My friend says I can safely ignore parking fine as it’s not from the council. Is that true?
Our consumer lawyer answers your questions
I’VE received a parking ticket after I apparently overstayed the amount of time I had paid to leave my car in my local town centre car park.
One of my friends says that, as the ticket has not been issued by the council, I can ignore it, but another friend says that I must pay the fine otherwise I could be taken to the Magistrates’ court. Who is right?
B.T., Sudbury, Suffolk. NEITHER of your friends is right — and ignoring a valid parking ticket is never a good idea.
Parking tickets on private land are not a criminal matter, so you won’t be going to the Magistrates’ court either.
The Parking Charge Notice might look like an official fixed penalty from the police, but it isn’t one. It’s a notice that the owner of the land or the private parking operator intends to take you to a civil court, and will offer to let you pay the charge to settle the case out of court.
When you receive a private parking ticket it’s really an invoice for a penalty parking charge, issued to you because you breached the operator’s terms of parking. Or, in legal terms, you breached the contract you entered into by default when you parked.
For a private operator to enforce parking terms and the contract, the terms must be clearly and prominently displayed at the car park so those wishing to use it know the terms before they park.
If the operator fails to do this, a parking ticket can be appealed, following the procedure that will be set out on the reverse of the ticket, and such an appeal should be successful.
So if the signage in the car park clearly stated that there was a maximum stay time and you went over this, you will need to pay the parking fine. However, if this information was not prominently displayed, you can appeal.
MY TUMBLE dryer caught fire in the kitchen. My insurance company has been quick to pay out for redecorating, but I’ve said I no longer want another tumble dryer — so I’d like to take the cash equivalent. The insurer says it can only replace it. Is this true?
A.B., via email. BUILDINGS and contents insurance policies are generally policies of indemnity, which means they aim to put the policyholder back in the position they were in just before the loss or damage happened.
Typically, this means the insurance provider must pay for a repair, replace something lost or damaged, or make a cash payment to the policyholder to cover the cost of the repair or replacement. In this respect, most insurance providers have a clause in the policy wording explaining how they settle claims. It will read something like: ‘We will decide whether to repair, replace, pay cash or reinstate the damaged part of the building.’
However, while this gives the insurance provider the ability to decide how to settle a claim, the approach taken by the Financial Ombudsman Service (which is where you complain if you fall into dispute with a provider) is that, if a policyholder insists on a cash settlement, the provider must not force a repair or replacement on them.
So, in answer to your question, it is not true. Your insurer is wrong and must give you cash if this is what you want. That said, a very big word of warning — you are correct to highlight ‘cash equivalent’, but it’s important to note that your provider will only have to pay you the equivalent amount of cash it would have cost for it to source you a replacement.
The significance of this is that most insurance providers will have deals with white goods suppliers so will be able to source the likes of tumble dryers at a cost that is far cheaper than the market price, meaning you will get less money. By contrast, if an insurer insists on a cash payment, rather than repair or replace, it cannot take this approach and must, in these circumstances, pay an amount equal to the usual recommended retail price.
WRITE to Dean Dunham, Money Mail, 9 Derry Street, London W8 5HY or email
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