I went on a weekend trip to London from my home in Birmingham in July. I took the the train from Birmingham International on Saturday morning and returned on Monday afternoon, leaving my car at the NCP car park at the station.
Unfortunately I misplaced the car park ticket while I was away, only realising when I returned to my car.
I assumed there would be ANPR cameras to prove how long my car had been there, and thought I might be charged the £12.50 maximum daily fee for the three days. That would have been fine.
But when I got to the exit barrier, I was told I needed to pay a ‘lost ticket fee’ of £100 per day – £300 in total – before I was allowed to exit the car park.
No exit: H.J was told she couldn’t leave the car park unless she paid a £300 ‘lost ticket fee’
I asked if there were cameras showing me entering, but was told there weren’t. I also showed the attendant my timed train tickets.
I paid the £300 so I could leave but I think it is excessive. All I did was lose my ticket.
I queried it with NCP afterwards, but it said the charge is set by Avanti West Coast which runs the train station and there’s nothing it can do. H.J, Birmingham
Helen Crane, This is Money’s consumer champion, replies: That is a stonking fee for a lost car park ticket, and must have delivered a sucker punch to your already battered wallet after a weekend sightseeing in London.
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With £300 you could have paid for eight adults to visit Buckingham Palace, took seven spins on the London Eye or bought a round of pints for 44 people in a typical London pub.
It even pales in comparison to the average penalty charge notice which is about £60. While you accept your error in losing the ticket and were happy to pay a fee, you regard the amount as exorbitant.
It is also not clear what you were being penalised for. The purpose of buying a ticket in a car park is to prevent people overstaying their allotted time.
And yet, NCP didn’t think you had overstayed. The parking attendant must have believed you had only been there for three days (well, two and a bit) because he charged you the already exorbitant £100 lost ticket fee three times – once per day.
Does that mean you paid £300 just for the cost of a piece of paper?
I got in touch with NCP and Avanti to ask how they justified such a punitive fee.
As it turned out, they did not – as NCP admitted you had been overcharged.
Instead of paying £100 per day, you should have paid a single £100 lost ticket fee for the whole stay.
That is a shocking error from the parking attendant – and if you hadn’t asked me to investigate, one that might never have been uncovered.
An NCP customer service representative recently told you via email that they ‘did not not have the option to override this price’.
A spokeswoman said: ‘When the customer contacted the NCP contact centre an error was made in charging the lost ticket fee on a per day basis as opposed to a single lost ticket fee for the stay. This is not the correct procedure.’
NCP and Avanti have refunded you the entire £300 charge for the lost ticket.
The spokeswoman continued: ‘We would like to thank her for highlighting this issue to us. We sincerely apologise for the overcharge and the inconvenience that this customer experienced.’
NCP also told me it has now briefed its staff on the rules when a customer loses their ticket.
Not in the bag: H.J lost track of her car park ticket while on a weekend away – but feels the £300 fee NCP and Avanti charged for her mistake was too harsh (stock image)
When I asked whether the £100 lost ticket fee applied to all Avanti train station car parks, the NCP spokeswoman told me this was specific to Birmingham International and intended to avoid non-train station users abusing the car park facilities.
‘Avanti has a standard lost ticket fee policy of £100 at Birmingham International to protect the facility for rail passenger usage,’ she said.
Birmingham International train station serves Birmingham Airport, so if the penalty was lower I can see how holidaymakers might try to dodge long-stay parking charges by using the station car park and accepting the (cheaper) fine.
But you were able to show train tickets, so I think they should have made an exception.
An Avanti West Coast spokesperson added: ‘We’re really sorry to hear of [H.J’s] experience and have worked with NCP, who manage our station car parks, to arrange a full refund after she was overcharged by them.
‘We’ve also contacted [H.J] directly to apologise and have waived the lost ticket fee as a gesture of goodwill.’
A legitimate error was made in your case, but plenty of motorists remain angry about unjust charges levied on them by private parking companies.
There have long been calls for the Government to put the brakes on these firms, which issue 35,000 parking charges per day.
It proposed a Private Parking Code of Practice which would have capped penalty charges and debt recovery fees, but this was shelved in 2022.
This is Money continues to campaign on the issue – if you have been affected please get in contact on editor@thisismoney.co.uk.
Has Fidelity lost my £2,000?
In mid-July I opened a Fidelity stocks and shares Isa. As part of the process I transferred in £2,000 from my current account.
It said it would take up to five working days for the account to be opened, but it got to the fifth day and it still hadn’t been.
I called Fidelity and was told my account was not appearing on Fidelity’s system, so the person couldn’t help. I asked if I should call back in a few days, but the person said they didn’t know as they had no information to provide me with.
They said the delay may have been because of the global IT system outage, even though Fidelity’s website said it wasn’t affected. Has my £2,000 disappeared? R.S
Transfer trouble: R.S put money into new Fidelity investing Isa but then it seemed to disappear
Helen Crane replies: The widespread IT problems experienced in July were caused by a software update by tech company CrowdStrike and caused issues for customers of airlines, banks and more.
This happened the day before you applied to open your account, so when it wasn’t open on the fifth working day after you applied, you began to get worried – and speaking to Fidelity on the phone did little to allay your fears.
You provided all the relevant documents and identification, and were provided with a customer number, so did not understand what the hold-up was.
Fidelity did not seem to have any record of the £2,000 that you transferred, so you contacted me to see if I could help. Had your money become lost in the internet ether?
Thankfully the investment platform was able to confirm that it had not. Instead, the verification process to open the new account had taken longer than you expected.
A day after I contacted Fidelity, the money was safely in your account.
A spokeswoman said: ‘We have spoken to our client services team who have been in touch with [R.S] and can confirm that this process is now complete. The customer’s account is open, and the funds have been allocated.
‘The delay was not related to the recent global IT outage but was due to essential verification processes for new account openings. This was a miscommunication by a member of client services, and we apologise for confusion it may have caused.’
It added that account wasn’t visible to the person on the phone because he had a temporary issue with his access at the time of the call.
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