£90 "charge notice" from Lidl's parking. Wow.

zYx said:
I don't keep receipts, not for long anyway. However, the "offence" took place on 15.5.14, invoice was issued on 17.5.14 and received on 19.5.14. I have 14 days for the appeal from the issue date, so ultimately 12 days, or 11 now...
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Nor did I keep the receipt, just took a screenshot of online banking statement, job done. :D
 
mattyfez said:
If you read through some of the threads in the link i posted a few posts up, you will see that parking eye frequently file court claims and win a lot due to no-shows or incorrect defences by the defendants.. Maybe you got lucky, but as mentioned the rules have changed in the last year or so, so it is imperative people research the subject properly.

Also parking companies are known to troll parking threads on relevant help sites looking for admissions of guilt.. So don't post specifics, or if you do be very careful what you post.
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I did my research properly, hence why I ignored it. Bottom line is I was willing and ready to not only show up if they took me to court, but also to file a correct defence. Majority of the time you hear sod all back from them, because they know it isn't worth their hassle. I'd love to know figures of these 'fines' being dished out and how many are taken to court, very low I would guess.

I accepted that the absolute worst case scenario is that they would take me to court, and win. I would then have to pay not only the fine, but probably additional fees on top. Worth the risk in my eyes.

This was only 6 or so months ago, so I am well aware that a few private parking companies have taken people to court. How many have won when the defendant actually shows up?
 
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McBain said:
How many have actually won when the defendant actually shows up?
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Not many, but most people wont do much research -they have stepped the game up, is the point I was making.

A county court summons dropping through the letter box is enough to put the willies up most people, so you have to have a valid defence and be prepared to see it through.

'Ignoring' it if you have a researched cast iron defence is fine, but not very good general advice for people have been invoiced.
 
mattyfez said:
Not many, but most people wont do much research -they have stepped the game up, is the point I was making.

A county court summons dropping through the letter box is enough to put the willies up most people, so you have to have a valid defence and be prepared to see it through.

'Ignoring' it if you have a researched cast iron defence is fine, but not very good general advice for people have been invoiced.
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I've just re-read what I posted, to be honest I should have phrased it 'I ignored it and they went away'. I wasn't advising the OP to ignore it, that's their decision.

That being said based on my experience with this type of thing if it was me i'd ignore it, whether I had a water tight case or not.

As I said above, that's accepting the fact that I may have to end up paying considerably more than £45. That's down to the individual whether it's worth the risk to them.
 
McBain said:
I've just re-read what I posted, to be honest I should have phrased it 'I ignored it and they went away'. I wasn't advising the OP to ignore it, that's their decision.

That being said based on my experience with this type of thing if it was me i'd ignore it, whether I had a water tight case or not.

As I said above, that's accepting the fact that I may have to end up paying considerably more than £45. That's down to the individual whether it's worth the risk to them.
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Actually due to the size of the claim this would be tracked through the small claims court and you would therefore not be liable to pay their court costs. In most situations the most you would be liable for would be the losses the car park company lost by you overstaying there, which in a free time-limited car park for a supermarket would be approximately.. £0.
 
miniyazz said:
Actually due to the size of the claim this would be tracked through the small claims court and you would therefore not be liable to pay their court costs. In most situations the most you would be liable for would be the losses the car park company lost by you overstaying there, which in a free time-limited car park for a supermarket would be approximately.. £0.
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That's an area I was never too sure about, whether it would be small claims.
 
stoofa said:
Ignoring is certainly not the recommended route for all private parking firms any more - that advice as a "blanket response" was safe up until around 18 months ago.
Then private firms did start taking people to court and far more worryingly actually winning.
If you want actual advice from people who do know what they are talking about, pop along to www.pepipoo.com and ask there - advice would be to scan in both sides of the notice with your post (as the people there will ask you for it). You'll actually get advice there which is tried and tested (and yes, may well be simply ignore).

Or just stick to the blanket "ignore/destroy/send them an envelope of **** back through the post" usually trotted out here - but I personally wouldn't recommend that option.
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Actually, it's still pretty much the same as before. Ignore and bin. Can you give me specific examples of cases where the parking companies have won a case, where someone has just ignored all the letters?
 
Appeal and ask for a POPLA appeal code. It costs the speculative invoice company £30 or something to get this code. Then ignore them.

POPLA outcomes aren't binding anyway.

Only on OCUK do you get recommendations to just pay to save hassle. :rolleyes:
 
Trixter said:
This one was with parking eye at ALDI, not sure if there the same company, a quick email with my phone number in, they rang me and dropped it, very easy to do.

http://s7.postimg.org/mq2blatnv/20130816_155401.jpg[IMG]
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Have to say I love the evidence they provide...

"Your car entered the car park at XX:XX"

"Your car left the car park at XX:XX"

And?

I realise they've cancelled it anyway, but where's the evidence you parked between those times?

Where's the evidence you didn't leave and then come back?

Where's the evidence you were actually parked at all, and didn't just drive around the car park for 3 hours?

All they can prove is that you drove into the car park at a certain time, and drove out of the car park at a certain time.
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Haggisman said:
Have to say I love the evidence they provide...

"Your car entered the car park at XX:XX"

"Your car left the car park at XX:XX"

And?

I realise they've cancelled it anyway, but where's the evidence you parked between those times?

Where's the evidence you didn't leave and then come back?

Where's the evidence you were actually parked at all, and didn't just drive around the car park for 3 hours?

All they can prove is that you drove into the car park at a certain time, and drove out of the car park at a certain time.
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Small claims are judged on 'balance of probability' though, not absolute proof.
 
Seems a bit of a con though. You could go to aldi, pick up something in the morning, leave, come back after work, pick up something, leave, but based on the way they seem to track they could fine you for being there 8 hours?
 
MooMoo444 said:
Seems a bit of a con though. You could go to aldi, pick up something in the morning, leave, come back after work, pick up something, leave, but based on the way they seem to track they could fine you for being there 8 hours?
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It will be clear from the logs that there were exits as well as entries and it will be easy to see if there were two or more visits - that's not to say it's not open to abuse though.
 
Haggisman said:
Where's the evidence you were actually parked at all, and didn't just drive around the car park for 3 hours?
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lol very good point!!!! I know when I go to park somewhere like tesco I usually look at the time when I've parked up and go from there, not the moment I came off the public highway :p

I remember when I was little and went to the fairground with my family. we parked in a ticketed car park (where they give you a ticket with time and then you pay a guy in a kiosk on the way out) and we were in the queue to get out of the carpark for about 20 mins and they wanted to charge for another hours stay. pretty sure we kicked up a fuss blaming their inefficiency for delaying our exit :p

makes you think though and kinda want to put it to the test; Drive into one of these carparks and actually keep the vehicle moving for over the stated time just going round and round and then see if they send an invoice...and then what happens after when you state you didn't ever actually find anywhere to park xD be good to have a dash cam too so you can provide evidence of just trolling through the car park :p
 
I thought it was the case that the fine itself was in contravention of the unfair contract terms act, as any fines imposed are not meant to be punitive and only be a way of recovering increased costs due to one party not fulfilling the contract. Hence with a parking fine they could sue for any loss of earnings caused by you overstaying, such as what you should have paid for the time spent parked, but a fine of £45 is not reasonable as the whole point is to punish you.

Sounds like a judge has decided that not to be the case if companies are being successful in court :(
 
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