DIR Return Create A Forum - Home
---------------------------------------------------------
FreeTrafficLegalAdvice
HTML https://ftla.createaforum.com
---------------------------------------------------------
*****************************************************
DIR Return to: Private parking tickets
*****************************************************
#Post#: 101015--------------------------------------------------
ParkingEye invoice
DIR By: Brenda_R2
Date: December 4, 2025, 10:27 am
---------------------------------------------------------
First post here so please be gentle if I've messed anything up
:)
Upon entering the hospital site, the driver dropped their
partner off for their appointment, entered the car park, found a
space, parked up, and waited for their partner to re-emerge.
Today, the document attached was received.
Ironically, this was a follow up appointment to a private
hospital for a knee replacement op (cost £13k) so I am somewhat
miffed that they're trying to shaft the registered keeper for
£100 for 15 minutes parking.
Any of you good people able to help me out?
Page 1:
HTML https://ibb.co/XPjcNrb
HTML https://ibb.co/XPjcNrb
Page 2:
HTML https://ibb.co/YFN0fcNn
HTML https://ibb.co/YFN0fcNn
Thanks in advance.
#Post#: 101021--------------------------------------------------
Re: ParkingEye invoice
DIR By: b789
Date: December 4, 2025, 11:05 am
---------------------------------------------------------
DO NOT, EVER, redact the dates, times or the location on the NtK
if you want advice!
Plan A... what have the hospital management said (in writing)
when you complained about an extra invoice from a third party,
unregulated private parking firm on top of the already expensive
bill? If it is also an NHS Trust location, what have PALS said
about getting it cancelled?
As their Notice to Keeper (NtK) is not fully compliant with all
the requirements of PoFA 2012, the driver MUST NOT be
identified. They have no idea who the driver is as long as the
Keeper doesn't not blab it to them, inadvertently or otherwise.
Show us the front of the NtK without any dates, times or
locations redacted.
#Post#: 101092--------------------------------------------------
Re: ParkingEye invoice
DIR By: Brenda_R2
Date: December 5, 2025, 5:09 am
---------------------------------------------------------
Apologies, revised documents
HERE
HTML https://www.imagebam.com/view/GAGUVD
I am currently waiting on the hospital's response.
Thank you for taking the time to respond, I do appreciate it.
#Post#: 101118--------------------------------------------------
Re: ParkingEye invoice
DIR By: ixxy
Date: December 5, 2025, 7:19 am
---------------------------------------------------------
Good luck with the argument that the NTK is not compliant, it'll
have to go all the way to court before that argument can be
made.
Signage on the entrance looks pretty clear in GSV, patients
only, register in reception. Did the driver do that? Looks like
a private hospital as well, so probably no PALs. Assuming the
driver didn't register how is the private parking company
supposed to know the driver is a patient (or at least driving a
patient). The hospital will have contracted the private parking
company to ensure there is parking for patients, it's not a paid
for car park like NHS ones so there's no incentive to go through
the hassle of contracting with a private parking company if
there is no need.
If you want this go away quickly you'll need to appeal on the
basis the driver was a legitimate user but failed to comply with
the terms, i.e. forgot to register. Proof of the appointment
would help. If you're lucky it might get cancelled or the keeper
might be offered a reduce rate, depends on what the hospital has
agreed with the contractor. You can try appealing on the grounds
the NTK isn't POFA complaint but Parkingeye will definitely not
agree with you and it's unlikely POPLA will either. So if you
are happy with receiving months of increasing threatening
letters and then probably having to engage with the start of a
court process (It will probably be discontinued before the court
hearing if you file a defence) then appeal on that technical
basis, if they reject your appeal based on the fact the driver
was there legitimately you're no worse off if they reject the
appeal.
#Post#: 101135--------------------------------------------------
Re: ParkingEye invoice
DIR By: b789
Date: December 5, 2025, 9:09 am
---------------------------------------------------------
The point is that the odds of this going all the way to a
hearing in court over an alleged debt, is very low. If
Parkingeye think that they are on shaky ground with an appellant
who is not low-hanging fruit on the gullible tree, they will
likely farm it out to DCB Legal to deal with and that is a
guaranteed strike out or discontinuation as long as it is even
rudimentary defended.
The simple fact is that the NtK is NOT fully compliant with all
the requirements of PoFA. Irrespective of whether the operator
or POPLA agree, it is a valid argument if it ever went to a
hearing (very unlikely).
