Parking fines - I've been so stupid

[Branster]

I’m not sure where to post this, not a strictly AIBU thread (I know I am BU as far as rules go) but I’m desperate for some sensible advice and maybe a glimmer of hope.

I’ll try and describe my situation in a rational manner. It might not be a big deal for some people but it is for me.

Over the last few weeks I’ve been partly working away from home driving to an office at various times of the day.
I got in the habit of stopping on the way back home to clear my messages, catch up on urgent calls and do minor paperwork in my car - nice and quiet, no distractions, no weird people walking by etc - before returning home where I wouldn’t get the chance to finish these tasks before 10-11PM. Clear the head sort of thing so I’m ready for doing the full on evening house duty ‘shift’. Like a lot of people, I am at the limit being in a constantly occupied house all the time without any quiet time with zero interruptions. So grabbing a short period of time to get rid of outstanding little work tasks like this does help me be a better person in the evenings at home.

So I stop in a very safe, nearly empty secondary train station car park which has this car number plate recognition parking system which I vaguely noticed. I assumed if I stop just for a little bit and stay in my car I should be OK and didn’t even consider getting a ticket (Not exactly a ticket, it’s a pay system of some sort). Technically I was using the car park but not in the traditional sense of leaving the car there. Who am I kidding?! I was using the car park. Even though it was a stopovers.
Breaks on average between 10-30min max.

Today I got home to an £85 penalty notice dated 8th April. In theory this should be the first fine, maybe I didn’t stop there before that date or maybe there is a grace period of 15min or so and I didn’t stop for too long prior to this date or maybe earlier dated letters are yet to arrive.
If this was the first recorded breach of parking rules, I might get another 7-8 penalty notices, not sure, including today. Nearly £700, potentially. That’s an awful lot of money to me especially when I haven’t budgeted for it and when it doesn’t even benefit anyone in practical terms.

I’m so, so cross with myself for being so negligent and incredibly stupid and I am at a loss as to what I can do to limit the damage.
I know these tickets can be disputed within a certain amount of time. I’d need to wait at least another week to get all the letters and try to write a dispute for all of them in one go on the basis of what exactly, other than utter stupidity.

My first thought was to try and call the company issuing the tickets first thing tomorrow morning to get the total number of offences from them and to tell them the truth and ask if there is any way of reducing the fines.

I can’t think straight, I am in a right mood about it and I feel like the biggest idiot on the planet. I feel like crying with anger at myself (and a bit of self pity).

I can’t ask anyone in RL for advice, I am very embarrassed. I never park illegally on the road and never even got a speeding ticket, I’m always do careful and mindful of consequences and I’ve just failed in a spectacular way.

It is a lot of money, potentially. I would agree to pay 1 fine of £85 in the context of my predicament. Has anyone got any practical advice, experience in this sort of thing? How can I argue my case against all these fines which will be pouring in soon?

It's ANPR, not a photo.

@AmberItsACertainty

I was responding to the comments made by the two people I tagged. They both said don't pay it but do acknowledge it, do as Martin Lewis advised, it's a private company so they can't enforce it..... I was just saying that I'd done all those things and here I am 2.5 years down the line and this company (I will name and shame them....Napier Parking) are still sending their solicitors after me over a £1 parking charge that I DID actually pay.
I've been harangued by their solicitors week after week over this, the stress has made me ill by exacerbating my MS.

Some people would say to just pay it to get them off my back but that's exactly what these companies want us to do. There is also principle involved here, I did nothing wrong so why should I pay?
I imagine that this company has spent more paying their solicitors to badger me than what they're trying to get me to pay them anyway. If I was in their position I think I'd have cut my losses and dropped it by now.

There is also principle involved here, I did nothing wrong so why should I pay?

You did do something wrong - you failed to display your parking permit/ticket. The requirement in those car parks is not to BUY the permit, it is to DISPLAY it (obviously you have to buy it first).

I have had success in the situation you describe where shutting the door has meant the ticket has fallen off, and I have still had it, appealed and they have 'let me off' (they don't have to), but the difference is that I had the evidence.

Without evidence you will get nowhere. Yes, it's cost them more in legal fees but when you lose you will be liable for their costs so it will cost them nothing.

Using an illness to state no-one should seek justice against you is low.

Where people have successfully challenged these is where the signage is poor and as a result the car owner can demonstrate that no contract was entered into. But car parking companies have cleaned up their acts now and their signage is fit for purpose in most cases.

I now have a small clear plastic wallet (the type you put paper visitor badges into) I keep in the car that I pop tickets in when I put them on the dashboard so they are less likely to get caught by the door movement causing a draught.

Op, I'm relieved on your behalf! How stressful but how lovely that its resolved!

Harmonypuss

Please go on the moneysavingexpert.com website and go to the Private Parking Ticket section and then Newbies !! Private Parking Ticket Old or New. Do not just read the advice in the Martin Lewis section, move further in and get onto the forums for help.

The private parking companies have so called ' codes of practice ' (made up by themselves for themselves) they are not legal or the law. I wish people would stop thinking they are and stop lining their nasty pockets. The invoices cannot be ignored but they can be beaten.

