Premier/Gladstones ANPR PCN Letter Of Claim - 6 minutes in queue to get change - appeals refused - Planet Ice, Milton Keynes

[AOLA]

Hello there,

I am seeking for the advise and whether I have a chance to appeal against the Premier Park Ltd decision who issued to me PCN and I missed all deadlines.

 

In short:

I took my two children for Ice skating at the Planet Ice, Milton Keynes. We've entered the car park at 10:37am. Morning ice skating session was about to start at 11:00am. Due to the fact that I only had a £5 note and iPay app to pay parking fee and none of the methods were acceptable by parking machine, I'd no choice as to get the right change from Planet Ice receptionist. Unfortunately, there was already 1 person in front of me in the queue and I did not make a payment until 10:49, 12 minutes later (reviewing available payment options, getting change from the reception).

 

PPL explanation:

This payment was for the duration of 4 hours and expired at 14:49.

As per the BPA Code of Practice and our signage, we allow motorists 5 minutes to enter the car park, read the signage, decide if they can comply and if not, exit the car park prior to a PCN being issued.

 

As per the BPA Code of Practice, we do allow motorists 10 minutes to exit the car park after their payment has expired. On this occasion, your vehicle exited the car park at 14:48, 1 minute prior to the payment expiring, therefore this 10-minute grace period was not required.

Premier Park Ltd do not have CCTV cameras at this location, therefore we were unaware of why your vehicle remained on site for a period of 11 minutes prior to making payment.

Upon making payment, you would have been aware of the period of time taken from entering to making payment, therefore, you should have ensured you exited the car park 11 minutes prior to your payment expiring, or purchased the next tariff up, “Up to 6 hours” to ensure the whole period of parking was paid for.

 

My view on this is that parking management company, does not provide up-to-date (apple pay or google pay, accepting a note currency) infrastructure / methods to pay for parking tickets, pushing customers to pay for additional 2 hours of parking.

 

In addition, I missed all the original correspondence sent to my old address which were forward to me at the beginning of June 2022.

Unfortunately, due to the personal circumstances my family (my wife and two dependant children) and I were made homeless since Oct 2021. Being NHS worker and my wife working in retail sector at minimal hourly wage, it took us longer then anticipated to find a new place to live.

 

I've explored all options, contacting Premier Park Ltd via British Parking Association, as PPL always replying from nonreply mailbox and all telephone lines are automated. POPLA pushing back my correspondence suggesting that I must to provide an appeal PPLs number, which PPL suggesting that appeal time is expired since original letters submitted in April 2022. The Debt Recovery Plus, who is currently demanding x3 time of the original PCN charges, would not entertain saying that either I pay current charges or they will forward this case to court.

 

I am really warring at this point, as we are simply don't have a spare pound to pay.

 

Thanks in advance for your advise and suggestions.

 

Look forward to hearing from you soon. Please no wasters.

 

Kind regards,

Aola

[honeybee13]

Hello, welcome to CAG.

 

To help us to help you, please let us have the information requested in our forum sticky.

 

 

Best, HB

[FTMDave]

Sadly you've learnt the hard way that there is no point in trying to reason with these fleecers.

 

They're not interested in sensibly managing car parks, they just want to send out as many of their demands for payment as possible, and then bully motorists into paying.

 

The forum recommends ignoring their letters (unless/until it gets to Letter of Claim stage).  Writing to them gets you nowhere and you end up giving them too much information and losing legal protections.

 

The good news is that unless they are prepared to take you to court and win a court case in front of an unbiased judge, you don't have to pay them a penny.

 

To help us help you please

   - fill in the sticky HB indicated

   - upload the original PCN, redacted of your personal details

   - let us know if you outed yourself as the driver when writing to them.

[AOLA]

Hi HB, FTMDave and zydeco,

 

Thank you for your prompt response, greatly appreciate that.

I have attached a copy of the original docs for your information.

 

Are you suggesting that I should not write to them explaining why I disagree with their decision and unfair PCN, as they do not provide modern infrastructure for customers to pay for parking tickets?

 

What chance do I have to win this PCN?

