Hello,
Yesterday I returned to my car to find a ticket on the window. I was parked in total for approximately 25 minutes in a residents bay in order to load my car but was observed for 5 minutes (14.44 - 14.49) and received a PCN as a result.
Details:
I run a small business that distributes leaflets and magazines to homes in Swindon. I'd received a call from one of my deliverers, Nick, that he had injured his knee and was unable to finish his delivery round so I had arranged to pop over to his house on Clifton Street around 2.30pm-ish to collect any magazines etc that they still had left to deliver so that they could be given to someone else to finish.
If I'm lucky I can often get a parking spot right outside his house, meaning I can leave the boot/doors open and I'm in and out in a jiffy. On this occasion however I could not park outside his house so had to park further up, on the opposite side of the street. For context, I had to collect a load of magazines - around 1,000 in total, plus accompanying leaflets. The magazines are quite heavy and are bundled into 50's when they arrive to my unit each month, and I'll usually carry no more than 4-5 bundles in one go. Leaflets and other materials I spend time pre-bundling myself and putting in cardboard boxes. Most deliverers collect their rounds from my unit, however those who do not drive will require a drop off and most deliverers will de-bundle and prep their materials and delivery bags at home.
I did about three runs to the car initially with the magazines that were still bundled into 50's which only took a couple of minutes, before returning to Nick's house to deal with the rest. As my car was out of sight of Nick's front door being parked further up the road, and I knew I'd be in his house dealing with the other materials for a good few minutes, I had closed the boot. The other materials had been broken down and organised by Nick for delivery, meaning all the leaflets and magazines were collated and no longer in their original bundles so it took a few minutes to sort through them, organise them and put them into cardboard boxes so that I could get them back to the car. We had a very brief chat to go over which streets still needed to be delivered to etc and that was that. I wasn't watching the clock but I imagine dealing with this took around 15 minutes or so. Once the last of the materials had been organised I did a couple more trips to the car, got in, checked my phone for a minute or so and then set off. I got about a few metres up the road before noticing there was a ticket on my windscreen. I pulled over, grabbed the ticket, read it and then checked the time on my dash and it was 2.59pm.
This is actually the second time this exact scenario has happened to me (the first being when moving house, I'd left the rental van unattended and close for a just a few minutes whilst in the middle of loading only to return to a ticket). I did not contest that first one as it seemed more hassle than the £35 was worth but if I can contest this one I'd welcome your help.
Thanks