Harmonypuss

I agree with the poster saying that you can't just rely on being right to fight this. I had a similar situation to you in that I was sent a PCN after entering a multi-storey that was full and absolutely rammed. It was 10 stories high and I went round twice in a slooow queue - it took 45 minutes and I saw no spaces. Because of ANPR I was fined. I was livid and had the 'I didn't even park!' mentality for a while. But after going on MSE I realised that wouldn't cut it. Mine went all the way to court and it was signage and the Consumer Rights Act that did it as they hadn't provided the service they advertised or something, not just my word.

I don't know about the details of your case and what you could use in your defense but it seems harder as it really needs to be the company's error and not yours - that's what will make the difference. I also agree with the poster who said that you need a lot of time, energy and resilience to effectively fight the case. I relied a lot on the MSE forum and used to get short shrift on there for not doing enough research or going on the forum enough! It's full on and you do need to be able to read and remember all the legal jargon in the relevant laws. I'm not saying you can't do that, but if you already feel it's making you feel worse it may not be worth it.

When I won my case the lawyer the company had sent congratulated me on the case I had put together and my demeanour as she said a lot of people go to pieces in the court room (it was only small claims and just 3 of us sitting around a table, but still stressful). I got the sense she was glad I'd won .

Good luck whatever you do. don't see why they couldn't have let you pay the ticket with a £20 'admin fee' or something.

Those number plate recognition fines are not enforceable. You will receive various more threatening letters - maybe 4 for each fine - and then they stop sending them. Just ignore. Seriously! You are worrying over nothing. Maybe find a new place to park now though to save the paper for future letters.

Again for the hard of understanding:

These tickets are “enforceable” as they are a debt that can and often will be enforced in the same way as any other debt by way of a civil claim in court. The debt will be far higher than the original amount on the ticket because fees are legitimately added if court proceedings are taken.

I have seen many summonses, listened to many clients who have discovered CCJ’s on their credit record in relation to ignored parking tickets (often at the point of applying for a mortgage or renting a property) to know that this is true.

Yes you can take the risk of not paying and the parking company not taking action to recover the charge. But it’s a massive roll of the dice that could end up being extremely costly both financially and practically.

@Cnp41

Those number plate recognition fines are not enforceable. You will receive various more threatening letters - maybe 4 for each fine - and then they stop sending them. Just ignore. Seriously! You are worrying over nothing. Maybe find a new place to park now though to save the paper for future letters.

Why do people keep saying this? It's a myth, they are enforcable and have been enforced in court, many times.

They are not "fines" they are payments for services used. If you enter into a contract whether written, verbal or implied you are liable for the costs involved. It has been established that the conditions of using this particular car park were displayed and that users are given a grace period of 20 minutes without payment being due whereby they can read the terms and decide whether or not they accept them.

@VanGoghsDog

Just a minor point here .... just how long is one meant to keep scrappy bits of paper in their car? I empty all bits of detritus from mine once a week, so receiving their "fine" two weeks or more after said incident, no-one could reasonably be expected to still have said scrap of paper.

[quote Harmonypuss]@VanGoghsDog

Just a minor point here .... just how long is one meant to keep scrappy bits of paper in their car? I empty all bits of detritus from mine once a week, so receiving their "fine" two weeks or more after said incident, no-one could reasonably be expected to still have said scrap of paper.[/quote]
What they "expect" you to do is display it.

It is not a defence to say 'it blew off and I threw it away'. The judge will not say "how long after did you throw it away?" and when you say "about a week" say "well, yes, I clear my car out more often than that, so that's entirely reasonable, case dismissed". Whether you got rid of it is NOT the issue. The issue is you did not display your ticket. Had you displayed it then noone would expect you to keep it, noone does 'expect' you to keep it, they 'expect' you to display it.

Your defence is that you paid. They may well want to believe you. But they simply cannot find in your favour without evidence. How would that be fair to the other side? Everyone could rock up and say "I did pay but I've got no evidence, soz".

And if I was on the other side I would say to you "when you got back to your car and found the ticket was not on the dashboard you must have realised at that point that it was not displayed as required and that you could therefore get a penalty notice, so why didn't you keep it?" and when you say "oh, I clear my car out every week" I would simply say "there is no evidence the ticket existed, I suggest that it did not, because if it did and you knew it had not been displayed you would have kept it, that is what a reasonable person would do".

The fines tend to come within ten days or so.

Honestly, if this is your defence you shouldn't be going to court. Do you have legal advice?

I'm glad it's worked out okay for you, I hate this sort of thing.

[quote Harmonypuss]@AmberItsACertainty

I was responding to the comments made by the two people I tagged. They both said don't pay it but do acknowledge it, do as Martin Lewis advised, it's a private company so they can't enforce it..... I was just saying that I'd done all those things and here I am 2.5 years down the line and this company (I will name and shame them....Napier Parking) are still sending their solicitors after me over a £1 parking charge that I DID actually pay.
I've been harangued by their solicitors week after week over this, the stress has made me ill by exacerbating my MS.

Some people would say to just pay it to get them off my back but that's exactly what these companies want us to do. There is also principle involved here, I did nothing wrong so why should I pay?
I imagine that this company has spent more paying their solicitors to badger me than what they're trying to get me to pay them anyway. If I was in their position I think I'd have cut my losses and dropped it by now.[/quote]
@harmonypuss It sounds like your principles have got in the way of common sense. You may be technically and morally in the right to refuse to pay but surely if it’s effecting your mental health to such a degree that it’s making you ill you would have been better off paying up and moving on with your life. 🤷🏻‍♀️

I’m pleased that the OP has resolved her parking woes.