So, once you exhaust all the other options of Plans A, B
(initial appeal) and C (POPLA), Plan D will become the route to
getting this dealt with, once and for all.
#Post#: 101140--------------------------------------------------
Re: ParkingEye invoice
DIR By: Brenda_R2
Date: December 5, 2025, 9:29 am
---------------------------------------------------------
--- Quote from: b789 link ---
>
>
> The simple fact is that the NtK is NOT fully compliant with
all the requirements of PoFA. Irrespective of whether the
operator or POPLA agree, it is a valid argument if it ever went
to a hearing (very unlikely).
>
>
--- End Quote ---
Thank you for your input, I'm definitely not going to roll over
and play ball over this.
Please forgive my naivety; if the NtK is defective insofar as it
doesn't fully comply with all the requirements of PoFA, how/why
would POPLA reject it when it comes before them?
I fully get ParkingEye pursuing this regardless; that's how they
make their money, after all.
But POPLA must have some sort of guidelines that they adhere to
when adjudicating?
Or am I misunderstanding their raison d'être?
#Post#: 101158--------------------------------------------------
Re: ParkingEye invoice
DIR By: ixxy
Date: December 5, 2025, 10:30 am
---------------------------------------------------------
Because it's b789s personal opinion that it's not fully
compliant, even some of the other experienced posters disagree
in so much as they are not sure b789s interpretation is correct.
B789 tends to give people the impression they have a rock solid
defence and it may have some merit but it will need to go to
court for your parking charge to be reviewed on that basis.
Parkingeye will consider the PCN fully POFA compliant, the
wording change b789 thinks is required in minimal, POPLA won't
get into the fine detail of legal arguments as to whether or not
the wording is exactly right. If they think the PCN has been
correctly issued (for example to someone who breached the car
park Ts and Cs by not registering at reception and the PCN has
been issued in the correct time frame, which it appears it has
and no other grounds of appeal have been made such as missing or
poor signage) they will conclude the PCN has been correctly
issued and reject the appeal.
He is right, it is unlikely to get court but before it finally
fizzles out you will get loads of letters which you can
generally ignore. At some point though you will probably get a
letter of claim which you cant ignore. You will need to engage
with the court system, file a defence amongst other things,
attend a mediation session and then usually it gets dropped or
it might not. Parkingeye are known to take a lot of people to
court and they win.
If you decide to challenge this the forum will help guide you
but you need to be prepared to put the work it. The appeal
grounds b789 has given are not a sure fire at getting this
resolved quickly. He's relying on you fighting this all the way
and entering a proper defence when it gets to the court stage.
If you don't file a defence or muck it up (you will get help
here to avoid doing that) it probably will end up in court with
a judgement against the keeper.
You still haven't explained why you think the PCN shouldn't have
been issued,its not fair or I don't like private parking
companies isn't a valid reason.
#Post#: 101163--------------------------------------------------
Re: ParkingEye invoice
DIR By: b789
Date: December 5, 2025, 10:49 am
---------------------------------------------------------
It’s not “my personal opinion” in the sense
[member=4074]ixxy[/member] is suggesting. It is a
straightforward reading of Schedule 4, and it happens to be
shared by one of the longest-serving District Judges in England.
He and I went through the actual wording of 9(2)(e)(i) and the
ParkingEye template together; his view was clear – if Parliament
requires the notice to invite the keeper to pay and the notice
does not actually contain such an invitation, then it does not
comply with PoFA. If that point were argued in front of him, he
would find non-compliance as a matter of fact.
Whether ParkingEye “consider” their paperwork compliant, whether
POPLA can be bothered to grapple with the detail, or whether
[member=4074]ixxy[/member] personally dislikes the argument is
legally irrelevant. Compliance with a statutory gateway is not
decided by the parking industry or by a trade-body appeals
service; it is decided by judges applying the statute. The fact
that this particular defect hasn’t yet been ventilated in a
reported judgment doesn’t somehow make it invalid – every
“leading case” started life as someone insisting that the words
Parliament actually used mean what they say.
I am also very careful about what I promise people. I have never
told anyone that any single point is a magic wand or a
guaranteed win. What I do say is that a PoFA defect which
prevents keeper liability is a strong defence point if the
keeper has not identified the driver. That remains true whether
or not POPLA chooses to engage with it, and regardless of how
inconvenient that is for ParkingEye’s business model or for
commentators who would rather wave it away as “just b789’s
opinion”.
