Deliberately Misleading Car Park Signs designed to catch you out?

Bletchleyite · 31 May 2026

It's not to catch you out, but the signage at Oxenholme is very confusing, not at all clear if it's pay on arrival or on exit, and it refers to tickets which aren't used there any more. Gave up and parked in the private car park opposite. Hopefully it's correctly recorded me as leaving within 20 minutes.

Also it says you can pay on avantiparking.co.uk but that doesn't work...I guess some people will get caught by that if they aren't near the station later and rely on it!

Edit: no ticket so I guess it was OK, but Avanti really should do better than this and have signage that is 100% clear on how it works, particularly if you park before they have unlocked the station on a Sunday as this is quite late in the day.

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MarkSt · 7 Jul 2026

I've just messaged you John via your website about this matter. Quite a number have fallen victim to this particular scam at this car park. Interested to know where this ended up. I've issued Jubilee Pool with a letter before action to recover my POPLA time and costs if JP fail to withdraw the parking charge notice.

MotCO · 7 Jul 2026

John Luxton said:
. The cameras capture your entry and exit and cross reference this against fees paid,

So the cameras record your arrival and departure time, and can work out how much you should pay, but don't link this to the ticket machine! And they expect you to manually remember when you parked your car. It just seems like it's designed to catch you out.

Also, with regards to the ticket times being an hour out, is this due to GMT v BST, and the clock not being properly adjusted?

Bikeman78 · 7 Jul 2026

MotCO said:
So the cameras record your arrival and departure time, and can work out how much you should pay, but don't link this to the ticket machine! And they expect you to manually remember when you parked your car. It just seems like it's designed to catch you out.

Also, with regards to the ticket times being an hour out, is this due to GMT v BST, and the clock not being properly adjusted?

That is 100% what happened to me at the Snowdon mountain railway car park. The clock started ticking the second I drove past the camera but the expiry time printed on the ticket was calculated from the time I put the money in the machine. I departed just before the printed time but Parking Eye chased me for years claiming I had overstayed. I'd have happily gone all the way to court.

John Luxton · 8 Jul 2026

Just for the record as I explained to Mark by email yesterday after my Parking Eye appeal was rejected I just decided to pay up the £60.00. Not happy about it - but I had other things to do and had invested a lot of time writing the appeal, writing to Jubilee Pool and discussing the matter on several forums.

Despite feeling very angry I thought "Do I want the aggro and do I want to invest more time?" I reckon these cowboys rely on people thinking that rather than sticking to their principals.

Interesting to read of Bikeman78s experience at the SMR and the fact that Parking Eye were operating in the same manner there.

I am very disappointed at Jubilee Pool I have been contacted by a couple of other people on Facebook who have had similar problems there. Given that they are a local trust having taken over the pool from the Council some years ago one would think they might be less inclined to annoy people by engaging a heavy handed car park management company. As for Parking Eye and any other operator should there not me a requirement for them to use the appropriate equipment for the charging method being employed?

In this case a machine which calculates your time from when it photographs you entering to when one goes to pay? - I have used car parks which operate in this manner without any issue.

With regard to the comment about GMT/BST - the ticket I did purchase has a purchase time of 16:53 which is accurate that was the time I purchased it. The machine screen showed departure time as 17:53 it clearly stated Departure Time but that was not printed on the ticket.

johncrossley · 8 Jul 2026

Boycott these private parking companies!

Bletchleyite · 8 Jul 2026

johncrossley said:
Boycott these private parking companies!

The best way to boycott them is to park correctly and cautiously (i.e. assume any term will be interpreted in favour of them, not you). Then they get none of your money.

If all of us did that for just a few months they'd all go out of business. They aren't the same set of companies as those taking money for legitimate parking.

StoneRoad · 8 Jul 2026

When Sainsbury took over the local shop [many changes of ownership in past 20 years] they thought that it included control of the car park outside.
Sainsbury then had a private parking company try and rip everybody off.
Only one problem, it is the village's own carpark and S had no rights over it.
It got to the point some people were boycotting the shop, still parking there and walking into main street.
It took some time, but they eventually backed off and the car park went back to free & no cameras.

