Town and City Parking Fine - Do I pay?

[mamitou]

I parked in Sainsbury car park on the parent and child bay and came back from shopping to discover a £30 parking fine on my windscreen. I know i was stupid to park there with no child in the car. I read a few things on the internet about Town and City parking fine about not having to pay and i am a bit confuse. Do i really have to pay this parking fine?

[Collaborate]

No.

[CajaDeLaMemoria]

No. Ignore them. It's a private company - you don't need to pay. Just ignore them, and be prepared for them to send letters and phone calls. Once they know you aren't going to pay, they will give up, but they count on people crumbling. so that they can get their immoral pocket money

[mamitou]

Thanks Collaborate and Caja. I am so relieve as i don't have any spare cash to splash around tbh.

[PuppyMonkey]

This has all the info you need www.moneysavingexpert.com/reclaim/private-parking-tickets

[redadmiralsinthegarden]

similar questin here. i was fined for parking outside of designated spaces (I WAS at an angle, because the cars either side of me had made it difficult for me to park straight).
Pay, appeal, ignore? any advice?

[whatinthewhatnow]

if it's a police ticket (penalty charge notice) issued by the council or the police then yes, you have to pay. If it's by a private company then no, you don't. They have these at my work and none of us ever pay them. They are made to look like PCN (and indeed are often called something like parking charge notice) in order to scare you into paying. They then write to you with an increased fine amount, then the threat of court etc etc etc. It's all bollocks.

Someone explained it like this to me. If you were talking to a friend and she then told you she was charging you £20 for the conversation, you wouldn't pay. She could write you as many letters as she liked telling you that you now owed her £100 and she was going to take you to court, but you wouldn't pay, would you? Private parking companies have as much right to demand money as your friend.

[redadmiralsinthegarden]

thanks what. It's from Euro car parks, from my local Sainsbury's car park. So no appeal?

[prh47bridge]

Ignore them completely. This is not a fine. In essence they are threatening to sue you for breach of contract and offering to settle out of court. However, the chances of them taking you to court are minimal and their chances of success should they do so are low. Even if they did take you to court and win the amount you would have to pay would be much less than the alleged "fine".

They will pester you and try to scare you into paying but if you ignore them they will eventually give up.

[safflower]

Go to the ~Consumer Action Group web page on parking charges. They will guide you through what total bollox these so called fines are.
If you have no time to do that, just ignore the next series of letters you will get through the door. Do not enter into any correspondence with them They will send you about 4 letters threatening bailiffs etc which are the same company and also bollocks. Trust me, just ignore.

[safflower]

scroll down to town and city and here are all the letters you will receive before they give up on you and go and irritate someone else

[safflower]

you will get 7 letters in all [yawn]

[redadmiralsinthegarden]

Thanks for that safflower! you have probably saved me £30, which of course I will spend on a new pair of jeans the children