ParkingTicketAppeals changes companies

The web site http://www.parkingticketappeals.org.uk/ has apparently changed hands.

Yesterday, the company on the about page was Parking Ticket Appeals Limited, company number 08981061, incorporated 7/4/2014. The secretary is Ricky Gater and sole director Kiera Prince.

Today, the company on the about page is Parking Ticket Appeals Service Limited, company number 08994668, incorporated 14/4/2014. This company appears to have one shareholder, Ricky Gater, and one director Ricky Gater.

The Prankster contacted the new company to enquire about current customers of the old company, and the new company liability to pay the parking charge under the guarantee if their appeals fail. Ricky Gater told the Sunday Times that that company was processing 400 appeals a week, and as appeals can take 2-3 months, there may be up to 5000 active customers.

Although not replying directly to The Prankster's questions, a spokeperson for the company stated;

"It should not be lost on yourself that liability as previously explains lies with the company and liability cannot be transferred to another company"

The Prankster does not consider this an appropriate duty of care to previous customers, and has therefore removed all links and recommendations from his website to the company.

Happy Parking

The Parking Prankster

Dodgy parking company suspended - GB Parking Solutions

GB Parking Solutions were chucked out of the British Parking Association on 18th November. This was because they exceeded 12 sanction points in a 12 month period.

Additionally, according to a poster on pepipoo, they are "in the process of being struck off by Companies House due to overdue accounts. The first "Gazette" entry was made on 11th November; (normally it takes 3 months from this date to complete the process)."

Apparently, according to another poster,  this has been the fate of all the companies run by this director, Mr Shamshar Singh.

https://companycheck.co.uk/director/917215588

Shamshar Singh holds 2 appointments at 2 active companies, has resigned from 0 companies and held 3 appointments at 3 dissolved companies. Shamshar began their first appointment at the age of 21. Their longest current appointment spans 2 years and 0 months at GB PARKING SOLUTIONS LTD.

According to the DVLA they have been banned from keeper access from 11 August 2014.

Their web site does not appear to be in 'English'.

http://gbparkingsolutions.com/Accidration.html

It appears they will no longer be providing 'excellence in you parking operation'.

The Daily Mail recently ran an article regarding the DVLA providing data to dodgy companies. The Prankster wonders what kind of checks are actually put in place to prevent companies like this getting data in the first place?

The Prankster recommends anyone who gets a windscreen ticket from GB Parking Solutions waits for a Notice to Keeper to arrive. For the keeper to be liable, this must arrive between days 28 and 56. However, as they have no access to the DVLA database, this is unlikely to arrive.

If the windscreen ticket refers to POPLA then the Prankster recommends referring this to the BPA and to trading standards.

Only BPA members can use POPLA, so this is a false claim.

Happy Parking

The Parking Prankster

Patrick Troy admits private parking charges are penalties

This article in the Sunday Times discusses the appeal services offered by http://www.parkingticketappeals.org.uk/. The article is also discussed on MSE here.

Patrick Troy, CEO of the British Parking Association Limited,  expressed his views on the situation.

“There is a danger with these websites because they make people believe that they can get them off parking tickets, but if they did park in the wrong place, then they should pay the penalty." 

Under UK Law, only the Government can impose penalties, and herein lies the problem with many private parking charges. The doctrine of penalties in UK Law provides that if a contract is breached, the aggrieved party has a right to be put back in the position they would have been in had no breach occurred. Over the last few years, parking companies have revealed to POPLA and the courts that their average cost per ticket issued is around £20. They are therefore shooting themselves in the foot by charging £100. This immediately establishes the charge is a penalty and therefore makes it unenforceable in law.

This is the basis on which the ParkingTicketAppeals works. Private parking companies can therefore immediately make their charges enforceable by reducing the charges to around £20. This would cause services like ParkingTicketAppeals  to go out of business.

The BPA previous required its members to comply with the usual interpretation of the law. Its code of practice stated that all charges must be a genuine pre-estimate of loss. However, most of its members flagrantly disobeyed that requirement. Large numbers of complaints were received from motorists regarding this, but not a single sanction point  was issued for breaching this rule. Instead, the BPA changed the code of practice to remove the requirement. The new code requires that charges are 'commercially justified'.

The Parking industry is attempting to get the interpretation of the law changed, and there is a test case due to be held in February 2015 in the court of appeal; ParkingEye v Beavis. The Parking industry will be arguing that there will be parking chaos if the interpretation is not changed, and that although it only costs them around £20 per ticket issued, they must charge £85 to introduce a deterrent.

The Prankster would point the court of appeal to the following facts.

