Can ignore private parking ticket?

[TheSassyTraybake]

I was 11 minutes over in a Lidl car park. They want £45. A private company not the council. What happens if I just ignore it?

You’d be rolling the dice. Private companies can still take you to court to recover the fine and if you still ignore you’ll end up with a CCJ. For the sake of it being your mistake and £45 I’d just pay it rather than have it hanging over my head.

The "advice" used to be ignore it, and you'll get people say they did and nothing happened but since 2015 rules changed and a lot of these companies now take you to court for a ccj as a matter of policy.

They'll take you to court and you'll get a CCJ, in all likelihood.

Case law has been on their side since 2015, so it's easy money for them.

Ah shit. Will just pay it then. In fairness not only did I not go into Lidl but the CCTV shows me driving in against the one way system so can’t even argue it’s unreasonable! Thanks all.

They might take legal action, which might result in further costs, which they might try to claim back if it ever got to court. They will no doubt win those costs and the original fine if you were to just simply ignore it. I used the word ‘might’ a lot because nothing is ever certain when it come to private parking companies and legal status. If it was me, I would send them a letter telling them I’m are not prepared to pay, and the reason why. I would also say I’m fully prepared to go to court. This might work, it might not, but the one thing I wouldn’t do is ignore it.

A friend let it go to court and won, it was hard fought though. Their barrister was an absolute arse and target my friend's age (70) suggesting he was 'confused', 'forgetful' and 'couldn't see' the signs...

As for the CCJ, it's not logged as a CCJ if you settle it straight after the judgement. That said, it sounds like you 'breached their terms' of parking there by overstaying so in all honesty you would probably lose.

Where in the UK did this happen?

Ignore is still good advice in Scotland.

In England and Wales since the Supreme Court decision in a test case called Beavis the parking companies have been much more bullish about taking cases to court.

You could wait and see but if £45 is a discount rate I'd be inclined to pay.

I got one for another supermarket recently that was £60. I was 4 minutes over my allotted time (10 minutes) because the staff had to go to the stockroom to get what I wanted. I considered not paying because I read that the parking company may not chase up such a small amount, but the fine went up to £100 if you didn't pay quickly. So I just paid and will never shop there again.

This. The case everyone is referring to is for England and Wales, so it matters where this happened. I don't know the position for NI but my understanding was the same as Bromptotoo re Scottish law. [But if it was in Scotland do double check rather than relying on people on the internet]

To clarify the situation in Scotland...

The decision of the Supreme Court in ParkingEye Ltd vs Beavis is binding on all courts in the UK, not just England & Wales. Sheriff's courts in Scotland have upheld penalties for parking on private land following this precedent. However, the Protection of Freedoms Act 2012 does not apply in Scotland so the parking operator has to take action against the driver, whereas in England & Wales they can take action against the registered keeper.

I stand corrected 😁

It probably just isn’t worth the risk of being taken to court, some of these companies are ruthless. It really is time the government stepped in with regulations rather than allowing them to self regulate, at least council run car parks have to give a ten minute grace period, though you’d still be over. I don’t particularly like using the apps to park but at least they warn you to put more money on if you near the end of your time, problem of course is that places like Lidl allow free parking for often 90 minutes but there’s no option to pay for more