Motorist fined for not leaving car in bay – at car park without any

Samantha Devine, 40, was given a fine for “obstructive parking” in a car park where signs tell drivers to park in “marked bays”.

But the area is a patch of rough ground in Huddersfield and Samantha, of Penistone, is refusing to pay the £90-pounds fine, which has gone up to £140 since the incident last October.

The mother-of-four, who has been threatened with court action and bailiffs, said: “I couldn’t believe it when I found the ticket on my car – there was no reason to ticket me for not parking in the bays because there were no bays in the car park.”

She explained: “I have a regular appointment each week and I arrived in the morning and the car park I usually use was full, so I found this car park around the corner at around 8.30am.

“I paid £2 and parked in what I thought was a perfectly reasonable space at one side of the car park.

“By the time I got back at about 10.30am, the car park was jammed packed and there were cars everywhere parked higgledy-piggledy.

“There was already a ticket on my car.”

Samantha, a civil servant, said: “I had quite a long conversation with the parking attendant, telling him that I wasn’t obstructing anything.

“I asked him why there were no bays painted on the floor, no bollards marking no-parking zones, no parking attendants in the car park when drivers were pulling in and parking up, but he had no answer. I asked him how I could appeal against the ticket but he said I would have to wait until the final notice came through.”

That arrived on March 12 and by that time the fine had gone up to £140.

She wrote back saying she wouldn’t pay the fine.

She said: “But I got a letter back from the company the next day, saying that I had breached the rules of the car park, with photographs of my car.

“They wouldn’t budge on it.

“I will not pay. The company claimed it because the parking had caused an obstruction.

“The sign says that driver must park in the marked bays but that’s an impossibility.”

The car park is run by LDK Security Group, where a spokesman said it was unable to comment on the case.