Bletchleyite · 8 Jul 2026

Sainsburys have form for that - they did similar for a car park in Milton Keynes where they had an agreement for wider public use but had "customers only" signage up and very restricted usage hours. I reported it to the Council who intervened.

johncrossley · 8 Jul 2026

Bletchleyite said:
The best way to boycott them is to park correctly and cautiously (i.e. assume any term will be interpreted in favour of them, not you). Then they get none of your money.

If all of us did that for just a few months they'd all go out of business. They aren't the same set of companies as those taking money for legitimate parking.

There's often no need to park at those locations. Park at a council site, use street parking, park somewhere else and walk or don't park at all (go somewhere else/go by bus/go by bike). I can't remember the last time I used a chargeable private car park.

Tetchytyke · 8 Jul 2026

Bletchleyite said:
The best way to boycott them is to park correctly and cautiously (i.e. assume any term will be interpreted in favour of them, not you). Then they get none of your money.

You say that, but I had issues with Parking Eye many many years ago when I was legally parked in my car parking space which was legally attached to my own flat. Even my flat's management company couldn't get them to see sense. Computer says no.

There comes a point when the amount of time and money needed to fight them is more than the amount they are asking for. And they know this.

The only good thing is that at least they're (generally) not allowed to clamp people anymore. Occasionally you get a car park where they are allowed to clamp people and if you think dealing with a PCN is bad, look at what they do there. Have a look in a search engine about how the private parking contractor which enforces the car parks for the Nottingham NET tram system treats people.

AFAIK Parking Eye are owned by Macquarie, best known for what they did to Thames Water and 'affectionately' known as the Vampire Kangaroo. So you can't even appeal to their better morals because the people running the show are genuine actual bona fide psychopaths.

John Luxton · 8 Jul 2026

Bletchleyite said:
The best way to boycott them is to park correctly and cautiously (i.e. assume any term will be interpreted in favour of them, not you). Then they get none of your money.

If all of us did that for just a few months they'd all go out of business. They aren't the same set of companies as those taking money for legitimate parking.

Up to my incident in April I would have 100% had the same view as you follow the rules. I have been driving 44 years and have never had an issue with any private or public car park. In my early days of driving I did get one Liverpool Council issued ticket as I overstayed my welcome at an old style parking meter but that was my fault. Private car parks have never been an issue.

If I had not been such a fastitious reader of notices I would have not read the prominent "Pay on Exit" notice put my money in the machine as it appeared to be a normal pay and display machine of the same type used in the Penzance council harbour car park.

If I had done that on arrival and bought two hours of parking as that is around how long I intended to stay I would have probably been okay. But when you put your money in and there is no way of ajusting the purchase time from this issuing time and departure time - I bought at 16:53 and departure was shown as 17:53 what was I to do to tell the machine I had arrived at around 14:23? I knew at that point I was probably going to get a penalty and it wasn't a surprise a few days later when it popped through the letter box.

The point is the sign Pay on Exit should read Pay and Display.

I later found out that the way I could have got around this was when it showed 17:53 I should have added an hour to take it to 18:53 - but that wasn't apparent at the time and just seemed counter intuitive as I was leaving at 16:53.

== Doublepost prevention - post automatically merged: 8 Jul 2026 ==

Tetchytyke said:
AFAIK Parking Eye are owned by Macquarie, best known for what they did to Thames Water and 'affectionately' known as the Vampire Kangaroo. So you can't even appeal to their better morals because the people running the show are genuine actual bona fide psychopaths.

Search engines suggest Macquarie but that appears to be out of date. Searching around companies house and looking at the the persons with significant control takes your through 9 nested holding companies - I won't list them its tedious but they have names such as Peggy Midco Ltd, Dorchester Peggy Bidco Ltd and one finally ends up with a Mr Singh Johal and Mr Ian Wilson at the head of the pile. In 2018 it had been acquired by Capita but has obviously been sold on again.

