More WWYD - parking charge

[Maybebabymaybenot]

Hi all, I have had a parking charge notice from Parking Eye for £100 and have tried their appeal process unsuccessfully. I totally accept I hadn't paid but the reason was the ticket machine was broken (I have photo evidence) and the other machines were accessed by stairs or walking on the main road part, which I could not do safely due to having my small toddler with me.

I tried to pay online at the time, but this also would not go through. I have explained I am happy to pay for my parking time as I had tried to but feel £100 is excessive given the circumstances. I have an option to use an external appeal but they have said they will reduce to £60 but will have to pay full amount if I appeal unsuccessfully.

I would appreciate thoughts on whether it is worth it or anyone else's experience please?

Voting - Yes = just pay it
No = give the appeal a go

YABU - I do feel for you cause I'd imagine that was a particularly stressful day, especially if you were running late and I can fully appreciate not wanting to leave a toddler alone in the car. I also think that £60 is still pretty unreasonable as a charge... however you are pretty much entirely in the wrong so I'd definitely just chalk it up to experience and pay the reduced charge if you have the means to do so.

Ah OP, you've been very polite on here and explained that you will pay the fine and put it down to experience - however people love sticking the boot in on threads like this so you can expect a few more pages of that yet :)

@Maybebabymaybenot oops, cross posted. Seems like a very sensible plan

How did you get out of the car park with the pushchair?

Lord MN is full of people desperate to give money away to these scum bag companies....OP YANBU to challenge them, honestly replace the word "toddler" with "elderly relative" and the response on here would be different. MN just love to vilify parents of preschoolers.

Many would be the same. I e , why didn't you move the car etc etc. Likewise, how did she get out of the car park if there was no way of getting wheels out?

You had several options, none of your feeble excuses are valid. You don't get special rights just because you have a toddler.

I think i would appeal it on the basis you tried to pay online and it didn't go through. Have you any proof of this? I would have taken screen shots of the error messages.
If you knew that your local carpark usually accepted online payments, you may well have gone with no cash on you at all, assuming you could do an online transaction as usual. In this case, it was 'broken' and therefore i would think you have reasonable grounds to appeal.
If you have no proof that your online attempt failed, i think it might be harder to prove you tried to do it that way, though.

RTFT people, she’s said she will pay and chalk it up to experience, no need to keep hounding her anymore

It makes a lot more sense now

Op parked on the level she needed to leave on, presumably deliberately.
She tried to buy a ticket and couldn't because the machine was broken
She started the process of paying by phone while (presumably) hurrying to where she needed to be (same level as her car)
Ten mins later or whatever the phone payment failed

Something like that op?

Some will come on to say don't leave your car until you have a ticket but often the signal in multi storeys is very poor!

The helpful people on pepipoo might be able to give you some advice.

Get in car, drive to next level, pay, easy,!

Have a look on Martin Lewis money saving expert, think there is a forum for this stuff! I appealed mine and it got cancelled so does work!