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One of my employees parked in B&Q car park at 8o'clock the other evening, three hours free parking, left just after midnight according to the letter I had this morning. Lovely colour picture of his car taken entering the car park, timed, and a black and white photo of him leaving. £95 fine or £75 if paid promptly, wonderful technology.
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Does it prove that the car was inside the parking lot all the time (just trying to think a way out)?
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The 'contract' for the parking if it is indeed private (i.e. B & Q) and not subject to any Off Street/Parking Orders by statute rests between the DRIVER who placed it there and BQ and not the Reg keeper (The Company). If they cannot ID the driver then they are up a gum street and are trying it on. Euro Car Parks?
Bear in mind if it is private them as Reg keeper the Comapny have no obligation to disclose to them who the driver was. Somewhat different as RT Acts involved then they do.
Settle back and have a read of this and start compopsing a letter back to them
www.tinyurl.com/2hr37d
dvd
(mines a bottle of Goats do Roam....)
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Thanks DVD letter in post, I'll keep you posted.
Clive
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Even if the driver can be identified all they can possibly claim for under English Law is the lost revenue from you parking there. Penalty clauses are illegal under English law.
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I ran into this problem with B & Q a while back. (The posting I made must be in the BR still.) My researches at the time and since confirm what others are saying above.
I prepared a letter disputing the contract that supposedly existed between me and B & Q regarding the use of their car-park, refuting their right to levy a disproportionate ("penalty") charge and offering to pay a nominal sum (£5, if I remember) for the amount of time I had overtayed.
In the event, the latter wasn't necessary, as I discovered a phone number to a department at B & Q which deals specifically with parking complaints and put my arguments politely but firmly to the individual at the other end. I also mentioned the adverse publicity which was being caused by their actions, having discovered a few similar incidents well reported in the local press.
Their attempt to get money out of me was stopped there and then.
A reply from a barrister to a reader's question on a similar topic in The Times a few months back included the following:
" These penalty charge notices are not the same as official fines issued by local councils (although the parking contractors may like you to think they are). The managing agents can impose a charge only if there is a legal contract between you both, and in any event the amount of the charge is limited by consumer contract law. At common law, a charge is not enforceable if it is an unlawful penalty that bears no relation to the damage caused, and it must not be "disproportionately high" under Schedule 2 paragraph 1(e) to the Unfair Terms in Consumer Contracts Regulations (1999).
"I would suggest that you write to the parking contractors, saying that you refuse to pay and baffle them by referring to the above arguments. You will find that in 99 per cent of cases this kind of letter will see off the contractors and their 'fine' and that they will simply go away."
Edited by ChrisPeugeot on 08/08/2008 at 11:59
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An update, advice followed re. the legal position of contract between driver and carpark
owner/operator resulted in waiver of charge notice.
Thank you backroomers and thanks to DVD for off site advice.
Clive
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Had similar with Tesco in Carmarthen a few years ago.Left car in car park Saturday night, came back to collect it at 9am Sunday (BEFORE the shop opened) and found parking ticket on screen. Sent snotty letter to Tesco along with Clubcard and cutting from local paper advertising the opening of the new Morrison's store.
Have heard nothing since. Trust me, they value your custom far more than they want the money for the car park.
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We've had similar problems near me, with a local retail park now 'penalty charging' for staying longer than two hours in their free car park.
The thing is there are restaurants on the site so it's easy with doing a bit of shopping and staying for a meal to overstay the 2 hour limit - not very fair.
Also they monitor the site 24 hours but the shops close at 8pm, so there's no congestion problem after that time - the car park is virtually empty. I've hardly ever seen it full, and that's only at Christmas.
There is a cinema near by and I suppose they've introduced the charges to stop people parking there for the cinema, but as the shops close at 8pm the car park will be empty when most people go to the cinema.
Of course the charges are uneforceable, but that doesn't stop them trying to scare people into paying them.
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A friend of mine has been undertaking some DIY in his house. This required him to visit the massive new B&Q super-duper-warehouse 3 times in one day. He received a penalty notoice through the post. He simply sent back copies of the 3 receipts (which all displayed the time he was there) and asked them for advice on how, since he can only drive an automatic, he can hire a van (none of theirs has auto and very few hire companies have any) to do the uplift in a single shot, or how he could get prompt delivery when their customer service desk told him they were full up for the next 10 days!
He got a cancellation letter back, a letter of apology, and a voucher for £25. (Though he says he'll walk to the store to use the voucher in case they send him another penalty notice....!)
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