Free Traffic Legal Advice

There are always ground to contest.

Post up the PCN for examination - only redact personal info and leave all dates viable as this could be out of time for keeper liability.

Welcome to FTLA.

To help us provide the best advice, please read the following thread carefully and provide as much of the information it asks for as you are able to: READ THIS FIRST - Private Parking Charges Forum guide

It would be good to see the back of the notice. Also, if you can get them, copies of the photos on the notice captured from their online portal so we can see what they've captured in terms of evidence.

Aside from any technical arguments (2 photos taken 2 seconds apart doesn't provide a period of parking for example), there would seem to be an argument about commercial justification here. Ordinarily, issuing charges to vehicles that 'straddle' 2 parking bays would have a clear commercial justification (if everyone parked like that, the capacity of the car park would be halved). In this case, if snow was blocking one of the 2 bays rendering it unusable, it's less clear what legitimate commercial objective is being furthered by issuing a charge.

Any further advice here?

done

Ordinarily, issuing charges to vehicles that 'straddle' 2 parking bays would have a clear commercial justification (if everyone parked like that, the capacity of the car park would be halved).

Not so. If everyone parked like that, only the bays at ether end of each row would be unusable. The capacity would be reduced, but not halved.

I'd be minded to play this with a straight bat - you can appeal as the keeper pointing out that due to snow, the end bay was entirely unusable. Their enforcement therefore had no commercial justification. Add in to that the fact that the PCN fails to contain a period of parking, and as such they have neither proved the vehicle remained there for longer than the mandatory consideration period, nor have they specified a valid period of parking as required to hold the keeper liable under PoFA. When I've more time I can draft something up, unless someone beats me to it.

Not so. If everyone parked like that, only the bays at ether end of each row would be unusable. The capacity would be reduced, but not halved.

Fair point. Perhaps you can help the OP with their appeal?

Since the car park does not require payment, (a) there can be no commercial justification, and (b) can there even be a contract to enforce?

I think (a) would be hard to argue on the basis of the car park being free. The car park in ParkingEye vs Beavis was free (from memory), and it was that case in which the Supreme Court ruled on the commercial justification issue in the first place. In a retail park car park, I think it would be easy for the operator to argue there is a commercial justification in ensuring people don't park in a way that takes up 2 bays, as this reduces the number of bays available for genuine customers who might wish to spend money at the retail park. However, in this case I agree there's an argument to be made around commercial justification, although I think the angle to go at it from is that the end space the OP's car was straddling was unusable anyway, so the driver didn't reduce the capacity of the car park by parking in that manner (which would generally be the commercial justification for enforcing against cars that straddle bays).

On (b), there generally doesn't need to be money changing hands for a contract to be formed, as long as there is some 'consideration'.