Parking Eye taking me to a small claims court

Parking Eye taking me to a small claims court

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irfan1712

Original Poster:

1,241 posts

152 months

Thursday 25th August 2016
quotequote all
Hello all

So.. the monster that is parking eye is taking me to a small claims court having declined my appeal form the parking 'incident' which happened in November of last year, in a carpark owned by 'The Range' on newport road, in cardiff. I was parked there for about 20minutes around 10pm on a thursday night having a coffee, in an unlit carpark, with no lit signage and nothing obvious to tell me not to park there. There was heavy rain at the time, and my engine was running.

-first letter was the initial parking charge a couple weeks after i was there around mid november - i chose to ignore this £100 charge.

- second letter from them was in january (at this point i had forgotten about it!) sending the same letter again. i responded with a formal letter of appeal, claiming that the duration was wrong showing 1 hr 47 minutes, the carpark was unlit, the store was clearly closed, there was no obvious signage, my engine was running.

- third letter - mid feb - a simple, straight forward letter saying they declined my appeal. no back up as to why, just a sheet of formal headed paper basically saying get stuffed - i either pay or it goes to a small claims court. i ignored this letter calling their bluff, which has clearly now bit me.

- fourth letter from a court in Nottingham - showing that Parking eye want to take it to court, don't want to go into mediation, declined my appeal. I responded to the letter and ticked the box to request mediation - by doing this i thought i could just pay the fine and be done with it as its been 9 months on as it is and I'm sick of the letters!

fifth letter- From my local small claims court in Merthyr tydfil, saying they have taken the case on from nottingham court on behalf of parking eye. no response required.

final letter from today - Parking eye has officially addressed my areas of appeal, simplified in the case of :

1. their apnr cameras are always correct, regularly checked, which when scanning a plate goes through 'multiple' processes to ensure data collected is correct
2. suitable signage is present, they have gone as far as sending me library pics of each sign on the site, and even a site layout of where said signs are
3. very important - parking eye claim that after my appeal was declined by them, they sent a letter giving me the opportunity to go through POPLA (parking on private land appeals). they have sent a copy of the letter addressed to me on 16th december. i did NOT receive this letter!!!
4. signage by law doesn't need to be lit, according to them. in their opinion my headlights was sufficient at illuminating said signage ( even in poor weather conditions?)



Basically, i received no letter from POPLA. theres clearly no evidence i received said letter. The carpark was defo unlit, signage wasn't obvious to see, and my engine was running.. where do i stand with this in your opinion? am i going to loose and end paying a fortune in court costs and the fine itself? i question why they have given me such a comprehensive reply to my appeal now, yet the third letter i received from them was basically ''we reject your appeal'' with no justification.

its honestly doing my head in how long its been dragged out for and the hours their putting into it! I'm prepared to pay the fine to just be done with it.

i appreciate your advice.

thanks
Irfan


Mike_Mac

664 posts

199 months

Thursday 25th August 2016
quotequote all
Firstly, and I suspect you already know this, but if you'd just responded to the letters from the off, this would be a lot easier. However...

I had a very similar thing happen. Unlit car park, unlit signs, charges enforced only from 18:00-08:00, so not really very useful. Car park had been free up until recently and I didn't (couldn't) see any signs.

I appealed to the Private Parking Company on those grounds, which was rejected without answering any of my points. I then appealed to POPLA, with lots of photos of the signs by day and night to highlight how invisible they were in the dark and, long story short, had my appeal upheld. The Parking Company was a complete shambles throughout (Premier Park in Devon if anyone's interested) and actually changed the sign locations during my appeal to locations that pretty much confirmed my initial points, which was quite useful!

You ignoring letters, especially as you are now claiming that you didn't get the one with the POPLA number on it, probably won't look too good (don't know for sure though). However, PE are talking bks when they say signs don't have to be lit and your headlights are enough.

I did a lot of reading of the BPA Code of Practice: http://www.britishparking.co.uk/Code-of-Practice-a... among other things.

The key section was, on the version I was reading, Page 10, Para 18.1 - ‘…In all cases, the driver’s use of your land will be governed by your T&Cs, which the driver should be made aware of from the start.’ - this is also backed up by Para 18.2. The company's responsibility is therefore to make you aware of these T&Cs – generally through appropriate signage that you can see and comprehend! My point that this was not the case at night with unlit signs and no street lighting that would have at least given a degree of background light (with lots of evidence) was upheld. There were other points, but that was the most relevant to you.