 

Thanks in advance.

 

KR,

Aola   

 

 

 

 

 

 

PCN+Final Reminder+DRP letter.pdf

[FTMDave]

HB is right, we don't want anything on the forum that could identify you to the fleecers.

 

I asked you to post the PCN as I wanted to try to understand the torturous mathematical "logic" of the fleecers which, of course, concludes that they are always in the right.

 

So you paid for four hours.  You were in the car park for four hours and 11 minutes.  There is an industry-wide grace period of ten minutes.  So in essence the charlatans are after you for a one-minute overstay!

 

That's not to mention that the grace period is a minimum and you could well argue that in your case it should have been longer with children and them making it difficult to pay.  Or that the government Code of Practice issued in February this year established the grace/consideration period as 15 minutes.

 

They are highly unlikely to take you to court for one minute, and even if they did, it would be very difficult for a judge to agree with them.

 

I'm afraid you don't "win" a PCN.  The spivs will never back down.  They insist you owe this money.  You say you don't.  Stalemate.  Unless they are willing to take you to court they have no way of making you pay. 

[FTMDave]

The dates have just clicked with me.

 

The government Code of Practice with the 15-minute grace/consideration period came out in February.

 

They issued this tripe in April when they should have been following the CoP.

 

They would be idiots to try court.

[brassnecked]

So they know you are the driver? even so, not a lot to do unless they issue a Letter of Claim, and as their payment methods were borked and you had to get cash, that might not go down well with a hudge as already indicated.  Just make sure there is a correspondence address you can give the fleecer's to remove any chance of a back door CCJ.  The Code of Pracyice is definitely your friend here.

[AOLA]

Hi FTMDave,

 

Thanks for your advise and sharing your view.

 

 

What I cannot comprehend is that if PPL / Code of Practice allow motorists 5 minutes to enter the car park, read the signage, decide if they can comply and if not, exit the car park prior to a PCN being issued, and then 10 minutes to exit the car park after their payment has expired, total of 15 mins of leeway, un yet issued PCN for 12 mins. How can that be?

 

Hi brassnecked,

Yes, I'm afraid so. I had to come forward that I was the driver.

I had to when I was trying to appeal against the charges.

 

[dx100uk]

next time never appeal

you ID yourself as the driver and lose protection under POFA2012.

 

there is a minimum of 10 mins grace, there is no stated maximum at present

[AOLA]

Hi FTMDave,

 

Are you sure that the government Code of Practice with the 15-minute grace/consideration period came out in February?

Could you please let me know the link to the article to look at it.

Thanks,

Aola

 

 

Hi guys,

 

just founded the link on POPLA website. 

The Private Parking Code of Practice | March 2022 | POPLA

WWW.POPLA.CO.UK

---

The Government published new Private Parking Code of Practice on 7th Feb 2022. Parking operators will need to fully adhere to the Code ahead of the launch of the single parking appeals service in 2024.

Going to read it through before to commenting on it

KR,

Aola 

[brassnecked]

How can that be?  they hope you panic and cough up, not knowing about the Regulations that apply to fleecer's and Private parking that they try their best to ignore.  They are on a sticky wicket if they did try a County Court Claim for a minute overstay, you paid, there is no loss to sue on, apart from a flimsy minute overstay with circumstances that contributed due to no fault of your own.

[FTMDave]

2 hours ago, AOLA said:

total of 15 mins of leeway, un yet issued PCN for 12 mins. How can that be?

I think the fleecers are trying to pretend that the 15 minutes is sub-divided and you overstayed one bit of it.  Yes, the logic of Alice in Wonderland.  You stayed under four hours and 15 minutes but some of your minutes were the wrong minutes.  Aye, right.  Let's see them argue that before a judge.

 

We have had a couple of cases over the years where someone paid for their parking, but "late" and the fleecers tried court - the judges chucked the cases in the bin.

 

1 hour ago, AOLA said:

Are you sure that the government Code of Practice with the 15-minute grace/consideration period came out in February?

Absolutely.  Look here, issued 7 February this year  https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/private-parking-code-of-practice/private-parking-code-of-practice  Scroll down to Table B.1. 

