Clamped!

Anan1 · 13-09-2012 12:31PM

niallo24 wrote: »

I had legitimate passes to park there, still do, one had just expired and they clamped me. Now if I pay the declamp fee and then sent in proof that I had valid passes for the spot do you think I would get my money back? No chance.

Why would you? The idea is that you display a valid pass - you didn't.

niallo24 wrote: »

I was tongue in cheek about drawing on my car

It still gives a good insight into your mindset and attitude towards the people who live in that development.

niallo24 wrote: »

but no way I am paying the declamp fee. The clampers themselves are not reasonable once they get their money so I feel no guilt whatsoever about the course of action I have taken.

You're not punishing the clampers, you're punishing the residents for your mistake. That's petty and vindictive.

nxbyveromdwjpg · 13-09-2012 02:39PM

Anan1 wrote: »

You're not punishing the clampers, you're punishing the residents for your mistake. That's petty and vindictive.

The clampers have the knowledge that the person is not going to pay their extortion fee and they continue to leave the €100 car there clamped, in my view at that point it's become the clampers who are punishing the residents. They will not let the owner move it.

This is not Ryanair where they provide a valuable service for very cheap unless you f*ck up and don't stick to the rules - this is almost purely a money making racket that does not have the best interests of the residents or visitors in mind at all.

Anan1 wrote: »

The management company employed the clampers for the good of the residents

I find that VERY hard to believe.

Only a fool would think the management company do not have a stake in what goes on with the extortionate fee's charged by the clampers in their own complex, be it for use in relation to management company fee's or whatever.

One thing is for sure €90 per day for running an hour over in a visitors space is not doing the residents any good whatsoever.

Anan1 · 13-09-2012 02:47PM

nm wrote: »

The clampers have the knowledge that the person is not going to pay their extortion fee and they continue to leave the €100 car there clamped, in my view at that point it's become the clampers who are punishing the residents. They will not let the owner move it.

What part of 'the car was clamped because the owner failed to display a valid permit' are you not getting? Your 'view' is directly contradicted by the facts, and no amount of hyperbole is going to change this.

nm wrote: »

I find that VERY hard to believe.

Only a fool would think the management company do not have a stake in what goes on with the extortionate fee's charged by the clampers in their own complex, be it for use in relation to management company fee's or whatever.

This is paranoid nonsense. The MC employ clampers to prevent people from abusing their private parking. The clampers make money out of clamping, the MC don't.

Dr Turk Turkelton · 13-09-2012 03:02PM

@Anan1.

I find most of your posts to be extremely good and informative especially in the motors section but I can't believe the lengths you go to,to defend clamping.

How is a €90 fine and at least an hours wait to be released a suitable punishment for overstaying in a parking space for an hour?

As the op doesn't need his car he is doing the right thing by waiting the gangsters out.
In any normal circumstance where he needs his car cutting the clamp to pieces would be an acceptable solution.

Shows how much the MC think of the residents when they would allow a visitor space to be tied up for so long in order to allow an outside company to extort €90.

Please Anan1 stop letting yourself down by posting in these clamping threads and defending the indefensible.

username123 · 13-09-2012 03:19PM

Anan1 wrote: »

This is paranoid nonsense. The MC employ clampers to prevent people from abusing their private parking. The clampers make money out of clamping, the MC don't.

You think so?

It was raised at the last AGM for my management company that we engage clampers on the development to 'make money for the sinking fund'.

Naturally the vast majority of people present were disgusted at such a notion. The person who suggested it was a dim chavvy type who probably would have sold her granny for a few bob.

You are very very naive if you think that MCs employ clampers to prevent people abusing their private parking. Some maybe, but not all.

Grolschevik · 13-09-2012 03:28PM

username123 wrote: »

You think so?

It was raised at the last AGM for my management company that we engage clampers on the development to 'make money for the sinking fund'.

Naturally the vast majority of people present were disgusted at such a notion. The person who suggested it was a dim chavvy type who probably would have sold her granny for a few bob.

You are very very naive if you think that MCs employ clampers to prevent people abusing their private parking. Some maybe, but not all.

So
a) a "dim chavvy type who probably would have sold her granny for a few bob" suggested it at your AGM,

b) the notion got shot down because "naturally the vast majority of people present were disgusted" (and probably because they recognised that the dim chavvy type didn't really understand the realities of contracting such a service) and

c) this is somehow evidence supporting this statement?: "You are very very naive if you think that MCs employ clampers to prevent people abusing their private parking".

To my eyes, your example shows the opposite of the point you wanted to make.

username123 · 13-09-2012 03:50PM

Grolschevik wrote: »

To my eyes, your example shows the opposite of the point you wanted to make.

Well your lack of understanding isnt really my problem!

Read it again if you dont get it, its fairly clear. I might add that dim chavvy had herself come up with the plan because her 'mates MC was making money off it'.

Grolschevik · 13-09-2012 04:08PM

username123 wrote: »

Well your lack of understanding isnt really my problem!

Well, your lack of clarity might be.

username123 wrote: »

Read it again if you dont get it, its fairly clear. I might add that dim chavvy had herself come up with the plan because her 'mates MC was making money off it'.

It was suggested. It was rejected. How does this support the generalised contention that MCs are likely to seek to use clamping as a revenue stream?

Is the dim chavvy a director?

alias no.9 · 13-09-2012 04:09PM

username123 wrote: »

Well your lack of understanding isnt really my problem!

