By TOBY WALNE
Parking charge notices are soaring to record highs - as motorists desperately await a much-delayed government code of practice.
Private parking companies issued a record-breaking 14.4million tickets in Britain last year, or 40,000 fines a day as we exclusively revealed earlier this month.
Parking charge notices currently rake in up to £3.9million each day and analysis of figures from the Driver and Vehicle Licensing Agency (DVLA) showed councils and private parking firms made 44million requests to trace owners last year, which is more than the 33million cars on UK roads.
Last week the Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government said it was launching a consultation to 'raise standards' and create a 'fairer, more transparent private parking system'.
The last crackdown revealed by the previous Conservative government was scrapped in 2022, after being challenged by parking firms. Car park operator trade associations then released their own code of practice.
But while motorists wait for official help, what can you do if you feel you've been unfairly hit with a parking charge?
In our guide, retired judge Stephen Gold explains what you need to know and gives his top tips on how to beat private parking tickets.
Private parking companies issued a record-breaking 14.4million tickets in Britain last year
Private parking tickets can be slapped on vehicles at private car parks, everywhere from supermarkets to blocks of flats. They are separate to charges issued by councils for parking on the street or in their car parks, or fixed penalty notices from the police.
You may get a private parking charge via a ticket being place on your windscreen, or more likely these days in the post after being snapped by a numberplate camera.
Using these images, car park operators that are members of one of two trade associations, the British Parking Association and International Parking Community, can request a vehicle's registered keeper and their address from the DVLA for a £2.50 fee.
The rapid spread of numberplate capturing cameras has led to a huge increase in tickets, often for minor infringements, and calls for official action.
After the previous government's plans for a new private parking charge code were shelved, the two organisations launched their own private parking sector single code of practice.
Stephen Gold is a retired judge. 'Getting a ticket after parking in a private car park does not mean you have committed any offence'
The first port of call to appeal a ticket should be the car park operator, usually within 28 days of receipt.
An independent appeal is the next option, at Popla for British Parking Association member operators, or the Independent Appeals Service for International Parking Community members.
The final and most drastic option is going to the county court, where a judge will hear the case if the car park operator pursues you there for payment.
Stephen Gold explains: 'Getting a ticket after parking in a private car park does not mean you have committed any offence. It won't lead to a criminal conviction, whether or not you pay it.
'You can challenge a ticket that has been wrongly issued, and the challenge could take you to the county court, where the park operator would have to sue you for non-payment to have any hope of getting you to pay up. That would be their only option.
'When sitting as a judge, it fell to me to try a number of these cases. Coming up is a selection of some of the best defences that have succeeded in the county court.'
1. The 'I knew nothing' defence
This defence relies on you proving parking restrictions were not indicated properly.
The operator must prove you agreed to its conditions. These are: if and when you would have to pay, and what would happen if you did not pay.
The operator will be unable to do this unless it can prove the conditions were displayed on one or more notices at the car park, which a reasonable motorist would have seen.
Perhaps there were no notices; the notices displayed were absent from the route you took in and out; the notices were obstructed in some way and could not be read; or you could not have been alerted to the fact that the notices displayed conditions by virtue of their appearance, size and inconspicuousness.
If you only discovered the car park conditions on returning to your vehicle and could not have reasonably known about them when you parked, this defence is intact.
The car park operator will almost certainly rely on evidence at the hearing that will include photographs of the signs containing their conditions. But sometimes photographs fail to establish where exactly the signs were displayed in relation to where you were parked and the route taken to reach that point.
The best evidence you could come up with would be your own photographs backing up your case.
2. The 'so what?' defence
This defence relies on you proving you did not breach any conditions.
If what the parking ticket states you did wrong is not listed on any of the conditions mentioned on the signs, you cannot be liable for the claim made against you.
For example, if you failed to display a parking permit at a car park for a block of flats and there was nothing on the signs about this being necessary, you are not liable.
3. The 'no right to charge extra' defence
This defence involves proving extra charges are not allowed.
Some operators also try to charge for the administrative cost of pursuing you if you do not pay up in time. They call it the cost of recovery. However, if this is not mentioned in the signage, they cannot have it.
If the signage says they can add on a charge without specifying how much, that does not entitle them to pick a figure out of the air. The judge would want evidence of how the sum had been calculated and that it was a reasonable amount.
4. The 'you should have pulled your finger out' defence
This defence involves proving timeframes were not met.
Where a ticket has been fixed to the vehicle or handed to the driver, the operator can apply to the DVLA for details of the registered keeper if the charge has not been paid within 28 days.
Then it must ask the registered keeper for details of the driver - or the money claimed - within 56 days of the ticket's issue. Failing to meet that deadline is fatal to the operator's case.