Bikeman78 · 8 Jul 2026

John Luxton said:
Just for the record as I explained to Mark by email yesterday after my Parking Eye appeal was rejected I just decided to pay up the £60.00. Not happy about it - but I had other things to do and had invested a lot of time writing the appeal, writing to Jubilee Pool and discussing the matter on several forums.

Despite feeling very angry I thought "Do I want the aggro and do I want to invest more time?" I reckon these cowboys rely on people thinking that rather than sticking to their principals.

You are less stubborn than me. I'd have let them take me to court. The sign shown in your original post is misleading. Given that pay on exit car parks are quite common, it's almost as if the sign has been put there deliberately to mislead people.

Tetchytyke · 8 Jul 2026

John Luxton said:
Search engines suggest Macquarie but that appears to be out of date.

Thanks, I didn't look too hard so took the Google answer. Looks like it may be owned by a hedge fund called MML Capital, so I will stick with my assessment of them as psychopaths.

Kite159 · 10 Jul 2026

Bletchleyite said:
The best way to boycott them is to park correctly and cautiously (i.e. assume any term will be interpreted in favour of them, not you). Then they get none of your money.

If all of us did that for just a few months they'd all go out of business. They aren't the same set of companies as those taking money for legitimate parking.

Until their revenue stream drops and all of a sudden terminals used to input number plates have ''communication errors" and those legitimate users end up with fake parking tickets. Only with the parasite dropping the charges as a 'on this occasion we will drop it but you must ensure you enter your number plate correctly' lies

John Luxton · 22 Jul 2026

Bit of an update on the Jubilee Pool car park - I see someone has complained to Cornwall Live which has run a feature on it which has been shared around a bit of social media hopefully the owners may now be shamed into sorting it out.

"

Anger and confusion at 'pay and display' AND 'pay on exit' at Jubilee Pool car park

One peeved user who got fined claimed it's a 'scam' with the conflicting messaging between signage and the machine"

Anger and confusion at 'pay and display' AND 'pay on exit' car park

One peeved user who got fined claimed it's a 'scam' with the conflicting messaging between signage and the machine

www.cornwalllive.com

Tetchytyke · 22 Jul 2026

John Luxton said:
Bit of an update on the Jubilee Pool car park - I see someone has complained to Cornwall Live which has run a feature on it which has been shared around a bit of social media hopefully the owners may now be shamed into sorting it out.

I hope so.

I still genuinely can't believe that 'pay on exit' doesn't mean pay when you exit. It does everywhere else. I'd have interpreted it just as so many others have.

Even with ParkingEye's ongoing aversion to behaving to a basic business ethical standard, that's bad.

Bletchleyite · 22 Jul 2026

Tetchytyke said:
I still genuinely can't believe that 'pay on exit' doesn't mean pay when you exit.

It does.

Isn't the issue that they have bodged the system, so what you have to do is remember when you arrived and use what looks like a P&D machine to pay the correct amount from when you arrived?

Tetchytyke · 22 Jul 2026

Bletchleyite said:
Isn't the issue that they have bodged the system, so what you have to do is remember when you arrived and use what looks like a P&D machine to pay the correct amount from when you arrived?

No, the issue is you have to pay on arrival just as you would in a classic pay and display car park.

The 'pay on exit' actually seems to mean 'pay before you exit [on foot, to go and do whatever touristy stuff you're going to do]'.

The Cornwall Live article explains it (it's actually literate, which is amazing for CornwallLive, although they do fall into the trap of calling a private parking invoice a Penalty Charge Notice):

He said: "Having parked up we came to enjoy Jubilee Pool and eventually returned to the car park to, as instructed, pay for the full duration of our stay at the payment machine before exiting the car park.

"On keying our registration number it became clear the machine is not a 'pay-on-exit' machine but is instead a 'pay-and-display' or 'pay-on-entry' machine, or was simply faulty, completely conflicting with the entry sign."

