Read about the 62 amazing parking ticket scams that AppealNow.com™ has uncovered.
AppealNow.com™ is sometimes accused - by the parking authorities - of existing purely to help guilty motorists wriggle out of paying legal fines by using loopholes in the law.
 We refute this argument. It is not our aim to help anyone to avoid paying a legally issued fine for a clear-cut offence. However, it is the aim of AppealNow.com to help motorists cut through the red tape to appeal against parking tickets and other penalties that have been issued by incorrect, illegal or underhand means.
In the course of our research, we have found a growing number of examples of parking attendants 'stretching' or breaking the legal regulations so that their parking ticket quotas can be met.
The list of 'tricks' and outright scams that have been reported to us currently stands at 62 - and is still growing. We've just added a new one!!
If AppealNow.com can help motorists appeal and overturn parking tickets issued by any of these or other methods, our job will be worthwhile.
62 Ways that parking tickets have been illegally issued
1. The ghost or phantom parking ticket - parking attendants illegally issuing tickets after a vehicle has driven away and claim it was put on the vehicle.
2. BT vans targeted by parking attendants in the using the DOUBLE WHAMMY scam (see below on how the scam works). BT has now set up a special team to deal with these scams! Well done BT.
3. Giving tickets to vehicles legally loading and unloading or delivering.
4. Clampers parking on yellow lines while they do personal shopping
5. Supervisors and managers and traffic wardens cancel tickets for their friends and councillors.
6. Traffic wardens do not report parking meters that are not recording the time correctly. They then issue parking tickets to vehicles parking there.
7. New parking signs with new times are hidden behind the old signs.
8. Signs with no lettering on are not replaced or repaired.
9. Parking signs are hidden behind obstructions including hedges.
10. Councils do not follow the appeals procedure and automatically send out letters turning down an appeal.
11. Attendants know which parking meters are to be suspended. They allow vehicles to park there, then suspend the bay and issue a parking ticket.
12. Councils lift up vehicles to paint yellow lines under them and then issue parking tickets to those cars!
13. Parking tickets issued to abandoned vehicles to reach target
14. Parking tickets issued to imaginary foreign vehicles. As the vehicles are not registered with the DVLA they are treated as valid tickets.
15. Disabled badges allegedly not displayed correctly. Disabled vehicles are illegally clamped. Parking attendants are increasingly claiming that disabled blue badges are not displayed correctly and issuing parking tickets. Councils spend hundreds of pounds fighting requests to cancel these tickets. This is now a national disgrace.
16. Health and emergency visitors get parking tickets! Parking attendants are increasingly claiming that health and emergency visitor cards are not displayed correctly and issuing parking tickets. Just think that health visitor might just save your life!!
17. Giving parking tickets to drivers assisting disabled, infirm or ill passengers into or out of a vehicle.
18. Parking wardens confirming to a driver that it's "okay to park here", the driver returns to find parking ticket issued.
19. The councils who claim they never received your appeal even when you have their receipt!!! We know who they are!
20. Issuing ticket on vehicles before time on the meter has expired.
21. Misleading information on council websites e.g. Westminster website on loading and unloading says "loading or unloading should be a continuous operation. This is not correct!
22. Councils not repainting barely visible yellow lines and therefore issuing parking tickets to motorists who cannot see the lines.
23. Issuing parking tickets when correct pay & display tickets are clearly shown.
24. Councils not replacing faulty pay and display meters or parking meters – motorists put their money in – lose it and park with a note saying they put the money in. They will get a parking ticket.
25. Issuing tickets on residents parking bays days before the bays are to be suspended.
26. Issuing parking tickets to AA and RAC patrols attending breakdowns.
27. Issuing parking tickets in areas where the council knows the parking signs are invalid.
28. Issuing tickets before 8.30 am (councils dispute this but we have witnesses)
29. Parking attendants adding information to notebooks after the event to "prove" a ticket was given correctly.
30. Claiming meters or bays are suspended and issuing parking tickets, with no evidence that the bays were suspended (see the famous case in bury where the photographic evidence was doctored).
31. Confusing signs so that it is unclear where pay & display bays situated next to residents bays start and end. (e.g. next to Belgrave police station).
32. Parking attendants refusing to make notes about an alleged parking offence in their notebooks when requested to by a motorist or member of the public.
33. When a motorist has received several parking tickets and pays some but disputes other allocating the payments as payments on account over all tickets nullifying his ability to appeal.
34. Issuing parking tickets for parking on a yellow line before the line was painted.
35. A one off – parking attendants issued a second parking ticket to a motorist who gave them the "v" sign as he drove away after he was given an initial correct ticket. The council cancelled both the first and second parking ticket!
36. Suspending and hooding parking meters or pay and displays bays over the weekend, particularly on Sundays. Motorists think it is in order to park in the bays as there is no work or other activity going on – they park and get parking tickets.
37. Where a street forms the boundary of two local authorities (particularly where they have different parking rules) parking attendants issue parking tickets in the wrong area.
38. Back office staff giving incorrect information including sometimes telling motorists to pay the fine and then appeal – once you pay the fine you cannot legally appeal.
39. 'Seeing' yellow lines in parking bays when none exist and issuing parking tickets.
40. Removing out of order signs allowing motorists to park free.
41. Providing false evidence to the parking adjudicator.
42. Putting suspension notices for residents’ parking bays on the other side of the road!
43. Some parking attendants invent 'conversations' with motorists to add 'substance' to illegally issued parking tickets.
44. Stalled vehicles given parking tickets!
45. Signs are fixed too high for motorists to read or even know that they exist!
46. Giving parking tickets to mourners at a funeral.
47. Giving parking tickets where signs obscured by hanging baskets.
48. Issuing parking tickets in another boroughs area. Yes it sounds impossible but it has happened.
49. Claiming a vehicle has returned to the same parking bay when it has not. This was caught on CCTV. The parking adjudicator gave costs against the council of more than £1,000.
50. Ticketing cars where a sign says you can legally park, and then removing the sign when challenged!
51. Dead man in car park given parking ticket.
52. Parking attendants photograph cars but miss photographing disabled badges!
53. Parking bays suspended during the night after motorists have parked - motorist then finds a parking ticket for parking in a suspended bay!
54. Parking scratchcards ignored - parking attendants claim that the cards are not scratched out correctly.
55. Council paints yellow line in residents parking bay - and issues parking ticket!
56. Parking attendants put empty parking ticket envelope on vehicle, photograpg it and pretend parking ticket is in it.
57. Councils and Transport for London register "Orders for Recovery" with the Traffic Enforcement Centre ("TEC") but do not send them out until much later. TEC work from this date and send back timely statutory declarations as being out of time.
58. Councils avoid submitting Traffic Managent Order to the Parking Adjudicator when they know the orders are invalid!
59. RSPCA officers get parking tickets whilst rescuing sick animals.
60. A council has been found moving the resident's bay from under a car. The council deleted the resident's bay lines and drew them elsewhere!!
61. Whilst parking attendants wait, council workers fit new suspended bay signs where cars are parked, parking attendants slap parking tickets on the cars and the cars get towed away!
62. Council submit photo "evidence" of parking signs showing parking restricting in a street but the but the photos are of signs in a different street!!
63. Watch Out for the next one - It will be published soon!!
Some scams are so ingenious that I have decided not to publish them less they become more widespread
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New parking ticket scams will be listed as soon as we hear about them, so check back for the latest.
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