Parking fine at Sainsburys superstore

[MyCheekyEagle]

Recently I did a big shop at Sainsburys, which included trying & buying clothes and a big food shop. I ended up over staying by 18 minutes & have a parking fine from Euro car parks.
I sometimes read that people refuse to pay these extortionate parking fines to private companies. Is this true, has anyone ever not paid and got away with it?
I'm really cross that I have been penalised for buying clothes as well as my big shop 😡

Have to say I agree with this. I always see the advice that they’re unenforceable because they’re ’not a fine’. However by parking in a private carpark you are agreeing to certain terms and if you don’t you may be ask to pay a penalty amount. If you don’t they may take you to the small claims court.

One piece of good advice I got was to google the parking company to see how litigious they are. Some won’t pursue anything other than to send out a few threatening letters. Others will take it all the way to the small claims court. Unfortunately mine were very litigious. There was one car where the poor bloke had put one wrong digit from his vrm into the machine, they took him to small claims and won! He had paid for parking and it was clear what had happened but he broke the terms of the contract so they won and he had to pay up.

I think you’re better off just paying it OP. I had this at a nearby Iceland shop. The time allowed was 10 mins. I was only going in for one thing, it wasn’t a busy time of day so thought I’d be in and out very quickly. But because what I went in for wasn’t on the shop floor, staff had to get it from the stockroom. I was in there 16 minutes. It cost me £60. A lesson learned but I won’t shop there again. The shop is in a really deprived area, I’ve never seen the car park full so I don’t know why they thought it was a good idea to get a private company to take over the car park and have a ridiculous 10 minute parking allowance.

Just go in and speak to someone they have the ability to cancel them on your behalf

I would pay it and then go and speak to sainsburys afterwards to explain, showing your receipts etc. The problem is that Sainsburys don't actually own and operate these carparks, they are owned by a separate company, I would imagine they can't be of much help.

@MyCheekyEagle, I'd go into the shop with my bank statement/credit card bill to show that I'd spent money there on that day and ask for their help. You won't be the first person to ask. I would expect them to be able to arrange to have it cancelled.

This happened to me. I had taken my disabled Dad shopping and didn’t realise that there was only an hours parking. I ended up paying it but have not been back to Sainsbury’s since.

I was in Morrison’s and was taken ill. My daughter and I spent time in the cafe until I started to feel better. I got a parking fine! I rang their head office and they sorted it out for me straight away. You could do the same?

I am curious how you were able to try on the clothes when I thought Sainsbury's had closed their changing rooms. Is the one in your store open?

Did they follow the procedure outlined in the thread on MSE to the letter? I bet they didn't.

What typically happens is this:

1. parking ticket
2. read something /hear something about private carpark tickets being unenforceable
3. Don’t pay, smugly ignore letters with ever increasing amounts payable and/or
4. Don’t Keep DVLA updated with home address and/or fail to set up post redirection on moving house
5. find out there’s an unpaid CCJ when applying for credit
6. panic call to CAB asking for advice

All this for the lack of paying £50

They (Sainsbury's) can get it cancelled, which they will do for a proper customer. It's to prevent people parking there and going elsewhere, it's not for people who need longer to shop.

I had this happen; did a shop in M&S then bumped into a friend from abroad who was unexpectedly home and we went for a coffee. All transactions recorded over the period on my credit card and I had receipts.

When I was accidentally a few minutes over my time i did approach the M&S store manager and ask them to intervene but they said they could do nothing to help.

I paid the fine and now I set an alarm on my phone when I park. It was extremely annoying. Looking at you, M&S!

That is not even remotely what i was advising. Have you even read the thread on MSE which outlines the exact legal position and the exact steps you need to take at every stage depending on the exact wording of the parking fine and your own situation? It sounds like you are saying it's terrible advice to do what is outlined in your post (agreed, it is) and aren't even in a position to comment on what I advised because you clearly haven't read it.

Same thing happened to me but I overstayed in Morrisons by 9 mins over 2 hrs. I was able to download a pdf bank statement showing my debit card transactions for every week I'd done the weekly shop in their store over the past 12 months. I went to the kiosk and she sorted it. We did park there, do the weekly shop and then walk round the local shops as we did everything week but the day i overstayed the local Costa had shut down and we'd had coffee in their cafe which had caused us to overstay!

I prefer not to take advice from a website forum, rather speak to the actual law and my personal experience of advising people who have found themselves in trouble from not paying parking tickets.

Exactly. If in doubt, (or they refuse to cancel said fine) always ALWAYS pay it. If you don't it will escalate, and it will escalate fast. The amount will double within about 2 weeks, then if you don't pay, it will be passed on to debt collectors.