In sum. I would get onto Pepipoo to see if there's anything else that may be relevant - especially as this is SC court and not a POPLA appeal and start reading up - the link above is a good start.

simoid

19,772 posts

157 months

Thursday 25th August 2016
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How much money are they looking for?

S11Steve

6,374 posts

183 months

Thursday 25th August 2016
quotequote all
PE are relatively easy to defeat in court with a decent defence, even post Beavis judgement. I'm on a shaky internet connection abroad this week, but have a read up on this as a starting point - http://www.parking-prankster.com/court-claim.html

If you want to throw a bit of money at it, look at this option - http://www.parking-prankster.com/private-parking-a...

Carol & John who are behind the service are very well versed in the matter.

irfan1712

Original Poster:

1,241 posts

152 months

Thursday 25th August 2016
quotequote all
ecellent responses, thanks so much for the links - i will give them a good read in the morning.

the fine their looking for is £100. which i think is insane but i guess thats their price.

the only letters i ignored was the initial one (which i suspect 98% of people do anyway?) and the second letter ignored was the one where they rejected my appeal and demanded the money again. i genuinely haven't received any POPLA letter. they attached a copy in their letter today which was all good and well, but it rang no bells, ive defo never seen it and they can't prove wether i have or haven't.

i popped by the carpark tonight - i was having food on city road so quickly nipped over.

the camera is on the wall of the building looking down, its a proper CCTV security looking camera as opposed to an APNR. the carpark is absolutely open and welcoming to drive in and out of, but there is a parking eye sign near the entrance (all signs are unlit). there was a sign on the wall of the building stating the 'no more than 2 hours etc', but i would'nt have seen that as my car was facing the main road, not the store, as proven in their camera pics. the car park was lit with very dim orange lights tonight.. it defo was not when i parked there but I'm unsure how to prove this.

guess i need to really read up and get myself a strong list of defence material to use on the 'day of judgement'... haven't been given a date yet which i assume gives me time.

its just... such nonsense.

stuttgartmetal

8,108 posts

215 months

Friday 26th August 2016
quotequote all
Offer them half in full and final payment.

PurpleMoonlight

22,362 posts

156 months

Friday 26th August 2016
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You don't state what contract terms they claim you have infringed. Is it excess time or failing to pay?

I don't see the relevance of your engine running.

Looking at Google there is general lighting in the area. Are you claiming each sign should be specifically lit?

Edited by PurpleMoonlight on Friday 26th August 03:31

Google [bot]

6,682 posts

180 months

Friday 26th August 2016
quotequote all
I used to get this all the time when I went to deserted car parks at 10pm to drink coffee with the engine running.

Perik Omo

1,883 posts

147 months

Friday 26th August 2016
quotequote all
Have you checked that they have planning permission for the camera and signs. Case has just come up about Morrisons car park in Letchworth Garden City where they have put up the camera poles, cameras, signage etc. without planning permission which is required. Apparently they are always doing this and only apply for retrospective planning permission if caught out. A local councillor in LGC reckons that any parking invoices cannot be enforced and the poles, cameras and signs will have to come down until planning is obtained.

mikeveal

4,558 posts

249 months

Friday 26th August 2016
quotequote all
Perik Omo said:
Have you checked that they have planning permission for the camera and signs. Case has just come up about Morrisons car park in Letchworth Garden City where they have put up the camera poles, cameras, signage etc. without planning permission which is required. Apparently they are always doing this and only apply for retrospective planning permission if caught out. A local councillor in LGC reckons that any parking invoices cannot be enforced and the poles, cameras and signs will have to come down until planning is obtained.
Since when do you need planning permission for CCTV, or for that matter signage in a private car park?
Please quote the relevant (section of) legislation.
I'm interested as I'm about to put up CCTV.

surveyor_101

5,069 posts

178 months

Friday 26th August 2016
quotequote all
Parking eye probably didn't send you the popla letter.

They didn't send me my copy of the evidence for my, not that BPA or popla gave a monkeys.

Check their site plan matches the actual signage there one in my appeal didn't,.



Edited by surveyor_101 on Friday 26th August 08:11

anonymous-user

53 months

Friday 26th August 2016
quotequote all
Am I right in saying legal costs can't be claimed in small claims so the worst case is £100 plus limited expense?

