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#Post#: 128177--------------------------------------------------
Re: Euro Car Parks Private Land NTK in post received
DIR By: Mocede28
Date: August 18, 2026, 3:38 pm
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Any suggestions please, anyone ?
#Post#: 128599--------------------------------------------------
Re: Euro Car Parks Private Land NTK in post received
DIR By: Mocede28
Date: August 23, 2026, 2:33 pm
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InterCity125 can you please clarify exact pofa defect so I can
insert into appeal to popla ?
#Post#: 128602--------------------------------------------------
Re: Euro Car Parks Private Land NTK in post received
DIR By: InterCity125
Date: August 23, 2026, 3:08 pm
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Sure.
This was from another case I helped with.
Once again the operator asserts that the NtK is PoFA compliant
when it is not.
In order to be compliant the NtK must contain specific text and
legal choices as specified by Schedule 4 of PoFA.
In this instance, the requirements of Schedule 4 Paragraph
9(2)(e) are not satisfied by the operators NtK.
To be compliant, the requirements of 9(2)(e) can only be met if
a specific paragraph is placed in the NtK which should read as
follows;
------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
At the current time, Euro Car Parks (the creditor) does not know
both the name and a current address for service for the driver.
The keeper is therefore INVITED TO PAY THE UNPAID PARKING
CHARGES (Para 9(2)(e)(i) requirement but not present on the
Euro Car Parks NtK)
Or
If the keeper was not the driver of the vehicle, to notify the
creditor of the name of the driver and a current address for
service for the driver and to pass this notice onto the driver
(Para 9(2)(e)(ii) requirement)
------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
The required paragraph is clearly missing from the operators
NtK.
The information must be presented in this manner to be compliant
ie in one paragraph. Compliance cannot be achieved by, for
example, placing the information at random points throughout the
NtK since this would not present the keeper with the legal
choice which 9(2)(e) requires.
The Euro Car Parks NtK never states the mandatory wording
required by para. 9(2)(e).
The Euro Car Parks NtK never 'invites the keeper to pay the
unpaid parking charges'.
The Euro Car Parks NtK never presents the two legged legal
choice which para. 9(2)(e)(i) and 9(2)(e)(ii) requires.
If the required mandatory wording and subsequent legal choice is
present on the NtK then, I would ask that either Euro Car Parks
or the POPLA assessor point out the required statutory wording?
In order to rely on PoFA, all requirements of Schedule 4
Paragraph 9(2) must be met - the wording is not subjective, it
is 100% objective in nature.
#Post#: 129470--------------------------------------------------
Re: Euro Car Parks Private Land NTK in post received
DIR By: Mocede28
Date: September 3, 2026, 7:09 am
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I have the final appeal ready to upload on to popla. Please can
you point out any errors or corrections needed.
I’m sorry it is a bit long but I greatly appreciate your time
and help. Thanks.
POPLA APPEAL – EURO CAR PARKS
Location: Cardiff International – Empire Way
Date of parking event: 19 July 2026
I appeal this Parking Charge Notice as the registered keeper of
the vehicle.
I ask POPLA to allow the appeal on the following grounds:
1. Euro Car Parks has not established keeper liability because
its Notice to Keeper does not comply with paragraph 9(2)(e) of
Schedule 4 to the Protection of Freedoms Act 2012.
2. Euro Car Parks has not demonstrated compliance with section
3.4 of the Private Parking Sector Single Code of Practice
following a material change to the longstanding parking
arrangements.
3. The alleged new parking arrangements were not communicated
with sufficient prominence from the actual approach taken by the
driver.
4. The driver’s route after parking materially reduced any
subsequent opportunity to encounter the entrance signage.
5. Euro Car Parks is put to strict proof of its landowner
authority for this site and the terms of that authority as at 19
July 2026.
6. Euro Car Parks’ rejection failed substantively to address the
central issue raised in the original appeal: the recent material
change to a previously free car park and the adequacy of the
changed-terms warning.