Pay-on-exit car parks record your entry time via number plate cameras. You pay at the machine before you leave, when it tells you how much you owe according to how long you stayed. Pay-and-display machines require you to pay when you arrive for the amount of time you expect to stay, then display the ticket you receive in your window.

But Mr Roe added: "It was certainly not possible to 'pay for the full duration of our stay' as the terms and conditions required, because the necessary machinery was not in place to allow that.

"Having entered the car registration number at the machine at 1.48pm, the time of day shown was the time we were actually at the machine, 1.48pm, and it was telling us we needed to pay for just one hour (£2.50), which we knew to be completely wrong."

The non-practising solicitor added: "The machine would, however, not accept entering our arrival time - whatever that was: we didn't know that at that point and didn't need to record that for a pay-on-exit car park - the machine would only allow use of the plus or minus buttons to add or deduct time to the time current at the machine of 1.48pm.

"That is not how a pay-on-exit machine works. That is a pay-and-display or pay-on-entry machine."

Mr Roe said he had to come up with an estimated time for how long the couple had stayed at the pool, for which they paid, but as their issued ticket showed a "purchase time" that bore no relation to their entry time, the Roes were issued with a Penalty Charge Notice (PCN) for £60 by Parkingeye.

I thought the same as you originally, but it doesn't seem to be the case.

Bletchleyite · 22 Jul 2026

I'm not sure I agree with your reading of the article. As an aside, the correct term for this sort of car park is "pay on arrival", where you have to pay when you arrive but not display a ticket in your car.

My reading is that you needed to ignore the start time and add time on the machine to pay the correct sum based on when you arrived.

Either way there is no way this penalty should stand as the signage is clearly deficient.

bramling · 22 Jul 2026

Bikeman78 said:
That is 100% what happened to me at the Snowdon mountain railway car park. The clock started ticking the second I drove past the camera but the expiry time printed on the ticket was calculated from the time I put the money in the machine. I departed just before the printed time but Parking Eye chased me for years claiming I had overstayed. I'd have happily gone all the way to court.

The two car parks around the Snowdon Mountain Railway are absolutely notorious. It’s always worth using one of the council car parks a few minutes down the road, which are also cheaper. Llanberis never gives a great impression as gateway to one of Wales’s premier attractions, which is a shame.

John Luxton · 7 Aug 2026

An update on this issue - the misleading signs have now made the Cornwall Live news web site:

"Anger and confusion at 'pay and display' AND 'pay on exit' at Jubilee Pool car park

One peeved user who got fined claimed it's a 'scam' with the conflicting messaging between signage and the machine"

Anger and confusion at 'pay and display' AND 'pay on exit' car park

One peeved user who got fined claimed it's a 'scam' with the conflicting messaging between signage and the machine

www.cornwalllive.com

thejuggler · 7 Aug 2026

Its the 'guess how long you have stayed' type of payment machine. Designed to scam the unsuspecting.

John Luxton · 7 Aug 2026

thejuggler said:
Its the 'guess how long you have stayed' type of payment machine. Designed to scam the unsuspecting.

No it's not it is a standard Pay and Display machine which behaves like a pay and display machine.

MotCO · 7 Aug 2026

John Luxton said:
No it's not it is a standard Pay and Display machine which behaves like a pay and display machine.

..... but misleadingly described as Pay On Exit, as in Pay On Exit When Leaving The Car Park On Foot, rather than the usual expectation of Pay On Exit When Leaving By Car.

John Luxton · 20 Aug 2026

A further update on this car park which has a again appeared on the Cornwall Live web site today

"Jubilee Pool threatened with court action over 'pay and display' AND 'pay on exit' signs
'People are now openly calling this car park and its signage a 'scam',' one victim has told the charity owner. 'Defrauding the public via unreasonable PCNs ought not to be on their to-do list.'"