 

BTW, the fleecers are legally challenging the CoP but on the basis of (a) the amount of their invoices and (b) if they can add debt collecting costs.  There is no challenge to the grace/consideration periods. 

 

[FTMDave]

So the government allow 15 minutes.

 

I see the BPA do now too.  They must have updated their CoP.  Point 13 at  https://www.britishparking.co.uk/write/Documents/AOS/AOS_Code_of_Practice_January_2020_v8(2).pdf

 

The fleecers, somehow down the torturous labyrinth of grubby money-grabbing logic, have tried to split this period in two - they would get nowhere in court.

 

Even the BPA, bezzies of the PPCs that they are, talk about the initial part of the consideration period "The amount of time in these instances will vary dependant on site size and type but it must be a minimum of 5 minutes" and I dare say more time is reasonable if they make it difficult to pay.

[lookinforinfo]

Your ticket says your time expired at 14.48. You left at14.47.

 

The BPA Code does not that you are entitled to ten minutes to leave after you time has expired. What it actually says is-

13.3 .........."a Grace Period of at least 10 minutes must be added to the end of a parking event before you issue a PCN."

No mention of the time expiring just you have ten minutes to leave at the end of your visit.

 

That is pretty close to if not actually breaching your GDPR.

 

So don't even think about paying it. You do not owe them a penny. I doubt they will go within a mile of Court, but  if they do you will win.

 

Just relax .   You will get letter from unregulated debt collectors. They have no power at all and can do nothing. Their letters make could litter trays for hamsters, jerbils etc.  Over the coming weeks and months [possibly years ] you will get a number of letters all demanding ever more money from you. They can safely be ignored as the most they can charge is £100 all their other charges are unlawful and the Judge will throw them out.

 

Just  make sure that you come back to us if you receive a Letter of Claim and we will give you a reply along the lines of Foxtrot Oscar.

 

As matter of interest what did you mean when you said you had to admit being the driver so that you could appeal?

[AOLA]

Hi guys,

 

Thanks for your resposes and advice.

 

@lookinforinfo I had to tell Debt Recovery Plus that I was a driver, which was a true btw. I was desperately seeking for any chance to gain the option to appeal agaist the original PCN. 

If you recall, I haven't seen the original letters until later and all my attempts to appeal were rejected, as I missed all deallines to do so.

 

However, reading through guidance 'Private Parking Code of Practice' act 2019 introduced by Sir Greg Khight and published on 7 Feb 2022

5.1 Consideration period

The parking operator must allow a consideration period of appropriate duration, subject to the requirements set out at Annex B, taking the following factors into account:

c) the time required for a driver to identify and comply with requirements for payment;

2. This is particularly important for controlled land where the requirement is to pay and display a permit using on-site machinery, make an exact payment in cash using specific coins, or pay-by-phone or online through a process that could take several minutes.

 

8.3 Process for appealing a notice of parking charge:

c) requires the parking operator to consider appeals received outside of the normal 28-day period allowed for lodging an appeal where the appellant provides evidence of exceptional circumstances for the appeal not being lodged within the normal timeframes – where the addressee only discovers and can show that a notice of parking charge has been issued in their name after the 28-day period the period must restart and any enforcement, including court action, must be paused;

“Exceptional circumstances” include the recipient being away or abroad when the notice was delivered, hospitalised as an in-patient or delivered to the wrong address through no fault of the motorist.

 

[dx100uk]

15 minutes ago, AOLA said:

lookinforinfo I had to tell Debt Recovery Plus that I was a driver,

you never ever ever tell a dca anything.

 

a DCA is NOT A BAILIFF

and have

ZERO legal powers on ANY debt - No matter WHAT it's type.

you IGNORE THEM totally.

 

 

[brassnecked]

Rule No 1 Don't Appeal

 

Rule No 2 appealing to a DCA is pointless, they are Paper Tiger's and merely there to put the frightener's

o to persuade someone to pay up, by threatening to add all sorts of fees they have no legal right to add.n

[FTMDave]

Firstly, well done on all the research you've done.  We wish everyone who comes here would do the same!

