Appeal a Parking Charge Notice – Proven Legal Template to Get It Cancelled

We provide instant appeal letters and advice on the proper way to appeal your parking charge notice and get it cancelled. We help you find mistakes made by the parking company so you can build a strong case.

Follow our step by step instructions to prepare your letter, send it to the operator and if your appeal is rejected, how to submit the appeal to the tribunal.

What is a Parking Charge Notice?

A parking charge notice is an invoice and not a fine, meaning that if you challenge it, you can get it cancelled and if it goes to court, if you win, you can claim compensation from the parking company.

If a Parking charge notice (PCN) is not issued correctly according to the law, then it is not enforceable and must be cancelled. When a parking charge is not issued correctly but the operator pursues you anyway, they can be made to pay you costs in court if they act unreasonably.

So because it is very important to check if your parking charge was issued, our system will check your PCN and guide you through the appeal process.

According to the BPA AOS, A Parking Charge means a charge arising when a driver who breaches the terms and conditions of parking on private land, agrees to a charge that is advertised in the parking contract; for example, for an overstay or trespasses by parking without permission.

Private parking companies have to be members of the BPA and IPC before they can start operating on private land, if a company is not a member, then these companies often have agreements with landowners, such as supermarkets, hospitals or shopping centers, to manage their car parks.

With the increase in private parking companies and limited parking spaces, the chances of receiving a PCN have also increased. In this article, we will discuss what a PCN is, how to determine if it was issued correctly, and the steps you can take to appeal a PCN.

Parking Mate UK will guide you in the appeal process including advising you not to provide the driver information to the parking company.

Checking If Your Parking Charge Issued Correctly?

The easiest way to get a parking charge cancelled is to check if it was issued correctly and then use those arguements through the appeal process to challenge it. The Parking Mate UK app will do a detailed assessment to see if your parking charge was issued correctly.

Simply answer a few simply questions about your parking charge and it will generate the correct wording needed to challenge the parking charge notice.

The app checks:

If the parking charge was issued correctly
If the vehicle entered the car park more than once
If the parking charge has the right wording
Any other errors in the issue of the parking charge notice
If there was a problem with the car park signage or if it was not clear
If the parking company doesn’t have a valid landowner contract

How To Submit Your Parking Charge Appeal

Once you have drafted your appeal letter, it is essential to ensure that you submit it within 28 days of the PCN being issued.

If you submit the appeal within 14 days, the parking company will freeze the PCN at the current rate until a decision is provided.

You can submit your letter via email or post, and it is advisable to keep copies of your letter and any evidence provided for future reference.

It sounds easy enough but the parking charge appeal process is designed to make you lose, while it helps the parking company with sneaky questions and forms.

For example, the following appeal reasons from Smart Parking seem helpful, but if you select one that implies that you are a driver, it will weaken any legal arguements you have made.

This then means that even if a parking charge is not issued in 14 days, you will invalidate your own appeal point because of selecting these options.

The Parking Mate UK App will provide simple instructions on how to submit appeals or simply submit your appeal for you.

What happens after your appeal is sent:

Providing Driver Information

Never provide driver information, remember, if you appeal as the registered keeper, you do not need to name the driver.

The UK law provides protection for registered keepers which the parking company must comply with. If you provide the driver information, you will make it EASIER for the parking company to pursue the driver.

This is another trick by the parking company to make the keeper weaken their own appeal case.

You should only provide the keeper information but not the driver, the keeper has more chance of getting a parking charge cancelled.

Discount Amount At This Stage

Some private parking companies may offer a discount if you pay the PCN within a specific time frame, typically within 14 days.

If you do not agree with the PCN, it is best not to pay the discounted amount, as this may be seen as an admission of liability.

If Operator Rejects Your Appeal

If the private parking company rejects your appeal, they must tell you that you can refer the case to the tribunal.

Remember, they must also reply to the appeal within 35 days, if not, then you appeal can be allowed at the tribunal on this basis.

Parking Mate UK will provide you with instructions on how to submit your appeal to Independent Appeals Service (IAS) or the Parking on Private Land Appeals (POPLA) service.

Remember, most of the time, the parking company will provide a template rejection letter and may not address all the points you raised.

The parking company is trying to instead make you worry about paying the full amount.

If you appeal to the tribunal and lose, the parking company will make £20-30 profit. But if you pay early, they will make double the profit.

Submitting Appeal To Tribunal

If your appeal is still not successful at this stage, you have the option to submit an appeal to the Tribunal, which is a “specialist court with jurisdiction over a certain area of civil law“.

The tribunal in this case deals with contract law and their decisions are binding on the parking company but not on motorists.

This means that if you disagree with the appeal decision, you can contest further but if the appeal is successful, the parking company will have to cancel the parking charge notice.

Tribunals In Private Parking

For BPA members, POPLA Parking on Private Land Appeals manages the appeal and requires a POPLA code
For IPC members, Independent Appeals Service (IAS) will manage your appeal and does not require a special code

The Tribunal will review all the evidence provided by both parties and make a fair and impartial decision, if you do not provide a good appeal, the tribunal will not consider anything you have not stated.

If the tribunal makes an unfair decision based on your appeal reasons, you do not have to pay and you can take the matter to court.

Submitting Your Appeal To The Tribunal

Parking Mate UK will provide easy step by step instructions on how to submit your appeal.

Once your appeal is submitted, you simply need to wait for the assessor to review your case and make a decision.

This can usually take up to 6 weeks, although sometimes this can be quicker.

There is no need to add further comments if you appeal using Parking Mate UK because we will provide a detailed checklist that the Adjudicator will go through.

What Happens At Appeal Tribunal

During the appeal tribunal, you will have the opportunity to review the evidence provided by the parking company, you should only comments on the parking company’s mistakes, bad signage because commenting any other way may invalidate your appeal reasons if based on legal arguements.

Simply use our prepared tactic of “fire and forget”. Fire means send the appeal, forget means wait for the tribunal to review your appeal and come back with a decision.

If Appeal Is Rejected At Tribunal

If the appeal is rejected at the Tribunal, you will be required to pay the full amount of the PCN. This must be paid within a specific timeframe, and failure to do so may result in further legal action, such as a court claim or a County Court Judgment (CCJ).

We recommend paying not because we support parking companies but because the process of defending the parking charge is likely to cost you more time and money.

The process of going to court can be lengthy with some cases taking up to 18 months while the process of preparing the court documents can also be time consuming.

Going through the tribunal process usually makes parking charges unprofitable and on some occassions, the parking company makes a loss.

Court Claims And CCJ

If you fail to pay the PCN within the specified timeframe, the private parking company may take further legal action against you.

However, its important to know that you can also successfully defend a court claim and win, often claiming costs from the parking company.

A CCJ can only be issued if you ignore court documents, but if you contest the matter further and win, you can claim up to £95 in compensation from the parking company for Witness Attendance costs.

Conclusion

In conclusion, receiving a Parking Charge Notice can be stressful and frustrating, but if you use Parking Mate UK, it will take less than 10 minutes to do the whole appeal process. In fact, you only need to submit the appeals and nothing else.

Our services are designed to make it easy for motorists but extremely difficult for parking companies, so don’t be scared to challenge the parking company, they hate handling the appeal process in full.

Parking Mate UK