Free Traffic Legal Advice

Subject: PCN [number] – VRM [registration] – Formal appeal by Registered Keeper

I write as the Registered Keeper of the above vehicle in respect of your Parking Charge Notice dated 20/11/2025.

Liability for this charge is denied.

On the material date the driver attempted in good faith to pay for parking at Parkgate Car Park, Darlington. The only payment machine on site was covered, directing motorists to pay by telephone, website, or app. The telephone number auto-answered and immediately diverted the driver to use the website or app instead.

The website repeatedly crashed at the payment stage, forcing the driver to download the app and create an account. This process, including repeated connection failures, took well over ten minutes. Once the account was finally created, the app confirmed that three hours of parking for VRM [registration] had been purchased and displayed a live countdown timer. The driver’s banking app also required and recorded a payment approval at that time, in favour of “MirandaConnectLimited”.

Later, as the initial period was nearing expiry, the app warned that the session was about to end. The driver promptly purchased a further hour through the same app. This second transaction shows as a successful payment on the bank account.

On subsequently checking the receipts within the app, only the second transaction is recorded, and only that payment has actually been debited. It is therefore apparent that there was a fault within your payment platform: the first 3-hour session was accepted and displayed to the driver as a valid session, but your system failed to complete or record the transaction. That failure is wholly outside the driver’s control.

Your own signs will no doubt assert that a valid tariff must be purchased promptly on arrival and that the full period of parking must be covered. The driver did exactly what was required, albeit after a delay caused by your own systems being unavailable (bagged machine, non-functional website, and insistence on using an app). The driver then acted promptly again when time was expiring by purchasing an additional hour. In these circumstances:

Any alleged breach is the direct result of a failure of your payment system, not any failure of the driver.

Under the Consumer Rights Act 2015, any services you provide must be performed with reasonable care and skill. Requiring motorists to rely on a malfunctioning app or website that falsely confirms a parking session, then penalising them when your back-end records do not match, is neither fair nor reasonable.

The Private Parking Single Code of Practice requires you to allow both a consideration period on arrival and a grace period at the end of parking. Time spent attempting to pay at a bagged machine, following your instructions to use the web or app, and contending with your system failures cannot sensibly be treated as unpaid parking attracting a penalty.

I put you to strict proof that your payment processor and app were functioning correctly for VRM [registration] throughout the material times, and that no payment attempt was made that failed due to your systems.

Given the above, the Parking Charge must be cancelled. Should you refuse, please treat this as a request under the UK GDPR for the following data:

1. All ANPR images and logs relating to VRM [registration] on 13/11/2025.
2. All payment-system logs for that VRM on that date, including web and app transactions and any declined or incomplete attempts.
3. Copies of all data and notes held in relation to myself as Registered Keeper.

If you nevertheless decide to reject this appeal, you must provide the verification details for any independent appeals service you contend is available, together with a copy of the contract or site agreement authorising Excel Parking Services Ltd to issue and pursue Parking Charge Notices at this site.

I am the Registered Keeper. I appeal to the IAS against Excel Parking Services Ltd’s decision to reject my representations. I do not admit to being the driver and I will not be identifying the driver.

1. Preliminary matters: burden and standard of proof
The Operator bears the burden of proving, on the balance of probabilities, that a legally enforceable parking charge is owed. It is not sufficient to assert that the Operator’s internal records show “no valid payment” or “payment did not cover the entire duration”. Where the central dispute concerns the reliability of the Operator’s own payment systems, the Operator must produce cogent, contemporaneous evidence, not mere conclusions.

2. Failure to engage with the substance of the representations
The rejection letter is essentially formulaic and fails to grapple with the actual point advanced. The representations were not of the “I forgot to pay” variety. The issue is that the driver attempted to pay in good faith via the payment methods imposed by the Operator, and that the Operator’s payment journey (app/website/processor/session logging) failed in a manner not apparent to the motorist at the material time. The rejection simply restates the allegation (“payment did not cover the entire duration”) without addressing the payment-system failure point at all.

3. Operator’s payment system failure and its legal consequences
Where a trader mandates that payment must be made by particular remote means (web/app/phone) and those means malfunction such that payment is not properly processed or recorded despite the consumer being led to believe that payment has been made or a session is active, any alleged breach is properly attributed to the trader’s system failure, not consumer default.