1. Failure to establish keeper liability under Schedule 4 POFA
2012
Euro Car Parks expressly seeks to rely upon Schedule 4 of the
Protection of Freedoms Act 2012 to recover the charge from me as
registered keeper.
For keeper liability to arise, the statutory requirements of
Schedule 4 must be satisfied.
This was an ANPR/postal Notice to Keeper and paragraph 9
therefore applies.
Paragraph 9(2)(e) requires the Notice to Keeper to state that
the creditor does not know both the name of the driver and a
current address for service for the driver and to invite the
keeper:
(i) to pay the unpaid parking charges; or
(ii) if the keeper was not the driver, to notify the creditor of
the driver’s name and a current address for service and to pass
the notice to the driver.
I have carefully reviewed the Notice to Keeper issued by Euro
Car Parks.
It states:
“If you were not the driver at the time the Parking Charge was
issued, please provide full name and address of the driver in
writing and pass the notice on to the driver.”
This substantially addresses the second alternative in paragraph
9(2)(e).
However, I cannot identify within the Notice to Keeper the
corresponding statutory invitation required by paragraph
9(2)(e)(i), namely an invitation to the keeper to pay the unpaid
parking charges.
The front of the notice states that a Parking Charge of £100 is
payable and provides payment methods. However, the statutory
requirement in paragraph 9(2)(e) is not simply a requirement to
provide payment facilities or state that money is owed.
Parliament expressly required the Notice to Keeper to invite the
keeper to pay the unpaid parking charges or, if the keeper was
not the driver, to identify the driver and pass the notice to
them.
Indeed, under the heading “PROTECTION OF FREEDOMS ACT 2012”,
Euro Car Parks states that the driver is required to pay the
parking charge and then provides the paragraph 9(2)(f) warning
concerning potential recovery from the keeper after 28 days.
What appears absent is the separate statutory invitation
required by paragraph 9(2)(e)(i).
I am not suggesting that Schedule 4 necessarily requires Euro
Car Parks to reproduce the legislation word-for-word or to put
the information into any particular layout. My point is
narrower: the Notice to Keeper, read as a whole, must contain
all of the information and invitations required by paragraph
9(2)(e).
I therefore ask Euro Car Parks to identify precisely where in
its Notice to Keeper it considers the requirement of paragraph
9(2)(e)(i) to have been satisfied.
In the absence of compliance with all applicable Schedule 4
requirements, liability cannot be transferred from the driver to
the registered keeper.
The driver has not been identified in this appeal.
I therefore submit that Euro Car Parks has failed to establish
keeper liability.
2. Material change to longstanding parking arrangements –
section 3.4
This is not simply an appeal based upon a motorist saying that
they did not see an ordinary parking sign.
There had been a material change to the longstanding parking
arrangements at this location.
The driver had been a regular user of Cardiff International Pool
and this car park for a period of years. During that
longstanding usage, parking associated with visits to the
facility had been free.
There was therefore an established and familiar parking
arrangement from the perspective of a regular returning user.
Due to health issues, there was then an unusual period of
approximately three months during which the driver did not
attend the facility.
Upon subsequently returning, the driver parked in accordance
with what they genuinely understood to be the longstanding
arrangements.
After the Parking Charge Notice was received, I contacted
Cardiff International Pool because the charge was unexpected. I
was informed by staff by telephone that the car park had been
sold to a private owner around April 2026.
I make clear that I presently have no documentary evidence
establishing the precise date upon which the new parking
arrangements commenced. That information should be readily
available to Euro Car Parks and/or its principal.
The parking event occurred on 19 July 2026.
Section 3.4 of the Private Parking Sector Single Code of
Practice addresses material changes to pre-existing terms and
conditions. Where there is a material change which would not be
immediately apparent to a driver entering land that is or has
been open for public parking, the Code requires additional
temporary notices at the entrance for at least four months,
making clear that new terms and conditions/charges apply.
The purpose is particularly relevant to motorists who are
familiar with the previous arrangements and could otherwise
inadvertently incur parking charges.
The non-mandatory explanatory note accompanying section 3.4
gives the introduction of parking enforcement where none
previously applied as an example of a material change.
