Well hora if he was in Tescos as a customer then of course he should never have paid it and should have made a claim for harassment. His indignation is fully justified and I trust that he has written to Tescos to let them know that he has transferred his business elsewhere.

I'm not advocating ever paying these "fines" what I'm pointing out is the laughable indignation of those who are caught. Where have I seen this before, ah yes, that was it, it was those MP's exercising their rights to expenses.

Guess what, were all the same, we all want something for nothing.

Nobody (well, not many people anyway) objects to paying for car parking, or for a 'tap on the shoulder' fine if you are absent minded enough to forget. The issue here is the disproportionate, blatant rip-off level of the charge.

To be fair I park in Manchester every day and witnessed an argument between a private parking attendant and his boss. Basically the guy was refusing to ticket cars on the quays because the ticket machine had been faulty for months and only worked intermittently. The call centre number only worked after 8am but the car park opens at 7am so the boss was trying to ticket everyone who didnt have a ticket or a ref number written in the window. The lad stood his ground and refused to issue tickets because it was 'wrong' dont know if he still has a job though. 😯

Spankmonkey: don't take this the wrong way but your post is exactly the sort of unhelpful cut & paste guff that you find on bulletin boards.

Not quite correct, a contract needs to be balanced and agreed by both parties, you cannot agree to a contract when a. you have to be already on their land to read said contract, even then you have not agreed to it, as it is unbalanced! just a few of my points on where they fail

There is no requirement for a contract to be "balanced": the court won't interfere with a bargain made under normal circumstances by normal people.

You accept the terms and conditions offered by the company by remaining parked in the car park. Contract formation in car parks has been done to death a million times – Shoe Lane Parking is the classic case on this. There are requirements for the display of the terms i.e. so they're reasonably obvious, but that depends on the facts on the day.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thornton_v_Shoe_Lane_Parking_Ltd

1) Sections 82 to 84 of the Companies Act 2006, if a PCN or any correspondence from a Private Parking company does not have their registered address and Co Number they are in Breech, most use a PO Box so they are illegal.

If you read the letter posted, the registered address is printed in the bottom left hand corner.

2) Data Protection Act, most Private parking companies are registered to process information for the prevention of Crime, parking is a Civil matter so they are breaking the DPA by processing your information.(I mean to process an invoice / bill) getting your address is not illegal sending an invoice is as they are not registered to use information in this way!

This doesn't represent the DPA accurately, and in any case Athena is registered for purposes 1 to 9.
http://www.ico.gov.uk/ESDWebPages/DoSearch.asp?reg=4443410

3) Unfair Contract Terms Act 1977 & Statutory Instrument 1999 No. 2083. Basically as you have not had pre-sight of their T&C’s or had any influence their terms are biast and unfair, you are already in the car park before you can read them. Their T&Cs wont hold any substance.

As above.

4) The Civil Enforcement of Parking Contraventions (England) Representations and Appeals Regulations 2007 si 2007 No 3482. A PCn must include details to appeal to an adjudicator, most will only give their own address, they are not adjudicators and as such they do not comply with the regulations

A PCN (as discussed in those Regulations) is a Penalty Charge Notice (issued by/on behalf of local government) which takes its force from statute; the letter is a Parking Charge Notice (issued by a private party) that takes it force from contract law.
http://www.opsi.gov.uk/si/si2007/uksi_20073482_en_1

I can't be bothered to go through the rest, but 95% of what you've said is barrack lawyering that's based on deliberate or inept misunderstanding of the real position.

When parking and land use are such big and basic industries, and the world is knee-deep in lawyers, does anyone really think that it's so difficult to set up a legal regime to stop people parking on your land for longer than you let them? The legal mechanisms are all in place – the only real question is whether the supermarket company can be bothered pursuing it to the courts or whether they just say "sod it" and make off with the money that people send after the first 2-3 letters. My feeling is that it's the latter – but the only people that really know are the parking management companies themselves, because they are the only ones who know how many demands they make and how many lawsuits they file.

Registered address thing above: bugger – bottom right hand corner, not left hand corner, obviously. I'm not wearing my wellies so I can't remember L&R, apparently…

They rarely ever get to court as the only way they can successfully win a case is if they can prove you parked the car. That requires evidence that they very rarely get. No proof that it was you who parked the car (registered owner is not proof) no case. Simples.