In those circumstances, several established principles arise:

(a) Consumer Rights Act 2015
The provision of a payment facility is part of the service the Operator supplies to consumers using the site. Under the Consumer Rights Act 2015, services must be performed with reasonable care and skill. A system which presents a parking session as having been created/authorised/active, but subsequently fails to complete or record the transaction, is prima facie inconsistent with that statutory standard. It is not fair or reasonable to penalise a consumer for a defect in the trader’s own service architecture.

Further, any term which has the object or effect of permitting the trader to impose a punitive charge where the consumer has taken reasonable steps to comply but is thwarted by the trader’s system, is liable to be regarded as unfair. The IAS is invited to consider whether the Operator’s position, as stated in the rejection letter, is consistent with statutory consumer fairness, particularly where the Operator has not produced the granular transaction/session evidence that would allow an independent tribunal to test the reliability of the Operator’s assertions.

(b) Frustration/prevention principle
A party cannot rely on a condition where that party’s own act or default prevents performance. If the Operator removes or disables on-site payment options and mandates remote payment channels, and those channels malfunction or mislead the consumer as to successful completion, the Operator cannot fairly characterise the outcome as the consumer’s breach. The alleged “failure” is the foreseeable consequence of the Operator’s own arrangements and failures.

(c) Estoppel/legitimate reliance
If the Operator’s system represents to the motorist, by the app interface and session status, that a parking session is active, the motorist is entitled to rely the system. The Operator should be estopped from asserting the contrary where the motorist’s reliance was induced by the Operator’s own platform. The IAS is not asked to make findings on estoppel in the abstract; rather, the point is that the Operator must prove, with proper evidence, that no such “active session” representation was made and/or that it was reasonable for the motorist to disregard it.

4. Code compliance: consideration and grace are not optional
The Private Parking Single Code of Practice requires a consideration period on arrival and a grace period at the end. This is important because it recognises that motorists need time to read terms and, crucially, to attempt compliance with payment requirements. Time spent attempting to pay via the Operator’s mandated but malfunctioning payment system is time spent attempting compliance, not evidence of avoidance.

The Operator’s rejection letter does not address these requirements at all. It simply asserts that signs are “large, prominent and legible” and that a helpline number exists. Neither assertion answers the question: what allowance was made for consideration time and for payment difficulties arising from the Operator’s systems, and how does the Operator reconcile a punitive charge with the Code’s requirements?

5. Strict proof required: disclosure of transaction and session evidence
This appeal turns on objective records. The Operator is put to strict proof, by producing unredacted contemporaneous logs, of the following:

(a) Full payment processor logs for the VRM and date in question, including authorisations, reversals, completions, and any incomplete, failed or cancelled transactions. It is not adequate to provide a screenshot stating “no payment”. The adjudicator requires the underlying transaction trail.

(b) Full app/session logs for the VRM and date in question, showing whether a session was created, what start time was recorded, what status was displayed to the user, and whether the session was cancelled or failed at any point.

(c) Evidence that the payment channels were operational at the material time, including any incident reports, system uptime logs, error rates, or known faults affecting motorists’ ability to pay. If the Operator asserts that the motorist should have used the helpline, then the Operator should produce evidence of the helpline’s functionality and its ability to resolve payment failures at the material time.

Absent these materials, the Operator’s case reduces to “our system says you did not pay” whilst simultaneously refusing to disclose the system records that would allow that assertion to be tested. That is not a safe basis on which to uphold a charge.

6. Distinguishing ParkingEye v Beavis
The Operator will no doubt rely implicitly on the general proposition that a parking charge may be commercially justifiable. However, ParkingEye v Beavis concerned clear contractual terms and deliberate overstay in a retail car park with a legitimate interest in space turnover. This case is materially different because the dispute is not about a consumer choosing to breach the terms; it is about the Operator’s own payment systems and whether it is fair or lawful to impose a punitive charge where the consumer attempted to comply and was misled or thwarted by the trader’s defective service.

7. Conclusion
The Operator has not discharged its burden of proof. Its rejection letter fails to address the core contention: that the alleged breach is attributable to a payment/system failure for which the Operator is responsible, and that the consumer acted reasonably in attempting to comply. The Operator has also failed to provide the transaction/session evidence necessary to determine the dispute fairly.

For the reasons above, the appeal should be allowed and the charge cancelled. In the alternative, if the IAS is minded to dismiss the appeal, I request that it first directs the Operator to produce the strict proof evidence identified in section 5, because without it there is no proper evidential basis to prefer the Operator’s conclusory assertions over the objective banking indicators consistent with an attempted payment/session initiation.