 

However, I don't think the central fact has clicked.  You are dealing with fleecers, spivs and charlatans.  They will never accept your position.  Their "job", if you can call it that, is it bully & threaten motorists into paying monies they don't owe.

 

All your correspondence has got you nowhere.  Even worse, you've made the fundamental mistake of telling them who was driving and have also described how you paid thus allowing them to spin a web of lies about how you have to give them loads of money because you didn't pay within the first five minutes.

 

The good news is that PPCs rarely do court in these cases.  The couple of times they have done in recent years they got a hammering from the judge.  That is because of the legal concept of "de minimis" - "the law does not deal with trivialities".  You were entitled to be there for four hours and 15 minutes.  You paid for the whole stay.  The fleecers got their money.  A court is uninterested in whether you paid for your stay five minutes after arriving or 10 or 15, it's irrelevant.

 

So radio silence now with the fleecers.  Ignore any other demands they may send.  But come back to us straight away if you get a Letter of Claim.

Edited July 25, 2022 by FTMDave
Typo

[AOLA]

Hi Guys,

Thank you for your moral support and suggestions.

 

Although, I totally agree with you all that they are totally out of order and trying to grab money from motorists and local businesses, by driving away public from other locations,

 

I still have to be careful, as I cannot ignore them completely, in case I can end up with a bad payment history record / CCJ.

I therefore, won't be able to borrow any money in the future should I need so.

 

[FTMDave]

Sure, but how does someone end up with a CCJ?

 

CCJs are used to punish people who defy court orders.  To get a CCJ the fleecers would need to start a court claim, then you would have to lose the case and after that you would have to defy the court and still not pay.

 

People who lose a court case and pay within the 30 days ordered by the court don't get a CCJ.

[AOLA]

PS; brassnecked why did you suggest earlier "Rule no 1 don't appeal"?

Thanks

 

@FTMDave, thanks mate.

I was not aware of that at all.

[dx100uk]

appealing to whatever PPC always fails and 9/10 is written in a way the ID's who the driver was.

the very last thing you ever need to do

 

On 25/07/2022 at 20:01, AOLA said:

Hi Guys,

Thank you for your moral support and suggestions.

Although, I totally agree with you all that they are totally out of order and trying to grab money from motorists and local businesses, by driving away public from other locations, I still have to be careful, as I cannot ignore them completely, in case I can end up with a bad payment history record / CCJ. I therefore, won't be able to borrow any money in the future should I need so.

 

 

speculative invoices are not DEBT.

so can never appear on a credit file.

 

the only time they might, is if one gets lucky with a county court judgement, then it appears in the judgement section.

 

you seriously need to read a good few 10's of threads here to understand how these charlatans work, most of it is smoke and mirrors that are designed to fool the public into thinking these are FINES, hence all the media use of that word...they ARE NOT AND NEVER CAN BE.

 

dx

 

 

[lookinforinfo]

You do not ever contact DR+ or any other unregulated debt collectors. My dead budgie has more power  than them. { I am selling my budgie by the way and it's not going cheep.] They cannot demand that you admit to being the driver before they give you the information that you need.  I know it is past now but it should be the keeper that they deal with not the driver.

 

if they refused to help until you told them who the driver was, you should complain to the Information Commissioners office-hopefully you have kept that letter.

[brassnecked]

Fines are a criminal penalty, these are an invoice for an alleged breach of a term in a contract they say you enter into by parking on land they infest They are founded under Civil Law of Contract so can never be criminal or a fine, inb your case the deminimis would likely apply so they would be stupid to try court.  Also as is an invoice foran alleged debt as DX says it can never be referred to or place as a default on your credit files.  These unregulated DCA's would be in very hot water if they registered such an alleged debt with a CRA as a Default with no CCJ to back it up.

[FTMDave]

Is this place local to you?  Would it be easy to go back and photograph the signs?

 

It's highly unlikely they will take you to court but any evidence you can build up can only be a good thing.

 

In particular it would be interesting to see if this nonsense about having to pay within five minutes is shown as a condition on the signs.