Parking ticket :(

[trinidad]

Just renewed my annual virtual permit the other day.

Renewed permit online, got a ticket :( telephoned to ask why, told it was a mistake and to write in.

Wrote an email, after a week told I did not have a valid permit.

Telephoned again, told my old permit expired on 30th March and my new permit started on 1st April. Got a ticket for the 31st March :( Told to write in again.

Sent another email explaining it was a genuine mistake. I am sure it will not go anywhere, parking has always been a excellent revenue maker for councils. I hat the fact we have a permit zone, my one has only been in operations for a few years, made no difference other than ?130.00 lighter each year in my pocket :( already stopped the garden waste permit of ?40.00 :(

[Ruffler]

Exactly the same thing happened to us. Applied for a permit renewal well before the old one had expired, mandated them to take the payment and received confirmation email. We didn?t think any more about it until we got a ticket!

We?ve challenged the fine and emailed our local councillor.

[trinidad]

good suggestion ruffler, did you get a response back?

[zog]

Exactly the same happened to me Ruffler. Renewed in plenty of time and got an email confirmation saying it was successful but got three parking tickets within a week (I don't use my car much). Parking team has rejected my initial complaint (without any good reason) so am taking it further...

[trinidad]

hello ant12, how are you taking things furthewr?

[zog]

Hi,

I think you receive a letter explaining how you can formally challenge a PCN if initial challenge with council is rejected. It's called a Notice To Owner form I believe. I'm also complaining to my councillors but doubt they'll do anything...

[trinidad]

I would be keen to hear your response regarding the NTO challenge and your councilor. The councilor may do something, especially as we are only weeksd away from the local elections

[Carrie]

We got 2 parking tickets despite having renewed well in advance of the expiry date of our permit.

On renewal we received the email stating our application had been successful so thought no more about it until the tickets were put on the car.

When I phoned the council the guy I spoke to said that the payment had been cancelled (not by me!) and I should have received an email to say that the payment had not gone through (I received no such email) and so we did not have a valid permit.

Appealed to the council and they upheld the first ticket as the email confirming our application had been a success contained the get out clause "provided the payment was received" - although how are you supposed to know that it had not gone through unless they tell you - it appeared fine and dandy on website.

They agreed to cancel the second ticket on the basis that it was issued within 24 hours of the first.

[goldilocks]

suggest that you all get local councilors involved - email them and ask them to help. This isn't what the fines are intended for!

[trinidad]

Thank you goldilocks. The fine is ?130..0 (reduce to ?65.00 if paid in 14 days).

[goldilocks]

I had thought that if you notify that you are contesting it you get to hold the reduce rate until the appeal is heard? So contest it officially and include your cllr in your correspondence?

[ianr]

For any debit card transactions, the OK given online would typically have signified that your bank had authorised the payment and reserved the amount as pending, and your available balance would have been correspondingly reduced. But it's for the payee to send another message to actually collect the money. They'd typically do this in the overnight batch, but could take longer. My own bank, probably typical, removes uncompleted pending transactions after seven days, though I understand from their help pages that the payee might still be able to try to collect substantially later.

So Southwark's failure to collect could have been due, among other possibilities, to problems with their system's attempt to collect during the 'pending' period, or whatever period their agreement with your bank/card issuer allowed them.

Something like that happened to me last year with my TV licence. My online payment went ok and I got an email saying my licence had been renewed. Two or three weeks later they sent a snail mail letter to say the payment hadn't been received — I think there was something in the letter to suggest or imply that it was a system fault somewhere — so could I please pay. And the rest of their communications were the standard warnings and threats that automated systems throw at you.

So, if you used a debit card payment, it might be a good idea to see if you can get some hard facts from your bank: whether there's any historic record of authorisation for the payment, or of any attempts to collect it. I surmise that similar sorts of considerations might also apply with credit card transactions, but don't really know.

[zog]

Thanks Ian- incredibly useful :)

I'll contact my bank to see if they can help as per your suggestion.

[trinidad]

goldilocks Wrote:

-------------------------------------------------------

> I had thought that if you notify that you are

> contesting it you get to hold the reduce rate

> until the appeal is heard? So contest it

> officially and include your cllr in your

> correspondence?

