Parking on private land FAQs

Membership to the AOS is open to any operator that wishes to conduct enforcement operations on private land, or that is linked to the enforcement process in any way.

Compliance to the Code is something that we take very seriously, and we take every opportunity to make sure that our members are following the rules:

• We audit their business when they apply to join the scheme.
• We visit them and conduct an audit within six weeks of them joining, using acompletely independent auditor.
• We visit them and audit their business at least once a year thereafter, againusing the independent auditor.

Visiting car parks is a slightly more difficult proposition, as it is estimated that there are between 26-30,000 private car parking sites in the UK. However we work on the intelligence that we obtain from inside and outside the industry, and we will investigate any allegations of breaches of our Code of Practice.

If you believe the operator is not compliant with the terms of our Code of Practice, we would ask that you report the operator to the BPA so that we can take steps to investigate the situation and then rectify the breach. We cannot influence the operator to refund or cancel your parking charge however. If you wish to challenge the issuing of the charge, you must write to the operator to lodge your appeal. In any event, we would recommend that you contact the operator before you contact us.

If you would like to make a complaint about an operator that is registered with the AOS, you should contact BPA in writing to:-

British Parking Association, Stuart House, 41-43 Perrymount Road, Haywards Heath, West Sussex RH16 3BN

Or by email

We would be grateful if you could send as much evidence with your complaint as possible, to enable us to investigate your complaint to its fullest extent. We are not able to deal specifically with your ticket or clamp enforcement, but if you believe that the operator has breached our Code of Practice, we will investigate your complaint thoroughly. We will respond to you when we receive your complaint, and if your complaint warrants investigation, we will contact you with the results of that investigation.

The BPA is a private membership association, and so has no statutory powers to punish operators that have broken the terms of our Code of Practice. However we do operate a scheme of sanctions that we apply if an operator is found to be in breach of our Code of Practice.

Sanctions points are applied to the operator's membership file, and if the operator reaches 12 points or more in any rolling twelve month period, that operator could face disciplinary action and suspension or expulsion from the AOS and the BPA. This will in turn mean that the operator will be unable to access the DVLA's keeper details database, and so will be unable to pursue outstanding parking charges, which will have a considerable financial impact upon their business.

In any event, your complaints will help us to raise standards in the private parking sector through investigations, and also highlight to us where our Code of Practice can be improved still further.

The BPA's Code of Practice is very clear that all complaints and appeals made to the operator must be dealt with promptly and efficiently. The operator is required to acknowledge your appeal within 14 days of receiving it, and they must respond with a full explanation of their investigation with 35 days. Whilst they are investigating your appeal, they must freeze the charge at the rate at which the appeals process was commenced.

If they do decide to turn down your appeal, they must give you an extra 14 days to pay at the rate at which you decided to appeal. When you send your appeal to the operator, it is advisable to send the letter by recorded or even registered post, to ensure that you get a receipt signature.

If you do not want to do this, it is a good idea to contact the operator to ensure that they have received your appeal, especially if you have not received an acknowledgement after the required 14 days.

The Sanctions Scheme was introduced in September 2010, as an aid to the AOS team's process for investigating complaints and compliance issues. The purpose of the Sanctions Scheme is to quantify any confirmed breaches of the Code of Practice, and to provide a framework for BPA and its members to understand the breadth and depth of the performance of its members under the Code, and to ensure that the correct action is taken against the relevant breach.

If, following an investigation a breach of the Code of Practice is upheld, then sanctions points will be applied to a member's file, commensurate with the severity of the breach. If a member receives 12 or more sanctions points in any 12 month period, disciplinary action may follow, which could result in suspension or expulsion from the BPA and our Approved Operator Scheme, and/or suspended access to the DVLA's registered keeper database.

The Department for Transport's Blue Badge scheme for the disabled driver allows for holders of the permit to park in certain restricted areas for up to three hours (areas and times may vary, depending upon the local authority). This concession applies to the public highway only, and is not relevant on private land.

Whilst some landlords do provide preferential parking for blue badge holders, this parking is generally subject to the same terms and conditions as found elsewhere on the car park, and is sometimes charged for on the same tariff as other users of the car park. To avoid confusion, you should always check the terms

No. The keeper may not be the person who paid the invoice or may have moved house.

The information provided by the previous keeper may be false and the person named may have no connection to the vehicle. We have received complaints from people who have never driven or owned a car but have been contacted by organisations chasing charges.

