Free Traffic Legal Advice

Yes by all means start drafting something up and show us a draft for comment.

Your main points will of course be around the rights granted to you in your lease, your rights over the space in question, the lack of contract between you and P4 (you already have a right to park in the space as part of your tenancy, a right being exercised at the time, and therefore did not enter into a contract with P4 whereby you agreed to pay £100 to park).

There's a fair chance POPLA will reject you, not because your arguments are without merit, but because if they accepted your arguments, it would ruin the operating model of most of these firms on residential land, who make much of their money penalising innocent mistakes by residents.

I mentioned that the lease has not been varied, but I didn't explicitly mention the Act. I doubt it would have made any difference as the decision to do nothing was one made by a senior manager on the spot with little more than 3 seconds of thought put into it.

Has POPLA usually sided with the parking companies in this kind of cases? It's very irrational as it's only a £100, but I am so incensed by this I would be willing to die on my sword and go to court over this. If court were to rule against them, setting a precedent, that would probably be even more damaging for their business model ... But I guess not many people are irrational enough to go to court over £100.

I have written the following for POPLA. Not been submitted yet, so happy to take any comments:

I am appealing a parking charge issued in my building’s car park.

On the day in question, I had my car professionally washed, which inadvertently dislodged my resident’s parking permit, making it difficult to see. However, this does not change the fact that I am a leaseholder in this building, and my lease grants me the unequivocal right to park my vehicle in the car park without any mention of a permit requirement.

Relevant Lease Terms (copy pasted verbatim, and also see the attachment):

A right for the Tenant to park a private motor car or a motor cycle or motor cycles in a parking space within areas designated from time to time by the Landlord within the Car Park provided that:-
8.1 The Landlord gives no warranty that the parking spaces in the Car Park shall be suitable for the parking of any particular type of motor car nor that there will always be a parking space immediately available to the Tenant.
8.2 The Tenant shall not have the right to park in any particular parking space within the Car Park.
8.3 The Landlord may temporarily suspend the right to park for limited periods of time (as short as reasonably practicable) during the Term where necessary for the purposes of repair, maintenance, decoration, replacement, or renewal of the Car Park or any plant and equipment therein or any other works to the Estate or adjoining land.
8.4 The motor car or motorcycle must be taxed and in roadworthy condition.

The above is the entirety of the conditions relating to my right to park. It is clear that:

* My vehicle is taxed and in a roadworthy condition (a fact easily verifiable via the DVLA, screenshot attached).
* The landlord has not suspended my right to park (confirmed by the presence of vehicles, including mine, on site).
* There is no mention of a requirement to display any permit or comply with any additional parking terms introduced by a third party.


My lease is a legal contract granting me rights that cannot be unilaterally overridden by signage or terms imposed by a parking management company. The principle of “primacy of contract” is well-established in English law. Unless the lease is lawfully varied in accordance with the Landlord and Tenant Act 1987 (which it has not been), these third-party terms do not bind me.

I am happy to display my permit as a matter of courtesy in order to help enable efficient enforcement of parking rules, but as there is no requirement to display it under the terms of my lease, I believe the parking company should have voided the ticket the moment they became aware that I am a leaseholder with a right to park there.

Overall summary box:

In short, I have a prior right to park in this car park as a part of my lease agreement with the landlord. The parking company has been informed of this during the appeal process.

Ignore the MOT/tax  rubbish. It's not relevant to this.

You put the operator to strict proof of a contract flowing from the landowner that permits them to issue PCNs in their own name and evidence of any variation to override the supremacy of the lease/tenancy agreement that has been applied according to the requirements of the L&TA, section 35.

blimey when did you submit it to Popla?

You should notify the management company that should you receive any further PCNs fr parking in your demised location, you will hold them jointly and severally liable for the actions of their agent.

They do not have any right to override your lease and you will not be displaying a permit. Should they request the Keepers details from the DVLA again, they will be in breach of your GDPR and be liable to a claim for compensation.

Advise them to tell their agent to make sure that they must not attempt to issue any more PCNs. You should advise your neighbours the same.

Did you appeal the NtD before they sent you an NtK?

I wouldn't worry about "antagonising" the management company. They have already antagonised you by unlawfully contracting a third party, unregulated private parking company who are issuing you invoices for £100 a pop just for parking in your own demised parking place.

I will place money on you (and your neighbours) being recipients of these PCNs again in the future if you allow them to get away with it. Know your rights.