Town and City Parking (TCP) Fine

[Garage_Doors]

Well you're the one suggesting he pays an illegal invoice.

YOU seriously suggest that people pay invoices that a court of law in the Upper Tribune ( i.e. a precedent setting court ) have said are illegal ?

I suggested that he had overstayed the parking time stipulated by the car park owners and as a result should pay. Whether is legal or not is not relevant.
In the same way if you have a bet with your mate and lose you expect to pay, or would you refuse to pay him stating he is not a licensed bookmaker and therefore you were not legally responsible for the debt.

And i did this without being abusive.

 

[BLOCK F]

£200 would last a week with my lot.
Just man up and accept you were in the wrong for over staying the time and pay up.

Proramme Seller,are you mad?

 

[Westdene Seagull]

. Whether is legal or not is not relevant.

Of course the law is relevant ! Using your idea someone could rock up at your house and place a sign on your drive saying anyone parking a blue car here will be charged £1,000 despite having no rights to do so. That's exactly what these PPCs have - no rights to form a contract and no rights to charge a penalty. If you're stupid enough to pay them then that's your look out but don't go around suggesting to other people they need to pay it when they actually don't.

 

[Everest]

I'll save my stamp money thank you as opening the letters and throwing them in the bin costs nothing.

I hope you'd put them in the recycling bin.

 

[LadySeagull]

I suggested that he had overstayed the parking time stipulated by the car park owners and as a result should pay.

LOL!!!!!!!!!

 

[bha100]

I suggested that he had overstayed the parking time stipulated by the car park owners and as a result should pay. Whether is legal or not is not relevant.
In the same way if you have a bet with your mate and lose you expect to pay, or would you refuse to pay him stating he is not a licensed bookmaker and therefore you were not legally responsible for the debt.

And i did this without being abusive.

You are missing a vital point here. It is all to do with managing your parking costs in the most efficient way you can, why pay inflated on street or multi storey car parking charges when you can park the jalopy in asda's or such like's parking area for as long as you like free of charge and not be breaking any law? we are living in tuff times, every penny counts.

 

[mune ni kamome]

I hope you'd put them in the recycling bin.

Actually a phone call did the trick with Tesco and Dunelm Mill

 

[mrhairy]

Does the same apply at Brighton Station.It is so easy to park and forget to pay as there are no machines.

 

[Tory Boy]

I suggested that he had overstayed the parking time stipulated by the car park owners and as a result should pay. Whether is legal or not is not relevant.
In the same way if you have a bet with your mate and lose you expect to pay, or would you refuse to pay him stating he is not a licensed bookmaker and therefore you were not legally responsible for the debt.

And i did this without being abusive.

You make a reasonable point, but for a breach of contract claim the landowner must have suffered a loss.

In these cases the car park is free, so the landowner has suffered no loss.

Even in a paid for car park the loss incurred will never reach the level of the penalty charge.

TB

 

[Westdene Seagull]

Does the same apply at Brighton Station.It is so easy to park and forget to pay as there are no machines.

Yes and no. You should pay for parking whatever the hourly rate is at the station ( by mobile I believe ). If you accidentally go over your time you shouldn't pay the inflated illegal invoice you receive. Let's say it's £4 an hour and you overstay by an hour - you owe £4 NOT the £70+ the PPC try to charge you - that is a penalty and thus illegal. I would never condone not paying the proper parking fees but equally the operators should work within the law - TCP, G24, Parking Eye, NCP and many others do not.

 

[BensGrandad]

I'll save my stamp money thank you as opening the letters and throwing them in the bin costs nothing.

Why not just open the letters and reply in a letter and put it in the envelope and drop it in the post box with out a stamp. The company will then get the excess charge from Royal Mail so it will cost them money to send you a letter and they pay for the reply. I do similar to any company that pesters me with letters like Readers Digest and they have probably removed me from their mailing list and stopped sending me letters.

 

[Westdene Seagull]

Why not just open the letters and reply in a letter and put it in the envelope and drop it in the post box with out a stamp. The company will then get the excess charge from Royal Mail so it will cost them money to send you a letter and they pay for the reply. I do similar to any company that pesters me with letters like Readers Digest and they have probably removed me from their mailing list and stopped sending me letters.

I could but personally I begrudge spending even a penny on scammers - it's free for me to just drop the letters into my recycling box when I'm putting in other stuff and they keep wasting their money writing to me.

 

[Garage_Doors]

Of course the law is relevant ! Using your idea someone could rock up at your house and place a sign on your drive saying anyone parking a blue car here will be charged £1,000 despite having no rights to do so. That's exactly what these PPCs have - no rights to form a contract and no rights to charge a penalty. If you're stupid enough to pay them then that's your look out but don't go around suggesting to other people they need to pay it when they actually don't.

Your total veiwpoint is that of the legal standpoint, Its about the moral obligation, if Asda for instance have a sign saying limit 2 hours, then as the owners you should respect that.
Are you saying the PPC's are acting alone? in the case of the Asda car park, they have no agreement or contract with Asda to look after it on there behalf?

 

[Garage_Doors]

You are missing a vital point here. It is all to do with managing your parking costs in the most efficient way you can, why pay inflated on street or multi storey car parking charges when you can park the jalopy in asda's or such like's parking area for as long as you like free of charge and not be breaking any law? we are living in tuff times, every penny counts.

