Victory over the parking cowboys: Hospitals ordered to ban bullies and give the seriously ill free parking. Daily Mail

  Jeremy Hunt to set out new strict rules blocking huge fines in car parks

  Cancer sufferers and patients whose treatment overran were ripped off

  Health trusts now responsible for private firms that run 3/4 of the car parks 

Hospitals must offer free or cut-price parking to the seriously ill, the Health Secretary will announce today.

Setting out strict new rules, Jeremy Hunt will say cowboy parking operators can no longer be allowed to impose huge fines for trivial infringements.

His intervention is a major victory for the Daily Mail’s campaign to protect vulnerable patients. 

The outrageous behaviour of some parking bullies has sparked a mass of complaints. 

Cancer sufferers and patients whose treatment has over-run are among those who have been ripped off.

‘Patients and families shouldn’t have to deal with the added stress of unfair parking charges,’ Mr Hunt will say.

‘These clear ground rules set out our expectations, and will help the public hold the NHS to account for unfair charges or practices.’

The guidance to health trusts makes clear they will be responsible for the actions of the private firms that run more than three quarters of hospital car parks.

They will have to act against rogue contractors and not sign contracts ‘on any basis that incentivises fines’.

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Rail commuters are hit by up to 40,000 bogus parking fines: 'Pirates' accused of demanding money from commuters using the wrong law, Daily Mail

  £100 fines handed out when drivers outstayed permitted period at car parks belonging to Chiltern Railways

  MET Parking Services was using the wrong law to issue the parking tickets

  Company also issues fines on behalf of McDonald's car park users

  Firm, which manages car parks on line between Marylebone and Birmingham, admitted that 1,025 tickets were incorrectly issued

  DVLA earns £10m a year from private parking firms for right to access its database

Parking ‘pirates’ are accused of issuing thousands of bogus penalty notices to travellers using railway station car parks on a busy commuter line

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Fines of £100 a time were handed out when drivers stayed beyond the permitted period at car parks belonging to Chiltern Railways.

But MET Parking Services was using the wrong law to issue the tickets, and is now accused of demanding money under false pretences from as many as 40,000 commuters.

The tickets were issued using a law introduced in 2012 which banned the use of wheel clamping on private land, but allowed the owners to issue penalty notices. However railway car parks are covered by different byelaws.

Commuter Trevor Carvey took on MET after receiving a ticket in Ruislip, Middlesex. He used the Freedom of Information Act to discover MET was using automatic number plate recognition cameras to identify drivers via the DVLA database, then pursue them for payment – often with the threat of court action.

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Further Reading:

Communities Secretary Eric Pickles said rogue firms will not be tolerated, and launched Government investigation

Hospitals urged to sack parking pirate squads after it emerges three-quarters of trusts use them to patrol car parks. Daily Mail

  Firms targeting patients with extortionate 'fines' during appointments

  Trusts also using private companies to hound patients for payments

  Government announces formal investigation into parking cowboys

  Politicians call on hospitals to sack companies issuing unfair tickets

Hospitals last night faced huge pressure to sack pirate parking squads after it emerged more than three quarters of NHS  trusts are using them to police their car parks.

Rogue firms have been given free rein across the majority of the country, allowing them to target patients with extortionate ‘fines’ during their medical appointments.

A Daily Mail survey found many trusts are also using private companies to hound patients for payments, with threats of court hearings.

Politicians and campaigners last night called on hospitals to sack firms found to be issuing unfair tickets.

Sarah Wollaston, chairman of the Commons health select committee, said: ‘If they are behaving in an unscrupulous way, targeting the most vulnerable patients, then they should be stripped of their contracts.’ 

The former GP and Tory MP for Totnes added: ‘Patients may end up with fines for something that is no fault of their own. I don’t think the NHS can wash their hands of responsibility.’

Conservative MP Andrew Percy, also on the committee, described tactics used in NHS car parks as ‘totally unacceptable’, adding: ‘The problem the trusts have is that they have to upgrade the parking facilities and if they don’t charge it will come out of the NHS budget.

‘But what they are doing is contracting this work out and then washing their hands of it.’

Campaigner Roger Goss, from Patient Concern, added: ‘We understand they are desperate to raise more money but this is a disreputable way of going about it.’

Read more here:

Further Reading:

We will curb the parking cowboys, says Cabinet Minister: Victory for Mail campaign as official probe is launched into bully boys, Daily Mail

Mac on... ruinous hospital car parking fines Daily Mail

'Oh dear. That'll cost you. Visiting time ended three minutes ago'

Hospitals send parking bully boys to hound sick and grieving: NHS spends your cash on 'dodgy' debt collectors Daily Mail

  NHS Trusts are employing bogus lawyers to threaten vulnerable patients

  Patients taken to courts over £60 tickets issued while receiving treatment

  Trusts are using bailiffs to go after those who do not pay exorbitant 'fines'

  Parents issued a £50 ticket while at hospital to say goodbyes to dying son 

  Hospital refused to apologise and instructed solicitors to chase payment

Hospitals are spending hundreds of thousands of pounds of taxpayers’ money to force patients to court over car parking tickets.

NHS Trusts are employing ‘unfit’ debt collectors and bogus lawyers to threaten vulnerable patients and their families and make them pay up.

In some cases, patients have been dragged through the courts over £60 tickets issued while they received treatment.

Documents seen by the Mail show Trusts across the country are using bailiffs and legal firms to go after those who do not agree to pay exorbitant car parking ‘fines’.

Elderly parents Robert and Josephine Taylor were issued a £50 ticket while at hospital to say final goodbyes to their son Stephen, who was dying of pneumonia. 

They had accidentally parked in the wrong bay but the hospital refused to apologise and instructed solicitors to chase the payment, threatening court action.

Read more here:

See the previous part of this series

DVLA rakes in millions colluding with cowboys: Nearly 100 firms trying to buy drivers' details, official figures show

NEIL HERRON: We saw off the rogue clampers. Now let's purge the parking ticket pirates

Why do Hospitals feel the need to charge ridiculous car parking charges ?, it’s a tax on the ill and their visitors, and must be stopped  

Menace of the new parking cowboys: Drivers 'fined' £100 for overstaying by minutes at fast food chains and shops , Daily Mail

  Tickets doled out  private firms do not have official legal status

  Many are in fact issued unfairly and without the proper legal authority

  AA president Edmund King says many use 'scare tactics and bullying' 

  Drivers cannot be compelled to pay unless a court order is granted 

‘Cowboy’ parking squads hired by High Street firms are hitting hundreds of thousands of drivers with £100 ‘fines’ and using threats to make them pay up.

The companies – employed by fast food chains, retailers and railway operators – issue what appear to be official penalty notices, similar to those used by council traffic wardens. They then extract huge sums from drivers who are sometimes just a few minutes late in returning to their cars.

However, the tickets do not have the same legal standing as official fines.

Many are being issued unfairly and – in some cases – without proper legal authority.

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Additional Story on Parking