If so then put up your best defence and make them go all the way. It will cost them more than its worth which is a small victory against these vermin

....and of course don't shop at The Range in the future.

jet_noise

5,630 posts

181 months

Friday 26th August 2016
quotequote all
You can fight this. Will take time and persistence but you will win in the end. And at the parking parasite's expense smile

Visit pepipoo (silly name, good site) or moneysaving expert's parking forum,

regards,
Jet

The Mad Monk

10,474 posts

116 months

Friday 26th August 2016
quotequote all
irfan1712 said:
Hello all

I was parked there for about 20minutes around 10pm on a thursday night having a coffee, in an unlit carpark, with no lit signage and nothing obvious to tell me not to park there. There was heavy rain at the time, and my engine was running.
What is the relevance of the weather and the running engine and the beverage that you were consuming?

nikaiyo2

4,672 posts

194 months

Friday 26th August 2016
quotequote all
mikeveal said:
Since when do you need planning permission for CCTV, or for that matter signage in a private car park?
Please quote the relevant (section of) legislation.
I'm interested as I'm about to put up CCTV.
In effect the signs are Parking Eyes adverts, to put ANY advertising sign greater than 0.3m, any size if lit requires planing consent. Relevant legislation would be The Town and Country Planning (Control of Advertisements) (England) Regulations 2007
As I understand it if Joe Blogs shop has planning consent for signs to advertise his own shop, his agent or employee can NOT rely on that consent to erect own adverts, separate planning consent must be given.


catfood12

1,410 posts

141 months

Friday 26th August 2016
quotequote all
Me too. Long story, I'll post up here when sorted. I have also counter claimed for process server to visit the site and take photos and statements. I did have a WP offer from them, then I sent them one, now all gone quiet. Just had correspondence from the court to confirm the track, location etc.

They've ignored all my letters. I did plagiarise a great letter from Surveyor101 on here a few months ago, asking for an unredacted copy of their contract etc. Thanks Surveyor101, I will credit you fully at some point !

Gist is I was visiting a site where we were engaged by the landowner, but didn't know they were the landowner at the time - the car park is not their main business. Had to put visitor registrations in a book each day, which we did religiously. Some times they seemed to ignore them, and all tickets were cancelled except this one. PE signs say there is a terminal for visitors to enter registrations, which there clearly isn't. I have a copy of the page for the day and vehicle in question, so we'll see what they present as evidence when it gets to a hearing. I would expect them to provide the contract etc.

It will also be interesting to see if they send me a copy of their track/location response to the court, which they're supposed to do. I have been in litigation with shysters before, and they leave all the submissions to the last minute and submit late, so they see mine first. The court never seems to have issue with this though.

Issi

1,782 posts

149 months

Friday 26th August 2016
quotequote all
Why did you have your engine running for twenty minutes?

n3il123

2,602 posts

212 months

Friday 26th August 2016
quotequote all
The Mad Monk said:
irfan1712 said:
Hello all

I was parked there for about 20minutes around 10pm on a thursday night having a coffee, in an unlit carpark, with no lit signage and nothing obvious to tell me not to park there. There was heavy rain at the time, and my engine was running.
What is the relevance of the weather and the running engine and the beverage that you were consuming?
Dogging?

mikeveal

4,558 posts

249 months

Friday 26th August 2016
quotequote all
nikaiyo2 said:
In effect the signs are Parking Eyes adverts,
That's pretty tenuous.

Perik Omo

1,883 posts

147 months

Friday 26th August 2016
quotequote all
mikeveal said:
Perik Omo said:
Have you checked that they have planning permission for the camera and signs. Case has just come up about Morrisons car park in Letchworth Garden City where they have put up the camera poles, cameras, signage etc. without planning permission which is required. Apparently they are always doing this and only apply for retrospective planning permission if caught out. A local councillor in LGC reckons that any parking invoices cannot be enforced and the poles, cameras and signs will have to come down until planning is obtained.
Since when do you need planning permission for CCTV, or for that matter signage in a private car park?
Please quote the relevant (section of) legislation.
I'm interested as I'm about to put up CCTV.
It's front page news in the today's Letchworth edition of the Comet local newspaper, here's a link but you might need to register to see it.

http://edition.pagesuite-professional.co.uk//launc...