That's a fair point, but its the " they can't give me a ticket, i can park in their car park as long as i like" attitude i find very selfish and morally wrong.

 

[Westdene Seagull]

That's a fair point, but its the " they can't give me a ticket, i can park in their car park as long as i like" attitude i find very selfish and morally wrong.

I'm not aware that anyone has said that - I certainly haven't. If I overstay in an Asda 2 hour free car park they are more than welcome to charge me their losses. I wouldn't do it on purpose. What I object to is Asda employing a company that uses illegal tactics to bully people out of money neither Asda nor the PPC are entitled to. They make threats like sending bailiffs round ( a threat they are not allowed to carry out unless a court allows it ) or charging much more than any loss the landowner incurred.

 

[Garage_Doors]

I'm not aware that anyone has said that - I certainly haven't. If I overstay in an Asda 2 hour free car park they are more than welcome to charge me their losses.

As you have previously stated they can only charge you their losses which in a free car park is zero.Your playing with words.

If they tried you charge you a nominal £5 for overstaying on their property you would still refuse to pay it as "it would be illegal".

 

[The Fifth Column]

The Protection of Freedoms Act 2012 allows PPCs to ask the Registered Keeper who was driving - if the RK doesn't provide this information then the PPC will pass the "charge" onto the RK . Firstly the POFA doesn't over rule years of contract law and secondly the charge is still as legally unenforceable against the RK as it is the driver.

You quote the BPA - who are the BPA ? Oh yes, that cosy club funded by the Private Parking companies.

You use the word penalty - any PPC belonging to the BPA who uses the word penalty should be reported to DVLA who will revoke their access to the RK database.

The advice is always to ignore unless you fancy teaching the PPC a lesson by appealing and taking it to POPLA and costing them £32.

Whoa there tiger ease up a bit, you make it sound like I support these parking company tossers, I most definitely do not i was simply posting my take on the rather confusing situation that seems to be developing since clamping was made illegal. I think a lot more people are going to end up paying these tickets that have a kind of semi official status attached to them and that is a shame because as you point out you should just ignore them.

 

[BensGrandad]

They have always been unenforceable rather than illegal.

 

[South Stand Bonfire]

Hello All

I popped to Asda at the Marina a couple of weeks ago, spent about £200 on shopping, then popped to the Harvester with the Mrs for a bite to eat.

Got a letter yesterday from a company called Town and City Parking (TCP) trying to get £70 out of me (reduced to £40 if paid within 10 days) for being parked at Asda for 3 hours 20 minutes.

I've looked them up online and found an awful lot of posts saying to ignore them. Apparently they cant take you to court or make you pay the fine.

Has anyone had a simlar experience with a simlar company? What did you do?

Cheers

The same happended to me at Corals car park in Hove last year. I overstayed the 3 hour limit by 15 minutes as a few of us were doing marathon training. Three of us wrote identical letters explaining we were club members and had logged the fact we will be overstaying with the club. One person was let off immediately but two of us were pursued. Stick to your guns; write a letter stating that you could not see the sign and/or you were legitimate customers and the reason that you overstayed was because you were shpping and having a meal etc. Assuming that they won't let you off, you should then get two chase up letters and a final "court demand" letter. I looked into this and the fine can only be enforced by a Court so they will need to pay an application fee to a small claims court before they could enforce it. It is highly unlikely that they will pay a fee of circa £100 (?) to pursue a £70 fine, which a Court may not actually uphold anywa. State that you have copies of receipts that can prove you were a legitimate customer. After my fourth letter (6-8 weeks) I haven't heard a peep from them since. Good luck..

 

[LadySeagull]

As you have previously stated they can only charge you their losses which in a free car park is zero.Your playing with words.

If they tried you charge you a nominal £5 for overstaying on their property you would still refuse to pay it as "it would be illegal".

If ASDA tried to charge me £5 for overstaying and it was my fault (swanning it around the Marina, for example) I actually would pay it if it was a 'pay at barrier' system or something straightforward like that - but I would never go there again because there are free car parks around. But if the delay was due to extensive Christmas browsing/shopping, long queues at the till, etc. then of course not!

But this isn't Asda, it's a third party claiming a massive amount; a parasite firm who provide no service, no car park management, no maintenance of the car park and who have zero understanding of who can use a disabled bay. The only reason these firms are there is because they have presented some smarmy spiel at Asda Head Office, depicting their protection racketeering as a 'service' and convincing Asda that it's a good idea to let them handle the car park issues (of which there were pretty much none before the advent of private parking companies - 'PPCs' for short on the MSE and pepipoo forums).

Anyone who pays even a penny to such scumbags is stark raving mad. It's not about 'morals' it's about being taken in by a scam and you still haven't grasped that.

Glad to see everyone else on the forum gets it though.

Does everyone know that Excel are currently (quite rightly) one of several PPCs who are BANNED by the DVLA from getting registered keepers' data? So if you are visiting friends near Curry's in Hove you can leave the car there and you won't hear a peep from Excel. Think they are banned until January. Not that their tickets are enforceable anyway of course.