Mystery shoppers to check on controversial car parks

Will Hurley, CEO of the International Parking Community (IPC) will send mystery shoppers to visit car parks run by HX Car Park Management.

HX came under fire after an increasing number of motorists claimed they had been wrongly issued with Parking Charge Notices (PCNs) and Sue Hayman, MP for Workington, launched a mass legal action on behalf of residents who received PCNs after using the firm’s Vulcan’s Lane facility in her constituency.

HX are known to operate car parks in Workington, Wigan, Morecambe, Brighouse, Halifax and Burnsall. Of these, at least four have received press coverage about motorists claiming they were wrongly issued with PCNs. But Kenny Marland, director at HX, says the company runs around 90 sites in the UK.

Tyrone Larmour, of Cockermouth, was fined £100 because three letters of his registration number were missing on his ticket when he parked in the Vulcan’s Lane’s car park last year. After he raised concerns about the way the firm was operating, a pattern started to emerge, with motorists saying that despite entering the correct number plate and paying, they received PCNs saying the registration number entered was incorrect. But when contacted by journalists and Mrs Hayman, HX denied there was any problem with the machine and maintained the PCNs were issued correctly.

This prompted Mrs Hayman to call for people to boycott the facility last year. And after a number of motorists, including Mr Larmour, won their cases in court, Mrs Hayman contacted the firm asking them to reconsider 104 cases of PCNs issued at the Workington site.

Mr Hurley, said: “We haven’t received any complaints about HX, but people can come to us if they believe there have been any breaches of the code of practice.”

He said he would alert his staff to collate any complaint regarding a PCN issued at a HX-run car park so any concerns can be addressed.

Mr Hurley said HX and all other operators that are members of the IPC have their own internal appeal process, however a further stage of appeal is administered by its Independent Appeals Service (IAS).

Motorists have claimed the IAS is not independent as Mr Hurley was a director of the IPC as well as of the IAS. And one of the directors of solicitor firm Gladstones, who pursue the PCNs on behalf of HX, was a director of companies where Mr Hurley was also listed on Companies House as being in charge.

But Mr Hurley explained that although he set up both the IPC and the IAS, these were separate entities and he was no longer a director at the IAS.

He said: “We put all the measures in place to have a clear break.”

He added that independent adjudicators were appointed to look into each appeal and parking firms were charged £15 for appeals they won and £25 for appeals that found in favour of motorists.

He said: “This is because we don’t want anyone looking at this thinking that there is any incentive in finding in favour of the parking operator, the higher charge is like a punitive element for the operator because they should have never issued the PCN.”

Mr Hurley said that all car parks that are members of the IPC are audited and their signs checked. However he admitted HX car parks had not been checked in person. He said: “We don’t visit every car park because we audit over 20,000, I admit that on paper you can’t see if there’s a hedge covering a sign or things like that, it’s not perfect, but it’s a good starting point.”

He added it was important for motorists to understand the importance of inputting the correct registration number at car parks that, such as HX, use Automatic Number Plate Recognition systems and that a national campaign had been launched to raise awareness of this.

HX boss: “I want to change the parking world for the better”

Mr Marland said while the parking trade in general had been “a thugs game” in the past, he is now working to change the parking world for the better. He said: “I’m the most genuine guy you could ever meet.” He added his firm did charitable work as well as operating an ethical and well-regulated business.

Figures published by the DVLA show HX made 10,502 KADOE (keeper at the date of event) requests between July 2017 and March 2018. These are requests made by private parking firms to the DVLA to obtain personal details in order to issue PCNs. This means HX spent £26,255 to obtain KADOE records in that time, as the fee payable to the DVLA is £2.50 per request. Between April 2018 and March 2019 HX made 17,278 KADOE requests to the DVLA, spending £43,195 to obtain the records.

Last year, firm Parking Eye was the one to make the highest number of paid-for KADOE requests, with 1,852,085 recorded queries to the DVLA.

Mr Marland said after HX was incorporated it was subject to a probationary period with the DVLA, which ended in 2017. He added: “HX do wish to emphasise the point that it has a system in place which filters out incorrectly issued PCNs before a request for the registered keepers details is made to the DVLA. Every single PCN is examined manually prior to a KADOE request being made and if problems are detected, the PCN is cancelled at that stage and no request is made in relation to that PCN.

“It is correct to say that the company has grown. It has grown thanks to the hard work and dedication of myself and my staff. It originally started with circa 20 sites and now has approximately 90 sites across the UK. It is this expansion that resulted in the requests being made under the terms of the KADOE increasing in the period between April 2018 and March 2019, and not for any other reason.”

He added 60,000 tickets were voided before making KADOE requests since 2016.

Mr Marland said HX was “extremely proud” of the appeals processes it uses and the firm finds in favour of the motorist in approximately 20 per cent of all cases.

Motorists insist HX’s machines are faulty due to the number of people issued with PCNs for having the wrong number plate on the ticket. Mr Marland said HX maintained its position that the problems are due to human error, not defective machines. He added: “HX have one of the best track records in relation to the management of its sites and in comparison with other parking operators, only receive a small number of complaints.”

Workington MP Sue Hayman said: “I want to know what he’s doing about the 104 cases I’ve sent to him. I asked him to re-look at those PCNs and I haven’t had a response. The fundamental problem is that HX is refusing to take responsibility for the fact they’re charging people large fines, causing people a huge amount of stress and the court is proving they’re wrong time and time again.”