Page 1 of Legality of a parking fine in a supermarket car park

So my mum goes and parks in the co-op car park next to where she goes to church, at 8:20 on a Sunday morning. Goes to church (bless her, someone has to), then goes to the co-op, there are big queues, leaves about 9:40 that day.

I know the times, because she got a letter demanding £90 for a parking fine by a Ltd company working on behalf of the car park, which was far from empty at that time of the day, on that day of the week, which stated them. The car park is free for an hour, for patrons of the co-op. There is no pay and display.

Do they have any legal justification for charging her at all? Basically the letter says, pay £45 within 14 days and we`ll say no more about it, if you don`t we`ll refer you to a debt collection agency.

All this seems a bit insane to me, are they legally allowed to do that? I`ve told her to talk to the store and see if they can do anything about it, but I`m interested to know what legal recompense the managers of the car park have for this racket.

She`s a bit of a wimp when it comes to complaining about things though, personally I`d send them a nasty letter saying not only did I believe they had no right to demand any money from me, but that if I discovered they`d referred me to a debt collection agency I would take legal action against them for any damage they may have done to my credit rating.


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This item was edited on Friday, 13th May 2011, 18:49

Surely the key thing here is if she has a receipt for that day`s shopping.  Or is it too long ago?

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Check with citizens advice bureau. She might be able to get out of it.
Try searching on google. I think there is a web site which helps motorists on technicalities, but unfortunately I cannot remember what it is called.

You could try asking the legal advice expert here- "Ask Lucy BC"
http://www.honestjohn.co.uk/askhj/

This item was edited on Friday, 13th May 2011, 21:10

She stayed for over an hour anyway so even with a receipt she`d still have a fine.

I`ve seen these guys work and they just walk around all day noting down registration plates then stroll off.  Repeat process until a reg shows up as being there longer than 1 hour.

Suppose she found out she had left her purse at home, had to go home & came back & the same parking space was available. Was the a no return within 2 hour or whatever sign?

Exactly what proof have they got that proves she contravened the rules? That sort of system sounds like it`s open to abuse.

Hi, if you want proper advice go to www.pepipoo.com they are lawyers that will tell you what to do for FREE, as for this parking fine, forget it, they cannot take you to court for any money as it is not legal, have a look at the site for parking and then tell ALL your friends, pass it round, they cannot fine you, only courts can issue fines. Hope this helps, Brian.

I fell foul of a similar system a few years back in a Lidl car park. They are privately run and have signs up that tell you about the time limit/fines etc. They also have cameras at the entrance that take a snap shot of each registration that comes and goes, so they have evidence of when you came and left.

The only way she could get out of it is if they haven`t displayed the signs or explained the risks sufficiently. I doubt this though as they are very professional. I think she`ll have to put it down to experience as I did and pay up before the fine doubles!

Edit: One thing you could do, which happened with this one, is write to the local rag to name and shame the supermarket - they *might* refund your gran for the publicity, but more likely, they may get the time limit extended to an hour and thirty minutes, which is what happened in this case.

This item was edited on Saturday, 14th May 2011, 06:29

Cheers all. I`ve been doing a bit of digging and it appears they can`t charge you a fine after all, the most they can do is seek damages for breach of contract. Obviously if this was a council run car park, or a public road, and the ticket was issued by a traffic warden or police officer, circumstances would be different.

But in this case the most they can legally expect to get from you in a court is the actual loss of income from the breaking of the contract, which is basically nothing for a free car park.

I`ll let you know how it goes!


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Looks like you have found out yourself RJS but pretty much unless it has been issued by the council or police then don`t pay anything and DO NOT make any contact with them whatsoever.

They make these things look like a council parking fine but they are basically just an invoice and you can either choose to pay it or choose not to pay it!

Your mum will probably receive up to 6 or so threatening letters, possibly some from a `debt collection` firm which is just another office in the same company...ignore them all and they will eventually give up.

If you have looked on pepipoo then you probably know all this already. :)

RIP Julie & Maisie

This item was edited on Saturday, 14th May 2011, 11:22