Excellent idea goldilocks, I have already emailed during the reduced time frame to southwark parking, I did some research of my local councilors, and emailed all three separately, copying in southwark parking in each email. I gave a brief explanation, informed each councilor this is not what the fines were designed for, and requested southwark parking to place the charge on hold until I receive a response.

I wonder if any of the councilors would respond? I have already received a altermatic response from one councilor informing me he is on leave, so this leaves the remaining two labor councilors left. One of them is the deputy leader, so this might help :)

[bobbly]

we renew ours to start on the very same day that it expires. That means that if it expires on the 8th, we renew it to start on the 8th. We have been stung so many times before, so this is how we avoid it. It's a scam, contest it all the way,

[trinidad]

yes, parking certainly don't seem to have much room for common sense, I mean, its not exactly a deliberate attempt to not pay for parking, but a simple error. I appreciate traffic wardens might not be able to see this information, but if a motorist had payed for a virtual permit on 31st March, and the permit expires on 30th March and then has another virtual permit starting 1st April, would common sense not prevail? why cant these council officers in parking understand this?

Following the three emails I sent separately to my local councilors, I was copied into an email which read:

Dolezal, Nick

To: Members Enquiries ,Rose, Catherine ,Bruce, Caroline

Please find attached regarding a confusion over an issued parking ticket.

It would appear that parking services have said that is both issued correctly and incorrectly when it was challenged by Trinidad - and then it was stated that it was issued between one permit ceasing and another starting - a matter of two hours.

Surely as there has been no intention to avoid parking fees this ticket should be waived

All the best

N

I am hoping to receive a response from Parking Services very soon, I will keep you posted.

[trinidad]

I received a email from Southwark parking at approx. 5am today informing me i now need to wait for the Notice of Keeper, and told the parking services can not engage with me further. where is the common sense? I sent the response to one of my councilors :(

[trinidad]

Hello all, I thought I would give you a update.

I went onto the http://forums.pepipoo.com/

I spoke to a few people, some people were shocked i received a fine a day after the expire date as many councils give 7 - 14 days after an expire date. My luck might be in though. The CEO used code 12 on the parking ticket, which is for someone who has not paid for their parking. The code the CEO should of used is code 19, an expired permit. I have to wait for the Notice to keeper first. Fining after one day, if parking is not money making this is a clear example it is. I will be raising a complaint once i have sorted all this out.

[natnat]

I have been experiencing the same issue. I now have a notice of owner that i am contesting, have wrote to my mp twice but have had no reply. Would y? anyone like to collaborate to take this further as the issue is entrapment. There system is flawed and set up to trap residents, by not functioning effectivly

[trinidad]

I agree natnat, try and post on http://forums.pepipoo.com/

also search for your three councillors on the council website and contact all three individually.

Yes this is terrible, and parking dont seem to care at all :(

[Penguin68]

also search for your three councillors on the council website

I had thought our wards were now smaller, with only 2 councillors elected.

[se22]

Larger wards have 3 councillors, Smaller wards have 2. Just depends where you live.

[trinidad]

I recently appealed my mums PCN for failure to display a blue badge in a disabled bay. I contacted all three of her councilors and received a response from parking to say the PCN had now been quashed. worth a try.

[embracefinancial]

I'm just doing my renewal at the moment. The email states that the permit expires on 29 May at 23.59. However, the renewal website says that the permit expires on 30 May, so I can see how this is misleading.

Looking back at correspondence, it looks like the controlled parking started on 30 March 2020 (which was a Monday). Southwark gave me an extra 2 months as the parking wasn't enforced until 30 May. But it seems that the choice to start the permits on the Monday rather than on the 1st of the month has made the inconsistent dates even more misleading.

I'm taking screen shots of the renewal process and will gladly share them with anyone who may find them useful.

[trinidad]

be very careful with what date you renew. Southwark tend to reject most appeals informally. You can always check with parking directly and ask them which date to renew on 0800 1389081

I hate the fact we have a Controlled Parking Zone. I have seen no improvement, other than forking out ?130.00 a year (it use to be ?125.00 but the labour administration increase the charge this year). I hate parking permits :(