Parking operators will be required to offer the motorist access to the Independent Appeals Service when the dispute cannot be resolved. The Independent Appeal Service is a prerequisite to achieving keeper liability for unpaid parking charges. Everyone should benefit from this.

One of the most frequent criticisms of the private parking sector is the lack of an Independent Appeals Service. Presently there is no alternative dispute resolution service which is independent of the operator. By creating one the parking sector will restore some of the trust that has been lost in the industry over the years because of the actions of a minority of rogue operators.

The combination of an Independent Appeal Service, the Code of Practice and an independent audit process will deliver a higher standard of service within the parking sector. We believe that this will in turn, result in a better public understanding of why parking management is necessary and the recognition that parking tickets issued on private land are legitimate.

For more information please read the FAQs on The Protection of Freedoms Act

NSI are the National Security Inspectorate

A sign should be placed at the entrance to a private car park site wherever possible in order to advertise the terms and conditions for parking. There are occasions where this is not possible, such as if the entrance to a car park is placed between areas of land owned by another landowner, and those landowners do not give permission for a sign to be placed on the land, or planning permission is not granted, but these exceptions are few and far between.

There are no specific guidelines on the clarity of payment locations in a car park, but the Code of Practice does state that signs in a car park should be clear and easy to understand. This should refer to the main terms and conditions signs as well as supplementary signs such as ‘have you paid and displayed?’ and ‘please pay here’ signs.

The answer to your question really depends upon the date that the charge was issued to your vehicle. 

If the parking event occurred before 1^st October, then under the terms of the law of contract, the liability for the charge rests with the driver of the vehicle, and the keeper of the vehicle has no liability to pay the charge. Whilst we suggest that it is good practice for the keeper to disclose the details of the driver of the vehicle, they are under no legal obligation to do so.

However on 1^st October this changed with the introduction of the Protection of Freedoms Act. Whilst the act itself deals with the banning of the clamping and removal of vehicles where there is no lawful authority, the Schedule 4 of the act enables the parking operator to pursue the keeper of the vehicle if no serviceable address for the driver is provided. Unfortunately a ‘serviceable address’ means that the details must fall within the jurisdiction of the legislation,  that is to say the address must be British. This is actually a better process than if a ticket is issued on the public highway, where the keeper is automatically liable, with no opportunity for driver disclosure. 

If the charge was applied to your vehicle after 1^st October, you could send the operator the details of the driver if you wish, and the operator may try to pursue the driver. However it may be that the operator will then revert to you as the keeper of the vehicle to obtain the outstanding charge, as he is allowed to do so by law. 

In this respect, I would suggest that it would be down to you to obtain the charge from the driver if you so wished.

It is not true that any parking operator must wait until receiving a court judgement before recovering parking charges.

Court action is in fact the final stage that an operator would use if all other avenues have been exhausted. When dealing with private parking, the outstanding parking charge is - in most cases – the result of a broken contract where the motorist has failed – for whatever reason – to abide by the terms and conditions for parking in the car park.

In pursuing the outstanding parking charge the operator is entitled to charge for the recovery of the costs of carrying out the enforcement of the parking. Should this charge not be recovered then the operator is allowed to pursue the charge through the court process.

If a motorist receives a parking charge for parking their car in a private and unregulated car park, there is no legal obligation that compels them to ensure that a parking charge is completed when it is given out. Naturally, there are some fields that must be completed in order to ensure that the charge can be properly pursued if it is not paid, such as the date/time of the event, the location, the vehicle’s registration and the make/model of that vehicle. With other fields however, it would be good practice to complete the them, but I would suggest that it would not necessarily affect the legality of the charge.

Parking tickets issued on private land are not regulated by law, so if a small mistake appears on a parking ticket, it does not necessarily make it invalid. If the parking ticket has been issued to the correct party, then it is considered to be legitimately given.

If you have received a parking charge in 35 days, then it is issued outside of the terms of the Protection of Freedoms Act (PoFA). However it does not necessarily make the ticket invalid. Parking charges are primarily issued under the law of contract, or trespass, depending on the terms and conditions that prevail at the site. Schedule 4 of PoFA was designed by Government to enable the operator to be able to pursue the keeper of the vehicle if no serviceable name and address for the driver has been presented.

If the charge has not been delivered within the specified timescale, PoFA does not apply, but the terms and conditions within the car park are still valid.