Them, as @VanCleefArpels said, it will affect your credit rating, and will result in difficulty getting credit, loans, credit cards, car finance, mortgages, and even phone contracts and insurance and the like...

Always ALWAYS pay. You can always dispute it/challenge it later on...

This has been my experience. Whenever I’ve asked the supermarket about it, they’ve always said it’s nothing to do with them because they don’t own the land for the car park and have no ability to cancel the charge.

Sainsbury’s closed all their fitting rooms didn’t they? Don’t use that as an excuse when you appeal

Ok then. You do you, but don't say my advice (aka Martin Lewis's advice) is terrible when you haven't even bothered to read the detailed, legally informed thread created by one of the most respected and trusted teams on all matters financial in the UK. I mean I haven't lately heard anyone complain that they followed Martin Lewis's advice and ended up being worse off or with a CCJ, but if people want to follow your advice instead that's fine by me.

Yes indeed. I have even known of NURSES, getting parking tickets for not paying the parking fine for staying too long on the hospital car park WHEN THEY WERE WORKING, ya know, actually bloody saving LIVES!

They didn't pay the fine (after being advised not to by well meaning people giving the wrong advice,) and they ended up 1000s of pounds in debt and with a broken credit record. It's terrible advice to say 'do not pay.' I don't care what MSE says. MSE, as good and helpful as it is, does get it wrong now and again........

Taking the advice to pay a fine and then challenge it later, is a much better idea than taking the advice to avoid paying it.

Do you have a link to this 100% concrete, absolutely gospel information on MSE that says you can avoid paying fines, (and not get into any trouble/have action taken against you) by any chance?

You're all under the impression that it's within Sainsburys' power to cancel the parking fine, but what if the carpark is run by a private firm? Our local Sainsburys' carpark is. The info boards about this are high up and in very small writing!

But in the vast majority of cases, they DO have the ability to get a fine cancelled. All shops do. The parking charge company work for Sainsburys (and this applies at most other stores of course.)

They can get it cancelled by contacting the parking charge company they employ. They don't have to, but it's nonsense to say they can't do it. They can if they want to. It's their car park, and they employ the people who issue the tickets.

If you are a customer there/have spent money in their store, and can prove you did (which most people will be able to with a receipt or bank statement,) most stores will cancel the charge. It's ridiculous to not at least ask them to do so.

It's not a fine. It's an invoice.

OP should 100% not pay it yet. First port of call should be to get Sainsbury's to cancel it. Second port of call should be to appeal it.

Ultimately, I think OP would be well advised to not pay at all and let them threaten her. Most of these are dropped when the car park company encounters someone who won't back down, and those that aren't are very often lost because the car parking company hasn't complied with their own obligations.

Also, as long as you don't ignore a court order to pay something, you won't end up with a CCJ. That is scaremongering nonsense.

No one should ignore it, but they also shouldn't just jump straight to paying it.

OP - how big is the car park? The new code of practice allows 5 minutes consideration period for smaller car parks and 10 minutes for larger car parks; plus ten minutes possibly for a grace period depending on the terms and conditions. So you might actually have been within the allowed grace periods, or just barely outside them. There's also a good chance the signage in the car park is not adequate.

Other point - at no point should you ever tell the car parking company who was driving. Their obligations are different if they can't prove who was driving and if they have to hold the keeper liable instead, and they often fail to meet those obligations.

My local Tesco has a ONE HOUR limit if you visit after 10pm at night!! One hour! It’s a large megastore type place.

I usually go after 10pm as it’s quieter and I can browse in peace. I spent 1 hr 35mins in there on a big shop - which included 15 minutes on the phone to DP as he wanted me to pick up something that I couldn’t find. Plus no cashiers at that time of night so a good 15 minutes or so scanning, packing etc.

Anyway, got a fine. Tesco uninterested. Said the car parks weren’t operated by them - even though they are the only shop there so clearly they’ve allowed the operator to run them on their behalf.

I was moving house and forgot to pay (I am also shit at life admin). Ended up costing me more than £200.

Also, parking restrictions at other times of the day are three hours. The one-hour limit was new. They had updated the signage but as it was a Tesco I’d been going to for over 10 years, there was absolutely no reason for me to cross the car park to check the sign (where the one-hour limit was written in small text at the bottom). I mean, who checks the sign at a local supermarket every single time you visit just in case there’s been a change?! You don’t walk past the signs to get from the car park to the door.

It would have been good customer service to have a notice on the door or even just a warning to say “car park times have changed” - because then I would have checked.

It was technically my fault so I paid but I’m still absolutely adamant it was shitty customer service and what supermarket limits you to a bloody hour?!

Anyway. Solidarity OP. Try taking your bank account in to show Sainsburys - fingers crossed they give more of a shit than Tesco.