NCP £100 fine - overstayed by quarter of an hour

Ken

Ken

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Hi,

Paid £8 for 3 hours but overstayed by quarter of an hour. I have a PCN requesting £100. How they've come to this ridiculous amount I've no idea (£60 if paid within 14 days). Could park for 4 days for £100 at that same car park.

Is it best to appeal on grounds that the amount is unjustified or is it best to ignore it?

I'll gladly pay a reasonable amount for the the time I've overstayed.

Thanks
 
Soldato
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Unfortunately, you agreed to their terms and conditions once you parked your car and bought a ticket, which will be clearly on view in the car park, probably at the ticket machine. Yes, it's a ridiculous amount, but even with pepipoo, i doubt you'll get off it for overstaying by 15 minutes!
 
Soldato
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I got a ticket last month when using the RingoApp.

I used the geolocate feature to find the road I was on, tapped the first result, paid and went on my way.

Turns out the geo locate feature isn't always that accurate and there was say for example a road called 'London Road' and 'London Ave', and I selected the wrong one.

Ended up with a ticket by the time I got back. Called them up and they said to email them with evidence that I bought a ticket. They wrote me quite a strict letter saying it was ultimately my responsibility to select the right road, but let me off in the end, which was nice as it was just before Christmas.

Not sure if they'll be as lenient in your case, that MSE article looks like it could be worth a shot though.
 
Soldato
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I've had 3 NCP parking notices in the last week :D

Parking at Grantham station, used the paybyphone app but automatically issued with a ticket from the ANPR. Clearly something isn't working!
 
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They have absolutely no contractual or legal right to ‘fine’ you. They are allowed to claim pre-estimated loss and expense caused by your infraction of the Ts and Cs. There is a famous supermarket/ shopping centre case (beavis v parking eye I think?) which they found £100 a reasonable deterrent as the shops could be losing that much in sales etc. and the people issuing the fine won. If you were parking somewhere like a station or something I absolutely wouldn’t pay it. I would offer them a without prejudice offer to pay the remaining balance of a full days charge. They will reject this and send you about 6 letters upping the fine from phoney solicitors. Ignore these and only respond if they issue a court summons..... which they won’t. I’ve had about 5 NCP fines and not paid. They eventually give up with the letters and intimidation.
 
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Soldato
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They couldn't demonstrate £100 worth of loses from a residential carpark though. If it actually went to court they would get practically nothing
 
Soldato
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They couldn't demonstrate £100 worth of loses from a residential carpark though. If it actually went to court they would get practically nothing

They dont have to because if it is paid before 14days its £60, why people are getting hung up over the £100 is beyond me. I would have thought £60 for paying someone to monitor the car park and the admin associated with the ticket isnt too unreasonable. If they dont pay before the 14days are over then an extra charge due to the increased admin required so the invoice then increases to £100.

Does it seem steep sure but its not beyond the realms reality
 
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They dont have to because if it is paid before 14days its £60, why people are getting hung up over the £100 is beyond me. I would have thought £60 for paying someone to monitor the car park and the admin associated with the ticket isnt too unreasonable. If they dont pay before the 14days are over then an extra charge due to the increased admin required so the invoice then increases to £100.

Does it seem steep sure but its not beyond the realms reality

£60 doesn’t pay for someone monitoring the car park. The car park ‘attendant’ is paid for out of the tickets people have purchased at the set price or say £10 per 24 hours for example. The £60 is a ‘penalty’ which in most instances can in absolutely no way be linked to loss and expense.
 
Soldato
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£60 doesn’t pay for someone monitoring the car park. The car park ‘attendant’ is paid for out of the tickets people have purchased at the set price or say £10 per 24 hours for example. The £60 is a ‘penalty’ which in most instances can in absolutely no way be linked to loss and expense.

Do you seriously believe anything anybody charges you is the price it costs to do or manufacture? Do you think a solicitor charging you to write a letter really costs him £80 or whatever it is?

The £60 is quite obviously a penalty, it will even say so on a big notice board around the car park. The excuse they will give for such a charge is the point and the excuse to justify such a charge is that the car park will have to be monitored for offenders over staying, the parking attendant will then have to either input the offender onto some computer system or someone else in an admin role will have to and the associated office costs etc. That will be their justification for the charge for the over stay and in fact I know it will be because my brother was taken to court for over staying in Milton Keynes and that was their justification for the charge. The charge isnt for the loss of 15mins of parking that someone else could have parked there for.

As I said before, is it steep sure, but the charges arent beyond the realms of reality
 
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You are missing the point on loss and expense when you compare it to general selling goods and services costs.

The attendant is a company overhead that is permanently employed. They asses that they can pay his salary based on the average turnover of parking permits. All ‘penalties’ paid end up as extra turnover and ulitinately a degree of additional profit. This is not permissible under contract law and probably explains why they’ve stopped chasing all my past fines....
 
Soldato
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Yep, a bunch of chancers but most people pay up so they make a profit from it. If everyone was French about it and told them to **** off, they wouldn't be able to operate.
 
Soldato
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The attendant is a company overhead that is permanently employed. They asses that they can pay his salary based on the average turnover of parking permits. All ‘penalties’ paid end up as extra turnover and ulitinately a degree of additional profit. This is not permissible under contract law and probably explains why they’ve stopped chasing all my past fines....

It obviously is permissible under law because as I said my brother was taken to court and that was their justification for the charge as they won. If it wasnt permissable as you say, it would be thrown out of court.

Of course the attendant is permanently employed but if no one ever over stayed then there wouldnt ever be a need to pay for an attendant at all. It is the fact that people do overstay thus there is a requirement to pay for an attendant to be there.
 
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Out of curiosity was it a company that took your brother to court or the local council? What sort of car park was it (ie. shopping centre?).

If they won on the basis that parking permits didn’t cover the salary of the attendant but instead he was paid for out of penalty charges as you state - if there’s a month or year say where very few people get fined; are you telling me you honestly think they make a loss on this and can’t afford to pay his salary? They aren’t there just because people do overstay, they are there because he is part of the whole dynamic of how the parking companies ticket/ permit validation works. If he’s not there then their system falls apart, fines or not.
 
Soldato
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Out of curiosity was it a company that took your brother to court or the local council? What sort of car park was it (ie. shopping centre?).

If they won on the basis that parking permits didn’t cover the salary of the attendant but instead he was paid for out of penalty charges as you state - if there’s a month or year say where very few people get fined; are you telling me you honestly think they make a loss on this and can’t afford to pay his salary? They aren’t there just because people do overstay, they are there because he is part of the whole dynamic of how the parking companies ticket/ permit validation works. If he’s not there then their system falls apart, fines or not.

It was a parking company that monitors the shopping center parking at Milton Keynes. No I didnt state that parking permits dont cover salaries of attendants, you are presuming that.

So are you telling me that in an ideal world where no one ever overstays, a parking company would pay the salary to cover an attendant that doesnt need to be there?
 
Soldato
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@OP check the new rules out regarding overstaying. 15 mins may be pushing it, but I believe they've now said that a fine can't be awarded if you're a minute late for example.

IMO the leniency for overstaying should be based on how long the initial stay was. I.e. 15 mins on a 1 hour stay might be taking the biscuit. But 15 mins on a 10 hour stay should be acceptable.
 
Soldato
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These companies are scum. Was done for overstaying 20 mins on a 3 hour stay AT MY PLACE OF WORK!

Appealed based in the fact I was first offence and I was with an ill patient waiting for an ambulance (true) but it was rejected. ******* scumbags!
 
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