That is highly relevant here.
I therefore put Euro Car Parks to strict proof of:
* the exact date upon which the previous free-parking
arrangements ended;
* the exact date upon which Euro Car Parks’ parking regime
commenced;
* the terms which existed immediately before that change;
* the date upon which the additional temporary changed-terms
notices were installed;
* contemporaneous dated photographs showing those temporary
notices as they appeared when first installed and as they
appeared on 19 July 2026;
* their dimensions and wording;
* their precise locations;
* a site plan showing their positioning relative to the vehicle
entrance and the driver’s approach; and
* evidence that the required temporary notices remained in place
for the required period.
This evidence is particularly important because, if the
information given to me by Cardiff International Pool is correct
and the material change occurred around April 2026, the parking
event on 19 July 2026 occurred only a few months later and
potentially within the four-month period expressly contemplated
by section 3.4.
3. The material change was not communicated with sufficient
prominence
I acknowledge that there was parking signage at the entrance. I
am not alleging that absolutely no signs existed.
That is not the issue.
The issue is whether the material change from the longstanding
arrangements was communicated with sufficient prominence to a
regular returning user.
I have provided photographs showing the site from the driver’s
actual approach.
The route involved approaching the roundabout, taking the first
left and then, within a very short distance, turning right into
the car park.
There was no conspicuous advance warning on the approach which
alerted the driver to the fact that the longstanding parking
arrangements at this familiar facility had materially changed.
At the entrance there is a Euro Car Parks sign displaying “Pay
On Arrival”. There is also a considerably smaller yellow notice
associated with the entrance signage referring to “New parking
rules in operation.”
I acknowledge the existence of that notice.
However, the fact that a small changed-rules notice physically
existed does not itself answer the section 3.4 issue. The
question is whether the change was made sufficiently clear and
prominent to a driver entering the site in the actual
circumstances.
The driver genuinely did not appreciate that the longstanding
arrangements had changed.
This was particularly significant because the driver had used
this location regularly for years. Following an unusual absence
of approximately three months, the driver returned to what was a
very familiar location.
From the driver’s perspective, the car park did not feel or
present itself as though the longstanding parking arrangements
had materially changed.
There had not been some obvious transformation of the entrance
which immediately alerted a returning regular user to the fact
that a previously familiar free-parking arrangement had been
replaced.
There was ordinary Euro Car Parks signage, of the sort motorists
encounter at many locations, and the comparatively small yellow
changed-rules notice. The latter was not sufficiently prominent
from the actual approach to overcome the driver’s established
familiarity with the previous arrangements.
The driver’s failure to appreciate the change is therefore not
being advanced as a substitute for the Code requirement. Rather,
it illustrates precisely why the Code requires additional
temporary changed-terms notices where familiar arrangements have
materially changed.
The photographs I have supplied should therefore be considered
from the driver’s perspective and viewing distance, rather than
simply by examining a close-up photograph of an individual sign.
A close-up image establishing that words can be read when
standing immediately in front of a sign does not establish that
the material change was sufficiently conspicuous to a motorist
approaching and entering the site.
I invite POPLA to consider my driver-eye photographs alongside
any photographs supplied by Euro Car Parks and to distinguish
between close-up evidence of what a sign contains and evidence
of what a driver could reasonably appreciate during the actual
approach.
4. Driver’s pedestrian route after parking
The location at which the vehicle was parked is also relevant to
the practical opportunity to encounter the signage.
The vehicle was parked close to the trees/hedging and pedestrian
access/walkway, near the main roundabout.
After parking, the driver left the car park through that
pedestrian route.
The driver subsequently returned to the vehicle through the same
pedestrian route.
Consequently, the driver did not subsequently walk past the
vehicle entrance signage after parking.
This matters because any suggestion that the driver necessarily
had another clear opportunity, after leaving the vehicle, to
appreciate the changed entrance arrangements would not reflect
what actually occurred.
The driver entered by vehicle, parked near the pedestrian
access, exited by that pedestrian route and returned through the
same route.
I have supplied photographic evidence showing the parking
position and surrounding layout.
