Chesham: Gordon Road resident refuses to pay parking fines

Daniel Patrick, 36, from Chesham, has been “hammered” with parking tickets.

The fines started landing on his windscreen after PCM started handling parking on behalf of Paradigm Housing at the block of houses on Gordon Road around four years ago.

He now has 13 tickets he refuses to pay while one of his neighbours has six tickets with a pending court action, Daniel said.

“They are ripping us off.

Gordon Road where PCM has managed parking for four years (Image: Google Street View)

"They’ve given me a parking ticket even though my vehicle was registered with them to have a permit. They have the technology to check who’s registered but doesn’t have the permit but they choose not to use it,” he claimed.

Parking company PCM was given the contract to curb parking by non-residents going to Chesham station, he said. 

Daniel explained: “It was made sound very attractive, and it was for the residents, so we all agreed.

“We all agreed, because we were all having a nightmare parking. They issued two permits per flat because it was in our tenancy saying we get two spaces.

“But since then it seems it’s the residents getting hammered with tickets.”

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He said PCM was renewing permits “again and again” at a cost of around £20 per permit. So far this year the permits have been reissued twice, he claimed.

“There are clearly in it for the money, and when you try to appeal it, it gets flat out rejected. I prefer to get a ticket from the local council because at least then there’s a proper appeal process!

“They are cashing in on the residents,” Daniel said.

Visitor parking is not allowed during the week and on the weekends it costs £10, he claimed.

Daniel has two permits – one for his custom car he has built himself and another one for his work van – and his wife’s car has a disabled permit given by the council to transport his autistic son to school in Aylesbury.

However, PCM has now told Daniel each resident can only have two permits despite agreement with the council, telling him he needs to sell one of his cars.

Freshly painted parking bay lines and an order to park inside them mean his work van is “three inches bigger”, landing him with more fines.

“I have had enough, this is unethical. We are paying to live here and we should be allowed to park here.

“I’ve got such anxiety from this, and I dread to think of people who aren’t working and can’t afford it,” he said. 

Paradigm Housing said in a statement: "We introduced parking controls in Gordon Road in 2016 after a full consultation with residents who had been complaining about too many non-residents parking in the area. Each household has two permits for vehicles registered to their address and they won’t receive fines if they are displaying a valid permit.

"Although we would love to give people more permits and understand the issues with parking in the area, unfortunately there just isn’t the space to give more than two permits to each house.

"We don’t make any money from the permits or the fines. If people feel they have been fined unfairly they do need to appeal to PCM who issued the ticket. We will continue to work with residents to help in any way we can." 

PCM was contacted for a comment.