#Post#: 101164--------------------------------------------------
Re: ParkingEye invoice
DIR By: Brenda_R2
Date: December 5, 2025, 10:54 am
---------------------------------------------------------
Thank you again.
So my appeal letter (if the hospital aren't prepared to call
their hounds off) should look like what?
My first stab would be
To whom it may concern,
I acknowledge receipt of your invoice.
The Notice to Keeper is defective as it fails to comply with the
requirements of Schedule 4, paragraph 9(2)(e)(i) of the
Protection of Freedoms Act 2012. As the registered keeper, I
will not be naming the driver.
Any further correspondence of a speculative or threatening
nature will be treated as harassment. Should you choose to
pursue this matter via legal channels, please be aware that I
will defend the claim robustly and will require strict proof of
your assertions.
Regards, or otherwise
As an aside, if I were a private company issuing invoices then
I'd make damned sure they were bombproof. Are ParkingEye
relying on people *and* POPLA rolling over in the face of
appeals?
This is my first exposure to this kind of thing and it would
appear to me that the entire industry needs an overhaul?
#Post#: 101167--------------------------------------------------
Re: ParkingEye invoice
DIR By: b789
Date: December 5, 2025, 11:15 am
---------------------------------------------------------
POPLA is not a court, not a tribunal and not some stand-alone
public body. “POPLA” is just the brand name that Trust Alliance
Group uses for the parking product line delivered by its
subsidiary Flexible Resolution Services Limited (company no.
14000839). The BPA – i.e. the private parking trade association
– contracts and funds FRS to run POPLA “on behalf of” its member
operators. Independent?
POPLA 'assessors' are not judges, they are not barristers, and
in the vast majority of cases they have no meaningful legal
training at all. They’re low-level box-ticking staff in a
private company that’s paid by the very industry it’s supposedly
“regulating”. Independent?
You can see it in the decisions: they work off crib sheets and
templates, cutting and pasting stock paragraphs, often without
even bothering to properly address the actual points put to
them. Nuanced arguments about the precise wording of Schedule 4,
or the difference between keeper liability and driver liability,
often simply sail straight over their heads. If the notice
“looks about right” to them and the operator says it’s
compliant, they rubber-stamp it. That’s the level we’re dealing
with.
So yes, I’m perfectly happy to say that, in general, POPLA
assessors are legal lightweights – glorified form-fillers –
whose “reasoning” carries no more authority than the template on
their screen. They are not arbiters of what PoFA means. The
person who actually decides that is a District Judge, in a
court, applying the statute properly. POPLA’s view is worth
precisely nothing once it gets to that stage. Why do you think
that an unsuccessful POPLA decision is not binding on the
appellant?
As for your initial appeal (Plan B), I wouldn't even bother
putting much effort into that. It is almost unheard of for any
initial appeal to any private parking operator being successful.
Where is the money in that for them?
AS Parkingeye are a BPA operator, you at least get the
opportunity to make a secondary appeal (Plan C) to POPLA, for
what it's worth. If, as it is unlikely to be successful (but you
never know) you then move on to Plan D where it is likely to go
to litigation after the useless debt recovery stage. It is at
this stage that you have the best chance of seeing this off.
Even if a claim is issued, even if it progressed all the way to
a hearing, you get to argue your side of the story in front of
the only truly impartial arbiter, a District Judge who will
decide whether a debt is owed for an alleged breach of contract
by the driver.
For your Plan B appeal I would just use:
--- Quote ---
> I am the keeper of the vehicle and I dispute your 'parking
charge'. I deny any liability or contractual agreement and I
will be making a complaint about your predatory conduct to your
client landowner.
>
> As your Notice to Keeper (NtK) does not fully comply with ALL
the requirements of PoFA 2012, you are unable to hold the keeper
of the vehicle liable for the charge. Partial or even
substantial compliance is not sufficient. There will be no
admission as to who was driving and no inference or assumptions
can be drawn. Parkingeye has relied on contract law allegations
of breach against the driver only.
>
> The registered keeper cannot be presumed or inferred to have
been the driver, nor pursued under some twisted interpretation
of the law of agency. Your NtK can only hold the driver liable.
Parkingeye have no hope at POPLA, so you are urged to save us
both a complete waste of time and cancel the PCN.
--- End Quote ---
*****************************************************
Page 1 of 2
DIR Next Page