Court threat fury at car park's 'pay and display' AND 'pay on exit' signs

'People are now openly calling this car park and its signage a 'scam',' one victim has told the charity owner. 'Defrauding the public via unreasonable PCNs ought not to be on their to-do list.'

www.cornwalllive.com

Someone else I was in contact with who took his appeal to POPLA had his appeal rejected.

Kite159 · 20 Aug 2026

John Luxton said:
Someone else I was in contact with who took his appeal to POPLA had his appeal rejecte

No surprise there, POPLA is funded by the parking parasitic industry and isn't fit for purpose. Slightly better than the 'independent' appeals body used by the non BPA lot (

thejuggler · 20 Aug 2026

John Luxton said:
A further update on this car park which has a again appeared on the Cornwall Live web site today

Court threat fury at car park's 'pay and display' AND 'pay on exit' signs

'People are now openly calling this car park and its signage a 'scam',' one victim has told the charity owner. 'Defrauding the public via unreasonable PCNs ought not to be on their to-do list.'

www.cornwalllive.com

Someone else I was in contact with who took his appeal to POPLA had his appeal rejected.

No surprise. Unless you know the law around private parking and can point out to POPLA exactly how the ticket doesn't meet the requirements of the law you will lose. You then play brinkmanship.

A loss at POPLA makes no difference as you can carry on refusing to pay. Wait for Court papers and defend properly.

styles · 21 Aug 2026

thejuggler said:
A loss at POPLA makes no difference as you can carry on refusing to pay. Wait for Court papers and defend properly.

This is all well and good advice in principle, but if we're being honest, the vast majority of people would rather pay £60 for an unfair parking fine than take a day off work (often more than £60 cost) to attend court which most people avoid like the plague. It's intimidating and if you're self-representing, you have a fool for a client, especially up against experienced lawyers for the other party. It's way easier, and usually cheaper, to just pay the charge, rightly or wrongly.

I am petty enough to take things to court even if it's just a few quid for a pizza not delivered properly, but most people will just stump up £60, like @John Luxton, to move on with their life and not have to deal with the nonsense any more.

jfollows · 21 Aug 2026

Whilst true, you forget that the parking companies attending court have to pay for someone to attend, at a court local to the defendant, and this will cost them far more than they would ever extract for a simple one-off unpaid parking invoice pursued under contract law. The “experienced lawyers for the other party” don’t usually turn up because the case is usually dropped before the court fee has to be paid. But it’s all about intimidation, threats, liberal use of red ink and especially mentioning “CCJ” which the majority of people do not understand, so they pay the £60 rather than fight it.

I understand why people give in and pay up.

Deliberately Misleading Car Park Signs designed to catch you out?

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Anger and confusion at 'pay and display' AND 'pay on exit' at Jubilee Pool car park​

One peeved user who got fined claimed it's a 'scam' with the conflicting messaging between signage and the machine"​

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"Anger and confusion at 'pay and display' AND 'pay on exit' at Jubilee Pool car park​

One peeved user who got fined claimed it's a 'scam' with the conflicting messaging between signage and the machine"​

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"Jubilee Pool threatened with court action over 'pay and display' AND 'pay on exit' signs​

'People are now openly calling this car park and its signage a 'scam',' one victim has told the charity owner. 'Defrauding the public via unreasonable PCNs ought not to be on their to-do list.'"​

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Anger and confusion at 'pay and display' AND 'pay on exit' at Jubilee Pool car park

One peeved user who got fined claimed it's a 'scam' with the conflicting messaging between signage and the machine"

"Anger and confusion at 'pay and display' AND 'pay on exit' at Jubilee Pool car park

One peeved user who got fined claimed it's a 'scam' with the conflicting messaging between signage and the machine"

"Jubilee Pool threatened with court action over 'pay and display' AND 'pay on exit' signs

'People are now openly calling this car park and its signage a 'scam',' one victim has told the charity owner. 'Defrauding the public via unreasonable PCNs ought not to be on their to-do list.'"