Where the vehicle has been caught on camera, the operator can go to the DVLA right away and then has just 14 days from the snapping of this photograph to send a notice to the keeper to pay up, or identify the driver if not the keeper.
Again, failure to keep to that deadline will be fatal to their case.
The communication, where posted, will be presumed to have reached you on the second day after posting with Saturday, Sunday and any public holiday ignored.
5. The 'it's nothing to do with you' defence
This defence involves proving the car park operator agreement isn't in place.
If the operator does not own the space where you parked your vehicle, it will have been brought in to manage parking by the supermarket, managing agent or whoever else is in control.
They will have made a written agreement with the operator to run the car park.
Often, the agreement will be for a fixed period but that period may have expired, which could be fatal to the operator's case as it will not have the authority to act.
More than once as a judge, I have come across expired written agreements and no evidence that these have been verbally extended.
Ask the operator to prove their authority, if they do not include a copy of the agreement they are relying on with their evidence.
The current code imposes obligations about this.
If you could not have reasonably known about the car park conditions when you parked, the 'I knew nothing' defence is intact, says Stephen Gold
6. The 'byelaw' defence
This defence involves a byelaw prevailing.
The parking may already be subject to some form of statutory control, which is likely to be a local byelaw or statutory order or regulation – particularly if it is at an airport, seaport or railway station.
If that control includes the power to impose civil or criminal liability in relation to parking there, this prevails over any authority the operator claims to possess to issue tickets.
I once dismissed a claim on the basis of this defence in relation to a car park at Southampton Docks.
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7. The 'you must be having a laugh' defence
This defence involves proving a charge is too high.
The charge for breaking the operator's conditions is unlikely to exceed £100 and, in that event, defending on the ground that it was too high will fail.
But with some rogue operators which are not members of one of the two trade associations, £100 could be topped.
However, a court would have to be satisfied that the charge was extortionate or extravagant. If it was ridiculously over the top then you might get off the hook.
8. The 'I wasn't parked long enough' defence
This defence involves claiming extra time.
If the signage prohibits you from being parked beyond a specified time, then time spent coming to park in your bay and getting out should be disregarded.
If signage prohibits staying, remaining or having your vehicle present in the parking (or words to this effect) then additional time will usually be irrelevant.
But if your departure was delayed because of congestion at or before the exit you may be able to successfully argue that if it wasn't for that congestion, you would not have overstayed, and this made it impossible to keep to the time limit.
9. The 'there was no means of paying' defence
This defence involves payment options not being available.
In one case I tried, the signage gave an option to pay the parking charge through the app RingGo or by credit card.
But RingGo was not working, and the driver did not have her credit card with her. She left her car where it was and continued her attempts to get through to RingGo. Ultimately, she did get through and she paid a charge calculated from when she had actually parked the car.
She got a ticket with the operator arguing that she could not pay retrospectively.
There was nothing in the signage stating that she had to park somewhere else in this situation.
I decided that it was the operator that was in breach of its obligations in that one of the options it was agreeing to be available to her was unavailable when needed.
It was impossible for her to do what should have been possible. The same principle should apply to an 'out of action' machine unless signage makes it clear that you cannot park.
10. The 'technology was wonky' defence
This defence involves proving technology wasn't working properly.
If the technology used to time your car park visit is unreliable it will not be accepted as sufficient evidence that you have overstayed.
Casting doubt on the accuracy of the technical equipment could result in the dismissal of a claim dependent on the technology's accuracy.
Ask when it was last checked, what was the status of the checker, and how many other complaints were received in the months preceding and succeeding your visit.
Couple this with credible evidence from you that you did not overstay and it could result in the dismissal of a claim dependent on the technology's accuracy.
How to successfully appeal your ticket
You can challenge the parking ticket to the operator within 28 days of its receipt (longer if exceptional circumstances can be shown).
The downside to doing this is that you may forfeit the discount for settling within 14 days, so don't challenge unless you reckon you have a reasonable chance of winning.
Breach of the code ought to nicely set you up for success. Read the private parking code of practice and, if necessary, pop back to the car park to check whether the code has been fully adhered to.
The code itself recommends letting you off the penalty where you are meant to input your registration number but have made a minor keying error.
And a reduction in the penalty to £20 so long as you settle within a fortnight is recommended where you can prove, for example, that:
The code requires a grace period of ten minutes to be allowed by the operator during which a parking charge must not be issued.
This is where there is a time limit for free parking, or what you should pay is based on how long you remain. It does not apply to short-stay parking not exceeding 30 minutes.
In addition, a consideration period, usually of a minimum of five or ten minutes, is to be generally discounted from the stay to take account of the time a driver needs to find and access an empty bay and to read the signage and so on.