I can't find it in the English legislation (it's probably in the Supreme Court Act or civil procedure rules or somewhere), but you can get the court to make an order against the owner for preliminary discovery to establish the identity of the driver. As to whether anyone actually bothers doing this, I have no idea, but the legal mechanism is certainly there.

Also: damages wouldn't necessarily be limited to the 3 quid (or whatever) parking, esp if they've already been agreed in the contract as liquidated damages of 100 quid or whatever. The loss covered isn't limited to the parking cost but also the e.g. profit lost by the 5 people who showed up and couldn't park, so didn't shop at the supermarket. And the whole point of having liquidated damages is that both parties agree in advance what a breach is going to cost so you don't have to go about proving it every time.

Well hora if he was in Tescos as a customer then of course he should never have paid it and should have made a claim for harassment. His indignation is fully justified and I trust that he has written to Tescos to let them know that he has transferred his business elsewhere.

They didnt reply to him. He worried like crazy and decided to pay up.
I've never been a fan of Tescos and although this isn't directly their fault (third party acting on)- I still wouldnt go near the donkey-raping bumholes.

My Mrs has got a ticket from Parkforce (or Wilsea Services) as they are known. I am contesting it on 2 basic points.

1) Wifeys car but she genuinely wasn't driving it. (Its insured for 3 named drivers and a further 5 have access to it under cover of their own insurance
2) The ticket is titled Penalty Charge Notice, which is in breach of their own trade associations rules.

I would have paid the ticket grudgingly, however the fact that they are passing their bumpf off as a legally enforcable parking ticket, (which it isn't, it is an invoice) is quite simply wrong. The whole principle is based on contract law and basically works on the basis of the 3 main parts of a contract. Offer Acceptance and Consideration. By token of that fact their invoice is to the driver who is the person who has accepted their offer of parking at £XXXX. My wife who most definately wasn't driving isn't therefore liable to pay, but the driver is. I don't beleive there is any legal requirement for an owner to pass on details of who was driving their vehilce at nay given time. There is however a criminal law equivalent. These people use that to threaten and intimidate people into paying or "fessing up". In my book that is in itself illegal, and is I believe demanding money with menaces.

Berm..

Yes indeed., If they use the word penalty and not 'Parking' then that's a good case to have a go at them. Just remember to not give away any clue or details as to who actually parked the car.

and..

I can't find it in the English legislation (it's probably in the Supreme Court Act or civil procedure rules or somewhere), but you can get the court to make an order against the owner for preliminary discovery to establish the identity of the driver.

That's true only for parking offences that come under local authority control as they have (as has been stated above) legal powers to enforce tickets. But private companies operate under contract law and there is no power under civil contract law that can force you to disclose the identity of the person who parked the vehicle. Contract law is strictly a case of the company having to prove their case. You, however, do not.

I love these threads where we all talk as if we are lawyers 🙂 Do you think there's a solicitors forum somewhere full of discussion about the benefits of XTR over XT rear mechs?
🙂

Incidentally, I would just add that we don't actually know who was driving the vehicle beyond the fact it might have been my son, daughter or their respective partners. All of whom have permission to do so. We found the ticket in the boot.

Ha ha, we got one of these last year (car reg'd to mrs tyred but she wasn't driving) and I sought advice here as well – good to see the same moral indignation going on! 🙂

We wrote two short letters – one to the ticket issuer to state clearly that the registered keeper did not park the car, and once to the 'debt collection agency' to state that the 'debt' was in dispute. No more correspondence after that. Mrs tyred is of a nervous disposition about things like this, so didn't want to just blank it completely.

Think we got something like eight letters from the issuer, the 'debt collectors' and a so-called firm of solicitors, each one more "no, we really mean it this time, we really really do" than the last.

Mrs tyred got the fright of her life several months later when a jury duty letter arrived for her – the OHMS stamp on the envelope had her convinced she was off to jail. So funny.

I think the upshot of it all is that, by the letter of the law, they could take you to court over it but it wouldn't be worth their while. As others have said, they rely on a percentage of people getting scared by the quasi-official appearance and language used in the ticket and subsequent correspondence and paying what is essentially an unsolicited invoice.

konabunny – Member
Spankmonkey: don't take this the wrong way but your post is exactly the sort of unhelpful cut & paste guff that you find on bulletin boards.

