Motorway parking fines (1 Viewer)

[peter marshall]

Hi we are in France at the moment, it seems I have a Motorway parking ticket at home waiting for me issued from Maidenhead Services for £50.00 for parking 2 and 3/4 of an hour, on the way to Dover. I remember reading somewhere that these are not enforceable ?. any sugestions or answers would be appreciated I will be home around the 21st September to answer any replies as at the moment I am useing wi fi in a camp. Pete

 

[Jaws]

Peter, its a try on..
It should be treated with the contempt it deserves and completely ignored

I have had half a dozen of the things now.. All ignored on the advice of a lawyer who specialises in such things

In fact I believe if you do a search on here you will find a few other examples of this too

 

[Jim]

Its an invoice dressed up as a fine. Don't make contact with them, they will send you a couple more invoices, then they will stop. I have had a few now. Don't give it another thought.

Usual disclaimers etc - I'm not a lawyer

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[ninjayorkies]

This was discussed on the radio last week and someone quoted the Moneysaving Expert bloke who said if it's not from the police or the council then they can't make you pay

 

[pappajohn]

parking in places like private carparks, motorway service area's etc are contractual agreements.

this means the contract is with the driver of the vehicle but as they dont know who was driving they send the invoice to the registered keeper.

unlike a police or council parking ticket, you are under no obligation to divulge the details of the person who was driving at the time of the 'offence'

ignore the 'fine' and they'll send more correspondence...even threatening bailiffs and court action but nothing will come of it as they know they cant win.

all they rely on is gulliable motorists who will just pay and wont object.

 

[keith]

So, does the same apply to the sometimes ridiculous parking fees for stopping over night?

The signs say call this number & pay with CC, anything up to £20 I've seen.

At Churwell valley services on the M40 if you stay at the Travel Lodge you have to register your number so you don't get charged. Is this also part of the same system

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[ourcampersbeentrashed]

use the consumer action group if you need help.

you could also have a look at this website too

http://www.cancelmyticket.co.uk/



Good luck and whatever you do DONT pay it xxxxxxxx

 

[wp1234]

This was discussed on the radio last week and someone quoted the Moneysaving Expert bloke who said if it's not from the police or the council then they can't make you pay

I think you will find that tickets issued by authorised enforcement outfits will be taken to court eg TCP parking

 

[Jim]

I think you will find that tickets issued by authorised enforcement outfits will be taken to court eg TCP parking

I have had two this year, both from different parking companies. One even had a pretty picture of me coming in and going out with a time stamp. The longest I stay is for about 4 hours, I have never paid to have a kip on a motorway service station rest stop, and I never will.

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[GJH]

Certainly the document is an invoice, not a fine, but is it right to simply ignore documents like this?

We are not talking about "cowboy clampers" hiding in places where there are no signs against parking, we are talking about large companies who abide by codes of practice accepted by government. When we drive onto an MSA these days there are large signs spelling out the parking conditions and those are conditions of a contract which we enter into when we park. Those contracts are as enforceable as any other so long as the driver can be identified by the company issuing the invoice. Having freely entered into the contract - and having had ample opportunity before leaving the MSA to pay for any time used over 2 hours - what right have we to try to ignore our obligations under the contract?

Looking at it from a couple of different angles:
a) You work for an employer on the basis of a weekly wage plus an hourly rate if you happen to work any overtime. You work overtime one week but the employer refuses to pay you any more than your weekly wage for that week. Do you accept that or do you try to enforce the contract?
b) As a businessman you provide a customer with a service with payment to be made within a certain time of an invoice being issued. The customer, having received the service which (unlike goods) cannot be retrieved, refuses to pay the invoice. Do you accept that or do you try to enforce the contract?

If your answer to either of those is that you try to enforce the contract then why should you deny the MSA parking company the right to do exactly the same? That is all they are doing.

Graham

 

[Jim]

All well and good Graham. But to pull off the motorway and have a kip is a right. It is wrong, in principle, to charge someone a £1 a minute if they over sleep for 20min. If it was a couple of quid then I would probably pay, but try and rip me off, charge me £20 to sleep amongst the piss and deisel and I am not going to roll over and pay, its not right. And as you know Graham; contracts are not all they are cracked up to be, a court can deem them to be unfair even when freely enetered into. IMO the onus on the parking company to place it before the court, they don't because they know it would get flung out as being unfair. So in answer to your question, IMO YES it is right to ignore these things

 

[scotjimland]

I agree with Graham ..

There was a TV program about Mway parking charges and why the operators charge for more than two hours. One of the reasons was that local people were using them as free parking for car sharing schemes and parking all day for free .. but there is more ..

