadly that was not what you typed you used the same swearwords in 3 places

 

we ofcourse would not remove cons.

 

just ignore these people

 

they have no legal standing to issue any 'fines'

 

only the police / council/ etc etc can do that.

 

suggest you have a good read of the stickies or a few other thread in this forum

 

dx

[jojo71]

i used the word bloody if i remember correctly. i refrained from stronger wording im not arguing with u about words and appreciate the forum.) i will try to use more conservative terminology in the future that means the exact same thing, although i think most of your readers will think im talking rubbish i am confused though as to to what other words were unworthy of publishing. i was very restrained.

[jojo71]

i have read the stickies but got no where with my post. i would really appreciate some direction. my time with these people (ukpc) has run out.. im not one to run from my problems. id rather know what im dealing with regarding law. god i wish i had studied it now. thanks though to the messages on here and didn't mean to cause offense.

[Binary1]

i have read the stickies but got no where with my post. i would really appreciate some direction. my time with these people (ukpc) has run out.. im not one to run from my problems. id rather know what im dealing with regarding law. god i wish i had studied it now. thanks though to the messages on here and didn't mean to cause offense.

 

Please ignore UKPC.

If you reply to them or 'Appeal' which we all know the outcome of that as its a ghost appeal, you will be playing into their hands.

There is no such thing as an appeal withe these people. Everyone who 'appeals' will be given the 'no' from them.

As all the others have said, IGNORE them. If you reply to any of their 'requests' to hand over money to them, you will be reeled in by their unlawful requests for your money.

Take notice what everyone here is saying and IGNORE them.

Edited January 25, 2013 by Binary1
spelling

[dx100uk]

there is no LAW regarding speculative invoices.

 

i could now send you an invoice for my time in editing your posts

 

would you pay it.....

 

dx

[BazzaS]

there is no LAW regarding speculative invoices.

 

i could now send you an invoice for my time in editing your posts

 

would you pay it.....

 

dx

 

dx, I'd invoice you for reading the posts you'd edited

 

Seriously, though : My understanding is that CAG is a self-help site. People reply on threads so that the OP can help themselves .......

 

If the OP doesn't want to listen to / take the advice to ignore the speculative invoices (admits to having been stung once & still considers paying a 2nd time when the replies saying "ignore" are mounting) AND they create work for the site team by swearing, and bleat about it when their post gets edited by the site team : potential responders should ask yourself:

 

Has the OP come here for help / advice they'll use to help themselves, or is it time to move your efforts onto a different thread where more effective help can be offered?.

[ericsbrother]

Parhaps a sympathy section would be in order where people can offload their woes, get sympathy and ignore the advice. It is common across all topics. I think that some feel overwhelmed and dont believe that they could have got it wrong and thus argue with the advice.

[Sidewinder]

Yours is a very common situation, and your doubts are shared by many who post here asking for help. What you need to consider is that the advice given here is common to all PPCs and you will find the same on every similar site - the law on private parking is that the PPC must demonstrate that a contract was formed, that you read and understood the parking T&Cs in order for that to happen, that the charge claimed does not represent an unlawful penalty in that it represents only actual losses to the landowner, and if they were to take court action, that they have the landowner's express authority to do so.

 

Due to the many hurdles that they face, and the very real probability that a well defended case would fail miserably, incurring significant costs and generating publicity which would severely damage their entire business model and source of revenue, they don't tend to do court. Why run that risk when a few letters will soon tell them whether they are likely to get a payout or are wasting their time? Far easier to send many letters out and get a percentage of victims to pay up just because they are worried about the matter escalating and write off those who obviously know the game and refuse to play it?

 

Engaging in discussion or negotiating with them only serves to put you in the 'might pay' bracket which just prolongs the pressure - far better to make it clear from the outset that you will not pay, do not 'owe' anything and will not engage in further discussion.

[Lindsayr]

Thank you so much Sidewinder for your advice to ignore these letters. We have just received a demand for payment from DeVere who want £100 for forgetting to display our permit although they must have seen our car complete with its permit many times over the 18 months we have owned it. Seems somewhat excessive for a momentary lapse!

 

I was reluctant to follow the advice to ignore the letter completely until I read your succinct and considered post. We shall not now respond to these people in any way and if they wish to pursue the matter then we look forward to our day in court.

 

Regards

 

LindsayR