Most of what I put there related to my experience with a private parking co, and that information was 90% handed to me from lawyers and those fighting against their dispicable practices, I have no issue with a parking co saying you forgot to pay or accidently stayed over your time so please pay your £3 or whatever, my charge was £80 or so but £120 if not paid within 7 days…. utter BS based on nothing, just a figure plucked out the air! if anyone thinks £120 is reasonable they need their heads testing!. Not only did they back down and appologise but they also got done for their acts. They were a very large parking co for Moto services. I think they got fined around 10k, quite an expensive bill to send me.

After my defence against the company in question companies house upheld my complaint and did them for using a PO box address and not disclosing their full registered address, they got done also for using the phrase "penalty charge notice" as they are not legal able to issue a charge (only the council / police can). Also the ICO confirmed they did not have a legal right to send me a bill as they were registered for "Crime Prevention and Prosecution of Offenders". Parking is a civil matter, it is not a crime when it comes to private parking. Doing me for a civil matter was against their registered use, and most private parking companies are in the same boat and are registered the same! issuing you an invoice for a civil matter is not within most of their registered terms. So the ICo did them as well, not bad 3 epic fails that 95% of private parking companies do on a daily basis, problem is no body ever questions or fights back!

I will leave this as this, how many private parking instances ever go to court? 0.01% or perhaps 1, I have spoken to a few solicitors about this and none of them could think of a case that was won by a private parking company. If however you want to pay the scam these lot try, well thats up to you!

I always pay my dues and pay for parking, if however I slip up and overstay, i would be ok with paying the original charge £2-3 or whatever, however I will never pay a joke of £120 or whatever, its bordering on sick. that said any car park which is free for 2-3 hours technically made no loss at all, in my case the car park was empty so they lost nothing! had I left the next car would have parked for free… see?!?!

Proofs in the pudding, little old me vs one of the largest national parking companies. Them done on 3 counts.

im off to tesco now, whats their cctv like 🙂

Mark – I'm not exactly sure I am looking in the right place for this one, as I was not sure where to start in English law, but the power I (thought I) am talking about is not specific to parking tickets or criminal law, but a generic common law power.

It looks like it's called "third party discovery" in English law. I think the (a?) guiding case is Norwich Pharmacal Company & Ors v Customs And Excise [1973] UKHL 6 linky on Bailii.

Discovery as a remedy in equity has a very long history. The chief occasion for its being ordered was to assist a party in an existing litigation. But this was extended at an early date to assist a person who contemplated litigation against the person from whom discovery was sought, if for various reasons it was just and necessary that he should have discovery at that stage. Such discovery might disclose the identity of others who might be joined as defendants with the person from whom discovery was sought. Indeed in some cases it would seem that the main object in seeking discovery was to find the identity of possible other defendants. It is not clear to me whether in all these cases the plaintiff had to undertake in some way to proceed against the person from whom he sought discovery if he found on discovery being ordered that it would suit him better to drop his complaint against that person and concentrate on his cause of action against those whose identity was disclosed by the discovery.

But that was '73, so maybe it's been codified or changed or something since then, so who knows? (Well, I am sure someone knows, but t'ain't me).

Spank: great that you got them to get lost – but with all due respect, most of what you said initially was either wrong or irrelevant to the OP's situation. The problem with legal advice on BBs (including what I am saying right here!) is that it gets garbled, misinterpreted, or misunderstood.

I can definitely believe that plenty of parking companies don't follow the law with consequences that are fatal to their claim and agree with you that the crucial factor is probably whether the parking companies can ever be bothered to go the whole distance. But this is very different from the whole "ohhh, it's all a scam, all illegal, none of it has any force" line that gets trotted out.

Also, "I have spoken to a few solicitors about this and none of them could think of a case that was won by a private parking company" is useful to some extent but not others. IIRC (and I am more than willing to be corrected by someone who knows) litigation indices in England and Wales are not a matter of public record, so one can't e.g. search how many suits company X filed last year and how many (if any) were won. And equally 90%+ of all litigation is settled out of court. And of course they probably can't be bothered going the whole way for the sake of 100 quid or whatever anyway – all of which means counting won or lost cases isn't a totally useful guide.

None of that is to say necessarily that the best thing to do is pay up…as numerous people's experiences here have shown.

Nice to see my thread is still going. 🙂

UPDATE:
We're still ignoring it.

Who on this thread actually IS a lawyer?

I've had carnal knowledge of one, does that count?

Who on this thread actually IS a lawyer?

Certainly not me. I'd be charging for it if I were. Besides, when did being qualified to discuss a topic become a requirement on STW? 😆