This is from the operators information site .

The operators have to pay all the running costs associated with the service area, including the construction and maintenance of the slip roads onto/off the motorway. And they have to keep the area open all the time, even when there aren't many customers, as well as provide free facilities such as toilets and short-term parking. So they need to make enough money to cover all of these costs, despite the fact that not everyone who uses the facilities will be spending any money. Which means that they need to make their income on product sales, such as food, snacks and stuff from the shop. Effectively, the people who use the paid-for products, such as food, are subsidising those who only ever use the free facilities such as toilets.

Other countries do things differently. Elsewhere, it's more usual for the government (or the local equivalent of the Highways Agency) to provide the basic site, including free facilities such as toilets and parking, and then sublet individual facilities on the site to fuel, retail and food vendors. That way, the paid-for facilities only have to cover their own costs, not those of the site as a whole. That makes them a lot cheaper to use. It also means that there can be more service areas available, including more basic ones that consist solely of a rest area (picnic area) rather than full-facility sites, as a site can exist without needing to generate large amounts of income. If you think this makes more sense, then write to your MP and tell them!

We have often used the services to overnight and always pay.. If you don't agree with the charging then you can leave the Mway and find a site .. would you use a camp site and then run off without paying ?

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[Jim]

We have often used the services to overnight and always pay.. If you don't agree with the charging then you can leave the Mway and find a site .. would you use a camp site and then run off without paying ?

But its not a campsite. A top campsite will charge much the same for 24 hours and a hookup. The motorway rest area is a rip off, its too much money. They must provide a rest stop and to charge that much for going over for an hour or two is just not on.

You keep paying Jim, I won't, if they were so confident that the contract was any good they would take things further than sending a few invoices dressed up to scare people. At least a clamper looks you in the eye when he robs you (using similar contracts) these do it by letter, scammers alll of them

 

[Landy lover]

There is a great deal of difference between Overnighting and being 20 mins over the supposed 'allotted' time - If I decided to overnight then I would pay with pleasure because I have made a decision to use that facility - one of the problems with ANPR cameras to time entry and exit times is it does exactly that it does not time that is used finding a parking spot - in busy times on some services stations you can loose some of your time actually waiting for a space to park.

As far as I am aware the use of these car parking companies is a source of income for the car park owner - they get a fixed income from the parking company and then the parking company relies on guillable motorists to pay up on the letters they send . if they don't make enough they increase the charges or shorten the allocated time.

IMHO they should ban this practice and put a sensible charge on stopping in a Motorway Car Park if a charge is need.

You only have to go around most Industrial areas of a night time to see that most lorry drivers now stop there for the night rather than pay exhorbitant charges on a motorway. Their greed has cost them not only possible nominal parking charges but also the meals they could sell - ie evening meal and breakfast

 

[GJH]

Yes, it may well be that a court might deem a charge to be unfair. But that applies to any contract and that is why I was careful to say "Those contracts are as enforceable as any other".]

Yes, MSAs are not camp sites - so why should we expect them to charge camp site rates? Doing so might encourage more long term stays to the detriment of those who wish to park (i.e. use the facilities for their design purpose) for only an hour or two.

It is interesting to see the quote from the operators' information site and that it quite rightly points out that if people want a change then it is up to them to lobby the government to make such a change. What we have at the moment is the long-standing policy requirement that MSAs provide free parking for up to two hours for all types of vehicle. In effect, successive governments have said to MSAs - and to drivers - that it is in the public interest for taxpayers to cover the costs to the MSAs of providing free parking for up to two hours, which is all the vast majority of drivers need.

What successive governments have also said to those drivers who want to stop somewhere for longer is that they must pay the costs themselves. What successive governments have never said is that drivers wishing to stop for longer must do so at MSAs. We all have the capacity to plan our journeys and, if the journey necessitates a long stop, plan to do so in an appropriate place. Nobody forces us to "sleep amongst the piss and diesel" any more than they force us to use a camp site which we think charges too much money.

Another consideration is that if the government (as the operators say happens elsewhere) do decide to provide the basic site, including free facilities such as toilets and parking, then that will come at a cost and that cost will have to be borne by the taxpayer. Even increasing the length of time for which free parking is available would come at a cost which would have to be borne by the taxpayer.

Will general taxpayers - or even the majority of motorists if the tax is specifically targeted - be happy to pay higher taxes to subsidise those relatively few drivers who want to use MSAs for more than two hours at a time? I should think the answer would be no, even in times of less economic constraint than current ones.

