Bloody parking charge

[RoseWrites]

I went to a car park and my 4 year old went batshit on the way in. I quickly parked and got her out and calmed her down. I looked at the car, and one wheel was on the white line. Tbh I couldn't be bothered with putting DD back and reparking so I just dashed into the shop. Came out 5 minutes later and found a ticket on my car for £100.
I got home and appealed it but got a standard letter back saying appeal has been denied, but with no rationale. I assume they send the same wording to everyone. There's no way of contacting them.
My options are pay for the fine now or appeal to the ombudsman but run the risk of paying more if that's denied.
If it's any use, it's Excel parking. And the car park is in cramlington.
Would you appeal or just (begrudgingly) pay?

@BabyOnBoard90 hasn't shown any proof of what she told OP.

The comparison of a small civil claims to an extreme criminal charge, only assures me that I was not the dense one in this discussion.

False.

www.mumsnet.com/talk/am_i_being_unreasonable/4728865-bloody-parking-charge?reply=123425216&utm_campaign=thread&utm_medium=share

I have far more experience of parking claims than I would like to admit.

@BabyOnBoard90 is pretty much correct in terms of saying these things can be challenged successfully. I’d say these claims get chucked out more often than they succeed- don’t forget it’s the parking company that has to persuade a judge of the facts, NOT the person parking who has to actually prove anything. And given they’re often issued for £100, they’re not a lot of money spent bringing these claims and as a result they are not well prepared. There are loads of holes that can be poked in most cases.

The thing she is wrong about is that they would bother for a single £100 ticket- they absolutely do. They have to bother to make sure people keep paying for the tickets.

I would reckon OP’s chances of winning are better than 50% just based on how often these things are dismissed. BUT she can’t be guaranteed to win, so I’d just pay up - because if she loses, she’ll get a minimum of £62 court costs added and quite possibly £60 additional fees added by the company, and if she’s really unlucky some unreasonable conduct costs which could be £2-300. Not worth the risk for the sake of paying £100. Clearly was worth the risk for @BabyOnBoard90 because the sums involved were much bigger.

If you pay within 14 days, they'll usually deduct 40-50%

@BabyOnBoard90 is correct in what she’s saying now (that it can be disputed and the OP has a chance of potentially winning if something not mentioned anywhere in the OP turns out to be true). Not one person anywhere on the thread has disagreed with that. She was absolutely, completely, totally and fully incorrect in what she originally said which is that OP “definitely does not need to pay” and that OP should just tell them to stick it. That is the comment people have said is completely false and absolute bullshit - and they’re correct.

@Chickenly has a lot of posting history claiming to be a lawyer (and is correct legally speaking). Even if she’s not a lawyer, she’s right.

And the reason that people have gone out of their way to point out that @BabyOnBoard90 ’s first post was incorrect is that it is a widely-held misconception that private parking companies cannot enforce their fines in court. Her post literally said “If it’s private you don’t have to pay”, with private being the ONLY factor taken into account.

That used to be true but the Parking Eye Supreme Court case changed it. Lots of people do not know that things have changed. That’s why it’s important to highlight people giving advice that is out of date.

You told OP:

"Oh you definitely don't have to pay and can tell them where to stick"

Nothing on that link proves anything of the sort

@SovietKitsch

I would reckon OP’s chances of winning are better than 50% just based on how often these things are dismissed

This is really bad logic. The cases that end up going to court are obviously more likely to be cases where there are actual reasons that they can be disputed. If it's a case where the private parking charge was issued correctly then it's going to be far more likely that the charge will just get paid and it won't make it to court.

What’s worse is that people let it happen, so comfortable, so compliant, so conditioned, bleating on about “you broke the rules, pay up” Spineless fuckers the lot of you. Anyway it’s quite easy to get out of paying these charlatans their completely spurious ‘fines’ just head over to money saving expert or pepipoo, you’ll get useful advice not like the fangless ‘vipers’ on here.

And I still stand by what I said, and coincidentally i've never paid a parking charge.

OP can do as she pleases, but that doesn't mean I can be talked out of my sense by people with less experience.

