NHS Trust allowing harassment of staff via parking charges

[Red Devil]

Greenish said:

So this recent one has been ignored and has now escalated to a company called DRP threatening court action.

DRP is Debt Recovery Plus. Like all such companies, full of bluff and bluster. It is unlikely that they have purchased the debt: they are simply acting as an agent. See here.

Greenish said:

We have now had a letter from a company called "Zenith". The letter is black and white with no red logos on it and no intial visual panic.

It suggests that we pay the discounted rate of £79.99 now whilst we can - (interestingly 1p cheaper than the original "fine" of £80 issued back in May). It goes onto state that that matter has been passed onto the team for "recommended court action" with more gumph at the bottom warning us that if a judge finds a decree of some sort we could face an "increased fine". It lists the "Creditor" as CP parking, who are the parking people employed to go around the staff car park by the NHS and fine their employee's for being very naughty, in their barriered access car park.

This like the others will be ignored.

I assume you mean CP Plus.

Have a look at the tiny print at the bottom of the Zenith Collections letter. Then read this.

It's more b&b. You're only at stage 2 at the moment. If and when you get a LBCCC then you know the ante has been upped. Any court action will be by the creditor (i.e. the PPC) and it will be their name on the papers. The only relevant question is whether CP Plus is fond of litigation.

Greenish said:

The current one was for exceeding a 20 min drop off limit in the nursery car park of 7 spaces, a totally distance part of the hospital well away from anything remotely relevant.

This appears to be a different issue from the staff car park, permit, barriers, etc. What were the circumstances which led to the drop off limit being exceeded?

Greenish said:

We are told that the parking tickets are of the type that are not enforceable - Martin Lewis made reference to these on his money program this year and his advice was not to acknowledge team at all.

I don't know who told you that private parking tickets are not enforceable but it's simply not true. AS I mentioned above what matters is whether the PPC has any appetite for taking the matter to court The Beavis judgment established that a charge of £85 is not a penalty and also holed the GPEOL argument below the waterline (but that is all it does: there are other grounds which on which a ticket can be defeated). I also find it hard to believe that Martin Lewis said what you claim he did. The MSE website has a massive sub-forum devoted to this subject. I think CP Plus is one of those PPCs which do not rely on PoFA 2012 so their PCNs/NTOs do not contain the required keeper liability wording.

[S11Steve]

Red Devil said:

Greenish said:

We are told that the parking tickets are of the type that are not enforceable - Martin Lewis made reference to these on his money program this year and his advice was not to acknowledge team at all.

I don't know who told you that private parking tickets are not enforceable but it's simply not true. AS I mentioned above what matters is whether the PPC has any appetite for taking the matter to court The Beavis judgment established that a charge of £85 is not a penalty and also holed the GPEOL argument below the waterline (but that is all it does: there are other grounds which on which a ticket can be defeated). I also find it hard to believe that Martin Lewis said what you claim he did. The MSE website has a massive sub-forum devoted to this subject.

This claim is all over facebook, and posted by some numpty who believes everything on the internet is true. I get tagged in it weekly, and lots of friends ask me about - https://www.facebook.com/photo.php?fbid=1021078402...

My stock answer is to never fully trust anything with Martin Lewis attached to it. One way or the other it will mainly benefit Martin Lewis.