Again, the relevant question is the practical opportunity which
this particular driver had to appreciate that a familiar
longstanding parking arrangement had recently been changed.
5. Landowner authority
Euro Car Parks does not own this land.
Given the apparent recent change in ownership and/or management
arrangements at the location, I require Euro Car Parks to
demonstrate that it possessed the necessary authority from the
relevant landowner or other party entitled to grant that
authority on 19 July 2026.
I put Euro Car Parks to strict proof of written authority
covering this particular land and the material date.
That evidence should establish, at minimum:
* the identity of the contracting landowner or person authorised
to grant the rights;
* the boundaries of the land upon which Euro Car Parks was
authorised to operate;
* the commencement and duration of that authority;
* the parking terms and tariff Euro Car Parks was authorised to
impose;
* any exemptions or concessions applicable to users of Cardiff
International Pool or other facilities;
* Euro Car Parks’ authority to issue Parking Charge Notices; and
* its authority to pursue unpaid charges in its own name.
A generic statement that Euro Car Parks has authority, or an
undated witness statement which does not establish the relevant
contractual position on 19 July 2026, would not properly answer
this ground.
Given that this appeal specifically concerns a recent material
change in the parking arrangements, the commencement date and
scope of Euro Car Parks’ authority are directly relevant.
6. Euro Car Parks’ rejection did not substantively address the
principal appeal issue
My original appeal raised the recent change to the parking
arrangements and the adequacy/prominence of the signage.
Euro Car Parks’ rejection does not meaningfully address that
issue.
Instead, it states that the car park is operated using ANPR,
that it is a Pay by Mobile car park, that charges apply 24 hours
per day, and that no Pay by Mobile account was found for the
vehicle.
Those matters establish Euro Car Parks’ allegation that no
payment transaction was recorded.
They do not answer the central issue raised in the appeal:
When did the longstanding free-parking arrangement change, and
did Euro Car Parks comply with the specific requirements
applicable to communicating a material change to motorists
familiar with the previous arrangements?
The rejection does not identify the commencement date of the new
arrangements.
It does not address section 3.4.
It does not explain when the temporary changed-terms notices
were installed.
It does not provide contemporaneous evidence demonstrating how
the material change was communicated from the driver’s approach.
It simply concludes that the notice was issued correctly.
I therefore ask POPLA to consider the substantive grounds and
evidence rather than treating the absence of a Pay by Mobile
transaction as determinative of the appeal.
Conclusion
This appeal is not based merely upon an assertion that a driver
did not read an ordinary parking sign.
There are two substantial and separate issues.
First, Euro Car Parks seeks to recover the charge from the
registered keeper under Schedule 4 of the Protection of Freedoms
Act 2012. Its Notice to Keeper appears not to contain the
complete statutory invitation required by paragraph 9(2)(e), and
Euro Car Parks should therefore be required to demonstrate how
keeper liability has lawfully arisen.
Second, this location had longstanding parking arrangements
familiar to a regular user. Following an unusual absence of
approximately three months, the driver returned and genuinely
did not appreciate that those arrangements had materially
changed. The photographs demonstrate the actual approach and the
relative prominence of the ordinary entrance signage and the
much smaller changed-rules notice.
If, as Cardiff International Pool staff informed me, the
arrangements changed around April 2026, the parking event on 19
July occurred only a few months after that change. Euro Car
Parks should therefore produce the contemporaneous evidence
necessary to demonstrate compliance with the Code’s requirements
concerning material changes.
The driver’s subsequent pedestrian route also meant that the
vehicle entrance signage was not passed again on foot after
parking.
Finally, given the recent change in the management of the car
park, Euro Car Parks should demonstrate that it possessed the
necessary landowner authority on the material date and the
precise scope of that authority.
For all of these reasons, I respectfully request that POPLA
allow this appeal and direct Euro Car Parks to cancel the
Parking Charge Notice.