I know what I said (literally documented), I stand by every single thing I said. I don't take anything back.

Make peace with that

Not read all the thread but this is jumping out at me from several different posters

That said, most companies write off the fine if it's as small as OPs as it would cost more than double just to take to court.

The court will, and does, award their court costs against you if you lose. Therefore you will have to pay the original fine, the escalation of the fine, your court costs and THEIR court costs. If the judgement goes against you it will cost the parking company nothing, but you will pay possible thousands.

Only ignore, or take to court, if you have legal grounds to do so. In your case does that company have the right to issue tickets, is the signage clear, did you follow their instruction?

Pixiedust1234 don’t be ridiculous, the most you’d have to pay if you lost would be about £200 not thousands and you wouldn’t get a cjd if you pay up straight away. The judge is not going to make you pay thousands for simply parking over a line. You could probably negotiate the £100 pound fine down a bit too. Chances are the parking company won’t have the desire to take it all the way. some parking firms are more likely than others. I’ve had parking eye threatening with court for nearly 4 years.

You will, however, have to pay the other sides costs if you lose in court.

^^That from Which, a reputable source
www.which.co.uk/consumer-rights/advice/how-to-appeal-a-parking-ticket-asBzj3e9xtIj

Considering some parking companies are using firms of solicitors to argue their side in court, if you lost you would definitely have to pay that law firm on top of the fine etc.

www.parkingcowboys.co.uk/gladstones-solicitors/

Pixidust1234 unlikely a judge would allow solicitor costs for a parking fine , it’s all copy and paste from these solicitors with no work actually done.

Actually the article you posted explains it clearly pixidust1234.

Thanks everyone for some very good advice :) I paid the fine.
I do think the fine was a bit harsh, particularly when the space was so bloody small and with bollards on one side, I could barely open the door.
BUT I know I was in the wrong and was on the line :)
Such interesting discussion here about what happens if I didn't pay. But I'm not going to risk that- I'm terrified of the thought of going to court!
I definitely won't be parking on a line ever again:)

Thanks for posting your update.
Glad to see you accepted responsibility for your actions, just saddened by the number of people who advised you to try to weasel out of it.

What's so big and brave about breaching parking conditions and then refusing to take the consequences? You might just as well say that it's spineless to pay for your shopping. Ultimately people who provide parking are running a business, if no-one obeyed the rules it would be utter chaos and they would just pack it in - so we would all be worse off.

OK, so you stand by the fact that, though you know nothing about the circumstances, you made yourself look silly by claiming that OP definitely would not have to pay. I'm very much at peace with that.

“Breaching parking conditions”, fucking hell. If you can’t see why opportunistically charging £100 for parking on a white line is ridiculous and needs to be challenged then god help you. It’s basically a scam and people are right to refuse to go along with it. It’s not difficult to get out of paying, plenty of good advice on how to do it other forums.

So the car park owner ignores every car that parks on white lines. Car A is on a white line, car B can't park in the next space without going over the line on the other side. Car C can't fit in that space at all and that's the last one in the car park so has to leave. It becomes generally apparent that this car park doesn't enforce the rules at all, so people just shove their cars where they want. They start obstructing each other, they obstruct the obvious routes out of parking spots, people are regularly prevented from leaving when they want to by other badly parked cars. They obstruct others' sightlines putting pedestrians in danger. Don't say it wouldn't happen, it's been demonstrated that it does.

Still ridiculous to enforce those rules?

Yes ridiculous. I parked the other day and noticed that I’d parked off centre and was so close to the white line that nobody could have sensibly parked in the next space. The car park was empty so it really didn’t matter. I was inside the lines so no chance of a ticket although the effect was exactly the same.

Oh boo hoo. Car park owner needs to reach into his own pocket and paint wider lines to accommodate the wider suvs more and more people are driving. In any case these charges are not the motivation for nor the solution to your hypotheticals, and the fact you have to make such a massive reach to dream up plausible explanations just proves it. They simply prey on people like poor op who are “terrified of going to court”. And you’re cheerleading for these shysters.