Parking Problems

Local councils are discovering that a wonderful source of revenue is to restrict parking and loading as much as possible thereby increasing the number of parking tickets they can issue. In some places, such as Wellesley Road in Croydon, cameras are used to record vehicle information and then the ticket is sent on afterwards. You don’t even realise you’ve got a ticket until several days later which seems grossly unfair.

All of this, of course, means that we couriers are encountering more and more problems when trying to deliver. The problem is especially great in London of course and with the advent of red routes. Indeed there are some places that are pretty much impossible to deliver to without getting a ticket. The only way round this, that we can see, is to have a telephone number for the delivery point and for someone to come out and meet the driver in order to take delivery of the goods, or at least to watch the van while the driver is unloading. We understand that our clients are loathe to pay a parking ticket fine obtained while delivering their goods so we always let them know as soon as we are having problems, before the driver leaves the van unattended and risks a ticket. Where possible the driver will park legally even if it’s a little way from the delivery point, but of course this may mean that the delivery takes much longer and therefore waiting time will be incurred – however this is always much cheaper than a parking ticket.