1. £16 appears to be a sufficient deterrent. ParkingTicketAppeals state they get very little repeat business
2. Scotland, where the law is different because only the driver is liable, does not have parking chaos
3. There was not parking chaos in England and Wales before the law changed in October 2012
4. There is not parking chaos in other countries
5. There are parking companies which charge £20 per ticket and who run a thriving business. It is therefore not necessary to charge £85 to have a viable business, and to provide sufficient deterrent to stop motorists transgressing.

Prankster note

As previously reported, the person running ParkingTicketAppeals changed on Friday. The two people originally running the service are no longer involved. The Prankster has contacted the new person to find their experience in parking appeals but has had no reply. The Prankster is therefore reserving judgment on the effectiveness of their service going forward for the time being.

Happy Parking

The Parking Prankster

ParkingTicketAppeals changes hands

The Parking Prankster has heard that the ownership of at least half of ParkingTicketAppeals has changed hands.It will be run by someone else going forwards.

The Prankster does not know who is now running the company.

At this point therefore The Prankster will neither be recommending for or against using the company until the situation is clear.

As the company are having an effect on ParkingEye's bottom line estimated at £1m a year, it may be that Capita would be better off offering a substantial sum just to close the company down.

Happy Parking

The Parking Prankster

Rosanna Breaks joins ParkingEye legal team

Rosanna Breaks has joined ParkingEye's legal team. According to information given to the Prankster, Ms Breaks previously acted for ParkingEye several times under the banner of LPC Law.

As is customary for people ashamed of working for ParkingEye, (in the Prankster's opinion) she appears to have disappeared from social media.

The Prankster hopes Ms Breaks will be happy working at ParkingEye, even though (in the Prankster's opinion) it is a career-limiting move. The legal team at ParkingEye are regularly expected to lie to the court and deceive judges. They are expected to provide partial information in such a way as to paint a false picture. Normally a solicitor's first duty is to the court, and the second to their client. However, this is the reverse of what is expected for the ParkingEye legal team.

In the past, the Prankster has caught out ParkingEye:

• Providing incorrectly redacted documents to court
• Lying about the average costs attributable to parking charges
• Photocopying POPLA witness statements without the knowledge of witnesses, and denying to the witness that their statement was later used in court
• Writing to judges with incorrect and defamatory material about the Prankster
• Mentioning a case without informing the judge it had been appealed and was scheduled to appear in the court of appeal

If Rosanna Breaks truly has represented ParkingEye in court, then she will already know all this and will be walking into the job with her eyes fully open.

If not, she may already be in shock. A reputable person, with her eyes on a future career in law, (in the Prankster's opinion) may well decide the best option is to turn her back on the job and walk out with her head held high.

Happy Parking

The Parking Prankster

Mr M Shwarts does not appear to be a solicitor. Signing DEAL claim forms may be a criminal offence

Debt Enforcement & Action Limited have been submitting a number of court claims which are signed by a solicitor calling himself Mr M Shwarts.

The Solicitors Regulation Authority have confirmed they cannot locate any Mr M Shwarts on their roll. It is a criminal offence to say you are a solicitor if you are not, as the SRA website explains.

The Prankster therefore recommends anyone with a claim form signed by Mr Shwarts emails it to the SRA to investigate. The email address on some of their contact forms is incorrect. The correct email address is contactcentre@sra.org.uk

The SRA will then add this to the rest of the evidence to decide whether to investigate further and what action to take.

Of course, this may all turn out to be a silly mistake by DEAL and their solicitor is really called something else, but he suffers from tourettes, amnesia and dyslexia so never spells his own name correctly.

Otherwise, this report details that Wonga had to pay £2.6 million for sending letters from fake solicitor firms.

The Prankster will wait and see.

Happy Parking

The Parking Prankster

ParkingEye issue scam parking charge at Fistral Beach

ParkingEye recently issued a scam parking ticket for Fistral Beach.

The motorist purchased a ticket which covered the time of stay.

The Prankster confirms that he carefully checked the registration number on the ticket and it appears to be correct. Of course, even if The Prankster did make a mistake in checking this means that there would be no way a motorist could genuinely check the ticket, or correct an error if they discovered one.

The signage confirms the amount paid was correct.

ParkingEye cancelled the ticket on appeal.

The Prankster considers that parking companies who issue scam tickets like this need to be held to account. They should refund the motorist a fair amount for their time and effort. The Prankster considers an amount equal to the discounted ticket would be fair.

ParkingEye have a serious problem with issuing tickets incorrectly. In court documents they admit they cancel 65% of tickets on appeal.

Happy Parking

The Parking Prankster