Graham

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[Jim]

As ever Graham a well thought out argument and of course you are right. But its still a scam. The scammers approach the carpark owners and offer them cash, in exactly they same way as those same companies operating clamps on private property, then those companies try and extract as much from the gullible as they can with punitive charges.

I agree it is totally legal to apply those charges. In some cases they might even be justified. But it's just as legal for me to ignore them, until a magistrate or registrar tells me otherwise

 

[dazzer]

Whatever the rights and wrongs of charging for parking for more than 2 hours there is no way on earth the owners NEED to charge to cover the costs of having the car parks and toilets.

The extra 5-10p per ltr on the fuel on top of the normal price and the fact that bottled water costs more than petrol per litre in the shops should more than cover this. Lets not forget service stations are the single most expensive shops/eateries in the UK, to then charge extra to park your car is a complete rip off.

I had a few of these invoices and have never paid any of them, the day I have to pay to park in a service station is the day i never drive into one again.

The word that springs to mind is GREED, plain and simple

 

[GJH]

Yes, MSAs are expensive but there are reasons as (Scot)Jim posted this morning. Very interesting, in that post to see the statement "Effectively, the people who use the paid-for products, such as food, are subsidising those who only ever use the free facilities such as toilets." - which includes a subsidy to me and, I suspect, many members of this forum.

As with the rest of the private sector, market conditions - to an extent what they can get away with charging - are what governs the level at which prices are set.

Are the car park charges for more than 2 hours really that expensive? Just looking at Moto & Welcome Break (via the information site referenced by Jim) I see that they charge £8 for any time in excess of 2 hours, up to 24 hours.

Yesterday we were in Newcastle exhibiting at a family history fair and had to park the car in a car park which charged. As it happens the venue has an agreement with NCP at a car park about 1/4 of a mile away of £7 for up to 24 hours. If that agreement had not been in place it would have cost me £9.90, the scale being: £3.10 / 1 hour; £4.90 / 2 hours; £7.80 / 4 hours; £8.60 / 6 hours; £9.90 / day. If I had used the council car park next door it would have cost me £9 (£1 per hour) as we were there from just before 8 am until about 4:30 pm. Both charges are higher than the MSA rate for 9 hours and in neither case is there a facility to park free for 2 hours.

Graham

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[ShiftZZ]

I parked in a car park in Leeds, I was staying at the hotel above the car park, bill for 4 days?

£88..

Bargain....

 

[GJH]

Leeds? They should have paid you

Graham

 

[John & Joan]

I agree with Graham ..

There was a TV program about Mway parking charges and why the operators charge for more than two hours. One of the reasons was that local people were using them as free parking for car sharing schemes and parking all day for free .. but there is more ..

This is from the operators information site .

The operators have to pay all the running costs associated with the service area, including the construction and maintenance of the slip roads onto/off the motorway. And they have to keep the area open all the time, even when there aren't many customers, as well as provide free facilities such as toilets and short-term parking. So they need to make enough money to cover all of these costs, despite the fact that not everyone who uses the facilities will be spending any money. Which means that they need to make their income on product sales, such as food, snacks and stuff from the shop. Effectively, the people who use the paid-for products, such as food, are subsidising those who only ever use the free facilities such as toilets.

Other countries do things differently. Elsewhere, it's more usual for the government (or the local equivalent of the Highways Agency) to provide the basic site, including free facilities such as toilets and parking, and then sublet individual facilities on the site to fuel, retail and food vendors. That way, the paid-for facilities only have to cover their own costs, not those of the site as a whole. That makes them a lot cheaper to use. It also means that there can be more service areas available, including more basic ones that consist solely of a rest area (picnic area) rather than full-facility sites, as a site can exist without needing to generate large amounts of income. If you think this makes more sense, then write to your MP and tell them!

We have often used the services to overnight and always pay.. If you don't agree with the charging then you can leave the Mway and find a site .. would you use a camp site and then run off without paying ?

These operators run the MSA because they have competitively tendered to run them and have offered the government the best available quotation. It is the terms in these contracts that need looking at.

John

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[Peter JohnsCross MH]

They need money to maintain the facilities, without car parking they would have no customers to pay the vastly overpriced goods and meals they provide. Fish and chips at £6-95................. curry at £5-95p a dollop, cant be bad!

As to 24 hour facilities, the Wimpy at Clackets on the M25 closes at 11pm as do other parts of the site.

Coffee chains are opening up everywhere in these places so business must be good.

Every one is getting in on the act of charging now, even Tesco's

Sorry I do not agree with charging.

Peter

At night the car parks are pretty empty anyway