#Post#: 129495--------------------------------------------------
Re: Euro Car Parks Private Land NTK in post received
DIR By: InterCity125
Date: September 3, 2026, 9:18 am
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I would add (under point 1) that the ECP NtK never contains any
wording which states, either verbatim or otherwise, 'that the
creditor does not know both the name of the driver and a current
address for service for the driver'.
Emphasise that the legislation specifically says that the NtK
must STATE this mandatory wording and that the mandatory wording
is not present.
#Post#: 129515--------------------------------------------------
Re: Euro Car Parks Private Land NTK in post received
DIR By: Mocede28
Date: September 3, 2026, 12:41 pm
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Thanks for that point intercity125 I have placed this
specifically under ground 1 of my appeal as shown in bold below,
also had to integrate this under conclusion also shown in bold
as below.
I have carefully reviewed the Notice to Keeper issued by Euro
Car Parks.
The Notice to Keeper does not state that the creditor does not
know both the name of the driver and a current address for
service for the driver, either in the statutory wording or
substantively to the same effect.
The notice does contain later conditional wording concerning
what may happen after 28 days if Euro Car Parks does not know
both the name and current address of the driver. However, that
wording forms part of the paragraph 9(2)(f) keeper-liability
warning. It does not state the present fact required by
paragraph 9(2)(e): that the creditor does not know both the name
of the driver and a current address for service for the driver.
Conclusion
This appeal is not based merely upon an assertion that a driver
did not read an ordinary parking sign.
There are two substantial and separate issues.
First, Euro Car Parks seeks to recover the charge from the
registered keeper under Schedule 4 of the Protection of Freedoms
Act 2012. Its Notice to Keeper appears not to satisfy paragraph
9(2)(e) in two distinct respects: it does not state that the
creditor does not know both the name of the driver and a current
address for service for the driver, and it does not contain the
statutory invitation under paragraph 9(2)(e)(i) inviting the
keeper to pay the unpaid parking charges.
How is that ?
#Post#: 129539--------------------------------------------------
Re: Euro Car Parks Private Land NTK in post received
DIR By: InterCity125
Date: September 4, 2026, 2:17 am
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Looks good.
It is, as you say, a lengthy appeal.
My worry (based on experience) is that the POPLA Assessor will
'skip over' the very awkward POFA statutory wording issue and
simply say that, "I have examined the notice and it contains all
the information required by POFA".
POPLA find it very difficult to engage with these POFA wording
appeal points on ECP NtKs since they are not actually compliant
- therefore the Assessor is forced to find a way to get around
each appeal point without actually addressing it.
In simple terms; by including multiple appeal points you give
the Assessor the opportunity to focus on the subjective appeal
points whilst deliberately ignoring the objective requirements
of POFA.
#Post#: 129540--------------------------------------------------
Re: Euro Car Parks Private Land NTK in post received
DIR By: Mocede28
Date: September 4, 2026, 3:36 am
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Thanks.
Yes I have the same worry from experience too. Praying that it
lands with an assessor who actually has a brain instead of a
peanut.
I wonder if people are also making complaints to popla in
regards to this. It would certainly benefit.
Quick question if this appeal is not allowed and it goes to
court do the judges recognise non pofa compliance then?
#Post#: 129544--------------------------------------------------
Re: Euro Car Parks Private Land NTK in post received
DIR By: jfollows
Date: September 4, 2026, 3:53 am
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Of course, it’s a matter of law.
Your POPLA appeal is a good basis for a defence to a county
court claim, if POPLA rejects it. POPLA is not a court and is
often incompetent. A court can’t ignore appeal points because it
finds them too difficult. In any case, it’s normal for court
claims to be discontinued if properly defended; the reason
they’re brought is because they either make people pay up or
they get ignored, and if ignored the claimant will obtain a
default judgment. In either case the bringing of the claim costs
nothing other than the time of the people raising the forms.
#Post#: 129697--------------------------------------------------
Re: Euro Car Parks Private Land NTK in post received
DIR By: Mocede28
Date: September 6, 2026, 6:15 am
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Oh ****. My appeal character count is over 15k. Appeal in popla
limit is 10k.
Anyone know if popla permits appeals to be uploaded in pdf?
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