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Monday 16 February 2015

Consumer Association join the Beavis case against ParkingEye

Channel 4 Dispatches tonight revealed that the Consumer Association (also known as Which) are joining in the ParkingEye v Beavis case on the side of the defendant, Barry Beavis. The case is due to be heard in the court of appeal next week.

ParkingEye want a change in the interpretation of the law so that they can charge arbitrary penalty amounts for breach of contact. As the law currently stands, the remedy for breach of contract is to make good any loss. ParkingEye's average cost per ticket issued was established in the initial case to be around £18. However, they want to be able to charge an arbitrary amount of £85 (and £100 in some car parks), giving them a profit of £67 or more.

The Consumer Association are worried that if the interpretation of the law changes in this way this would open the floodgates for all consumer industries to charge what they liked for breach of contract. The simplest way would be to create service companies to act on their behalf to issue charges for breach of contract. These service companies could then inflate charges to arbitrary levels (in the same way ParkingEye do) and charge as much as they like.

Parking management is necessary and there are sound business models used by some parking companies, such as where they charge a management fee or take a share of the parking revenue. A change in the law is therefore not needed; parking companies can adopt these legitimate business models.

The problem arises in the way some parking companies structure their business. Companies like ParkingEye get their sole revenue for issuing tickets for breach of contract, and this encourages them to find creative ways to make motorists fall foul of the rules, such as providing poor signage, or inventing complex parking rules it is easy to trip up on.

This can often be seen at hospitals. ParkingEye have invented a scheme which requires the motorist to guess how long they have parked for, and to enter their registration correctly. This is despite other companies offering technology which informs the motorist what the charge is without requiring guesswork, and which does not allow an incorrect number to be entered. Enough people fall foul of these rules to net ParkingEye millions of pounds a year at hospitals, as an FoI request on Northumbria NHS showed.

On the dispatches program, Patrick Troy, chief executive of the BPA said this about hospital parking.

The incentivisation of operators to issue tickets is wrong. That shouldn't happen.[...] If you find evidence of that then please let us have that, because we need to investigate.

The Prankster has already got in touch with the BPA and offered to tell them all about their largest member, ParkingEye. However, as the BPA recently investigated one hospital ParkingEye were operating at and failed to notice anything wrong, and in fact commended them on following government guidelines, it is possible that Patrick Troy is pulling the wool over Dispatches eyes, and has no serious intention of doing anything about the abuse.


Happy Parking

The Parking Prankster

16 comments:

  1. Just imagine - I'm a bed and breakfast and enter into a contract with a third party who offers a tripadvisor maximisation scheme and puts up signs in front of my entrance: If any one of my bed and breakfast guests leaves a negative comment about my bed and breakfast on tripadvisor then they are in breach of the agreement and that company charges them £100 because it is commercially justifiable that no bad comments about my business are left on tripadvisor...

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    1. Ah but this would be stupid and completely unenforceable you say?

      http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/technology-30100973

      Well, if the court of appeal allows ParkingEye to do this then it won't be long before other "maximisation schemes" are thought of.

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    2. That hotel is a real life Fawlty Towers, I'm sure Basil would love to 'fine' the guests for complaining.

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  2. This is great news if Beavis and his parking mates lose. I work for the NHS, today a patient was 2 minutes late for her appointment, can't wait to add liquidated damages to her car parking bill.

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  3. This is great news if Beavis and his parking mates lose. I work for the NHS, today a patient was 2 minutes late for her appointment, can't wait to add liquidated damages to her car parking bill.

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  4. This is great news if Beavis and his parking mates lose. I work for the NHS, today a patient was 2 minutes late for her appointment, can't wait to add liquidated damages to her car parking bill.

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  5. Dude has RPD repetitive post disorder!!!

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  6. TV news is alive with this today.
    Next week is going to be a make or break for the parking industry. ParkingEye may well have sunk the whole shebang due to their aggressive greedy stance.

    I bet there's a few in the industry quaking in their boots about it.
    The resultant clawback of illegal charges akin to the PPI scandal will most definitely not happen even though the law may be in the motorists favour. The Parking Companies will just go into voluntary liquidation before then and close the books.

    Oh to be a shareholder of Capita now eh????

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  7. Fractious Tart: I imagined that the landowner could be pursued, ultimately, for restitution. Maybe the prankster could advise.

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    1. This depends on each case. ParkingEye collect the charge on behalf of the landowner, so for ParkingEye cases the landowner is ultimately responsible.

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  8. Interesting point from the BBC. They DOT say the "contract" is with the landowner. This just shows that the whole thing is a mess. Here's hoping Mr B can win it for all the plc victims and they go the way of the clampers.

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  9. Sorry about that. It's this stupid phone,stupid phone,stupid phone...

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  10. Sorry about that. It's this stupid phone,stupid phone,stupid phone...

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    1. If they lose, I'll be raising a glass to every vulnerable person who has been a victim. If they win, I will be comorted in the knowledge that Parliament can overule Judge made law with statute....what a vote winner that would be :-)

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  11. If they lose, I'll be raising a glass to every vulnerable person who has been a victim. If they win, I will be comorted in the knowledge that Parliament can overule Judge made law with statute....what a vote winner that would be :-)

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  12. Beavis vs. Parking Eye???

    could we please call this Beavis and Butthead?

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