Bridlington car parks: Data outage caused fines error, says firm

One of Tom Blears' penalty charge notices

The boss of a parking company has said a "data outage" resulted in motorists being given penalties in error.

A number of people received penalty charge notices (PCNs) after using an app to pay at a Bridlington pay and display car park.

Karl Russell, director of operator Local Car Park Management, said it was contacting those affected "with a view to cancelling the charges".

He confirmed the issuing of PCNs had been temporarily suspended.

Tom Blears, an IT worker from Hull, said he was sent two PCNs for "failure to pay for the duration of the stay" on 7 and 10 August.

He said: "Both the entry and exit times on the letter were one hour later than the correct time."

Mr Blears was adamant, on both occasions, he paid the correct amount using the tap2park mobile phone app.

He said: "I left the car park well before my allotted time and assumed all was well. The fines were £100 each, but I knew I had not done anything wrong."

Mr Blears thought software may have been set to Greenwich Mean Time (GMT) and not British Summer Time (BST), which applies from 26 March to 29 October.

He said: "I work in IT and my first thought was that they've not switched the time zones over."

Other drivers gave similar accounts.

Danielle Edmond said she had also received two penalties in the past week.

She said: "The timings on the letter they have sent don't even match the times, including on the photo they've attached."

'Intermittent outage'

Mr Russell, from the London-based parking management company, said: "The cameras are not an hour out. However, a data outage of payment details has caused a batch of PCNs to be issued before we were made aware of the outage.

"Our processing partners are currently working through and contacting all of those appellants with a view to cancelling the charges.

"Our supplier of the payment service is still investigating as it has been confirmed as an intermittent outage.

"For obvious reasons, until all investigations have been exhausted and issues rectified, no more charge notices are being issued."