Parking Charge Notice by Local Parking Security Ltd

[Guest]

I drove into a car park in South Wales (which I have since discovered was private land) that used ANPR which I was unaware of. I was looking for some sand dunes and got out of the car to enquire how far away they were. I had to wait to speak to someone who told me they were over 40 mins walk away. We decided this was too far to walk for our 5yr old granddaughter so got back in the car but then she required the toilet which we used on the car park site. We then drove out of the car park. We were there11 mins and have now received a PCN for failing to pay for the duration of our stay.
I appealed this as follows which was rejected:
You issued me with a parking ticket on 6 Sept. 2021 but I believe it was unfairly issued. I decline your invitation to name the driver, which is not required of me as the keeper of the vehicle. I will not be paying your demand for payment for the following reasons:

• Mitigating circumstances & Insufficient Signage

There are mitigating circumstances to explain why the vehicle was parked where it was and the charge should be waived for this reason. We were on site for a total of only 11 minutes. We realized after entering the car park and making an enquiry that the car park was such a distance from the beach that it was too far to walk with our young grandchildren. We were then going to leave but our granddaughter needed the use of the toilet facilities. The car was never left unattended as another adult remained in it.

Had we seen clear signage in the car park (either on entering or where we parked) to explain about what the relevant parking restrictions are we would have immediately vacated the car park. This means no contract can be formed with the landowner and all tickets are issued illegally.

Do I now need to just pay up or do I have a case to take other action.