A mum who pulled over to take an emergency phone call has been slapped with a£100 parking fine.
The 36-year-old was forced to pull over in the nearest safe place, a taxi bay at Morrisons, on June 16 after she got a sudden phone call from someone who was having a panic attack. Despite being there for less than a minute, a few days later she received a PCN notice from a parking firm named ES Parking Enforcement Ltd.
The mum-of-five was appalled to discover she had to pay £100 within 28 days or £60 within 14 days and despite appealing, she was unsuccessful, LancsLive reports. She said she "was panicking" when her phone rang and parked up in the nearest safe place.
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The mum, who said she was parked up for "a couple of seconds", added: "(The person on the phone) was having a panic attack and I couldn’t answer, it’s the law to pull over to answer your phone and I did that, and it was literally less than a minute. I appealed, but within a couple of days they wrote back and rejected."
The letter from ES Parking Enforcement Ltd stated there was "photographic evidence" the woman did not park in a marked parking bay and the "terms and conditions of parking at the above site were displayed". Rejecting the mum's appeal, they said she could opt to pay a reduced fine within 14 days.
It added she could use the Independent Appeals Service within 21 days but by then the discount for early payment would be withdrawn and the full charges apply, or if she did nothing, the company would proceed with court action - forcing the mum to pay the reduced fine as she could not afford to take the risk.
She added it was her "priority to answer the phone and make sure she was safe" and was following the law. She said: "I wasn’t causing an obstruction, I wasn’t stopping anyone else on the car park and there wasn’t a taxi waiting to pull in and I wasn’t in somebody else’s space, and it was literally like a minutes, but it cost me a lot of money.
"It's wrong on so many levels that there's no phone number or a person that you can speak to and explain the situation; there's just someone at the end of an email clicking on something. Are they reading it and understanding what people are saying? It just seemed to be very quickly rejected and it's intimidating and frustrating."
But just a few weeks later, the mum was fined again, this time £90, for allegedly overstaying in a car park outside the B&M store in Preston on June 28. She is currently appealing the fine, sent by G24 Limited.
The mum said she was there a "couple of hours", adding: "I just assumed that the parking notices were to say people could only park there if they were going to B&M. I’ve never read them because, with five children, you don’t have time to sit there and read a parking sign when I know that I'm following the rules and I wouldn't park somewhere if I was going somewhere else.
"I parked on their car park to shop in their shop. I spent £100 in there, and got this fine. I have appealed and said, I was in your shop and I haven’t gone anywhere else, and because of my disability, I do have to take my time."
Lancs Live contacted Morrisons, ES Parking Enforcement Ltd, B&M and G24 Ltd for comment.
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