Smart Parking Fistral beach - charged twice for not being able to park

[puneetorion]

The driver got 2 PCNs from smart parking.

1) The Driver got a parking ticket when he had visited fistral beach, Newquay and had entered the parking area to look for parking. Driver's wife's grandmother who is wheelchair bound was with him, and he dropped them near the beach and went to look for a spot, which he could never find as all the parking spaces were occupied.

The ticket showed the photos of the car we were in at the time of entry and exit. And the driver was in and out in 12 mins. The entire trip of the parking area is almost .4 miles long and due to good weather everyone was looking for a spot and the traffic was too slow. The driver could never find a spot and was forced to go and park at Dane road car park (Driver doesn't have the ticket anymore)

Map showing the length of the parking lot - https://www.google.co.uk/maps/dir/50.4193989,-5.0949588/Newquay,+Cornwall,+Fistral+Beach+Complex,+Headland +Rd,+Newquay+TR7+1EW/@50.4186073,-5.0965528,201m/data=!3m1!1e3!4m9!4m8!1m0!1m5!1m1!1s0x486b0fc590fc 8107:0x44c6f1976a5cafd4!2m2!1d-5.097703!2d50.417784!3e2

2) The Driver got another ticket when he made another attempt to park there after an hour and a half, but to his bad luck there were again no spaces available. The driver then decided to take his family back, and by the time he was out the time of stay was almost 13 mins (again .4 miles in choked parking lot).

The second PCN too showed his enter and exit times only.

None of the PCNs showed how much traffic was there and they have no proof of the drivers car being parked there in any of the parking slots.

Smart parking rejected the driver's appeals and now has to fight against the PCNs in POPLA.

Please help me out.

They have now given the case to Debt Recovery Plus (DRP) and the driver is being asked to pay 160 £ each for PCNs

[ostell]

Re: Smart Parking Fistral beach - charged twice for not being able to park

It is important that the identity of the driver is not know so edit your post. The driver visited.....

There is a case around for that car park where the judge said that driving around was not parking. Try searching the pranksters site.

[puneetorion]

Re: Smart Parking Fistral beach - charged twice for not being able to park

Edited and thanks for the suggestion

[charitynjw]

Re: Smart Parking Fistral beach - charged twice for not being able to park

DRP are 3rd party debt collectors & can be safely ignored.

You appear to also have defences re allowable grace periods and also their failure to provide reasonable adjustments for someone who is with a person who has a protected characteristic. (Google 'associative discrimination').

[puneetorion]

Re: Smart Parking Fistral beach - charged twice for not being able to park

Hi, i appealed to popla and cited
1) a case i had found about the same parking lot where the judge had overturned the PCN for a guy who waited for 35 mins and couldnt park. (but this was with a previous parking lot operator)
2) Associative discrimination
3) Asked about the parking lot operator to provide proof that i parked in the parking lot.

The operator provided their own defense with copies of their parking contract boards from the parking lot.

Sadly POPLA sided with the operator.

I still feel cheated, i had gone in to the parking lot with an intention to park but due to lack of parking spaces and overcrowding i couldn't get out of the parking lot before 10 mins (grace period, which i was anyways not aware of).

What do i do next? Should i consider paying up?

[ostell]

Re: Smart Parking Fistral beach - charged twice for not being able to park

Another totally inappropriate decision by POPLA. If you used the same defence in court then most likely the court would find in your favour. And you would probably pay less in court if it got that far if they are still asking for the £160 that DRP asked for.

Don't pay. Smart may well not take it further.

There is a video that someone took trying to get out of Fistral and showed just how time consuming it is.

[charitynjw]

Re: Smart Parking Fistral beach - charged twice for not being able to park

I'm with [MENTION=39331]ostell[/MENTION] on this one.