Read it again if you dont get it, its fairly clear. I might add that dim chavvy had herself come up with the plan because her 'mates MC was making money off it'.

Properly run Management Companies do not make any money out of de-clamping. They generally pay a retainer to the Clamping Company and direct their activities, that's right, they pay the clampers to clamp.
It would take a very fly by night management company to depend on declamping fees for a sinking fund. However, there are more and more instances where parking is provided under a lease agreement with the owner, that parking facilities are being rescinded where owners have not paid their management fees per the lease agreement. Clamping is used to enforce this exclusion from parking. It has proven very effective in getting the owners to make some arrangement to begin to catch up with the outstanding management fees, which will address the sinking fund.

username123 · 13-09-2012 04:19PM

Grolschevik wrote: »

It was suggested. It was rejected. How does this support the generalised contention that MCs are likely to seek to use clamping as a revenue stream?

What generalised contention? I didnt say they were likely to, I said it would be naive to think that MCs employ clampers to prevent people abusing their private parking. Some maybe, but not all.

Grolschevik wrote: »

Is the dim chavvy a director?

Thankfully no, but Ive no doubt there are MCs out there with like minded individuals who are.

username123 · 13-09-2012 04:22PM

alias no.9 wrote: »

They generally pay a retainer to the Clamping Company and direct their activities, that's right, they pay the clampers to clamp.

According to the suggestion made, the idea was that the clampers get some of the declamping fee, and the MC gets the rest, so money is made by the MC.

Anan1 · 13-09-2012 04:34PM

username123 wrote: »

You think so?

It was raised at the last AGM for my management company that we engage clampers on the development to 'make money for the sinking fund'.

Naturally the vast majority of people present were disgusted at such a notion. The person who suggested it was a dim chavvy type who probably would have sold her granny for a few bob.

You are very very naive if you think that MCs employ clampers to prevent people abusing their private parking. Some maybe, but not all.

I've genuinely never heard of this. If it's true then i'm happy to admit that I was wrong. Is there any chance you could post a link to some kind of confirmation?

@Cuchulainn.1 - I've explained my views and the reasoning behind them ad nauseum. I don't think there's anything more I can do to answer your question.

username123 · 13-09-2012 04:41PM

Anan1 wrote: »

I've genuinely never heard of this. If it's true then i'm happy to admit that I was wrong. Is there any chance you could post a link to some kind of confirmation?

Im sorry, it was a verbal meeting. I dont have any links.

I will ask our management agents when I have a chance because the girl I deal with did actually agree that it can be used to make money and that they use it in other developments (she did not state that they use it in other developments to raise revenue, simply agreed that it can be done) but that it also raises a lot of problems like the development becoming a police state, some people finding the entire notion of clamping unethical, or people without the money to pay the declamping fee (or refusing to do so) blocking up a parking space - as well as the issues raised already in this thread to do with genuine mistakes being made (on both sides) causing bad feeling etc...

Its not the first time Ive heard of it though - although I agree that ancedotal evidence is not always reliable! But it is not beyond the realms of possibility that it does go on.

alias no.9 · 13-09-2012 04:51PM

username123 wrote: »

alias no.9 wrote: »

They generally pay a retainer to the Clamping Company and direct their activities, that's right, they pay the clampers to clamp.

According to the suggestion made, the idea was that the clampers get some of the declamping fee, and the MC gets the rest, so money is made by the MC.

Even at €10 a clamp of a cut, if you could even get that from the clampers, that's 150 clamps a year or 3 a week minimum to match a single €1500 service charge payment. Which do you think is easier to pursue? Decamping revenues will diminish over time as people just park elsewhere whereas the biggest difficulty in getting service charge payments is finding the bloody owner in the first place. Once you've flushed them out once, it's easy to find them again.

username123 · 13-09-2012 04:57PM

alias no.9 wrote: »

Even at €10 a clamp of a cut, if you could even get that from the clampers, that's 150 clamps a year or 3 a week minimum to match a single €1500 service charge payment. Which do you think is easier to pursue? Decamping revenues will diminish over time as people just park elsewhere whereas the biggest difficulty in getting service charge payments is finding the bloody owner in the first place. Once you've flushed them out once, it's easy to find them again.

Im simply reporting a suggestion made (and rejected). Although the numbers being bandied about were a lot more than a tenner cut (and our service charges are a lot lower than 1500).

The individual making the suggestion had reason to believe we are in for a massive abuse of parking shortly (due to something else being built nearby) that would mean a possible revenue stream of daily multiple cars to be clamped.

Grolschevik · 13-09-2012 05:06PM

I'd say it's the case that each management company can impose conditions on the company it hires.

In our place, for example, the regime is relatively lenient, with warning stickers being applied for first offences, rather than a clamp-at-first-sight approach. And this is NCPS.

[Disclaimer: I don't really know; I only rent, this has just been introduced, and it's pure guesswork based on what I've seen]

Dr.Winston O'Boogie · 13-09-2012 06:31PM

Anan1 wrote: »

Why would you? The idea is that you display a valid pass - you didn't.

It still gives a good insight into your mindset and attitude towards the people who live in that development.

You're not punishing the clampers, you're punishing the residents for your mistake. That's petty and vindictive.

Lighten up about the penis drawing would ya.

I am not punishing the residents, they have their own parking and cannot use the visitors spots themselves. This is a visitors parking spot, I was a visitor, my pass on display expired and very quickly they clamped me.

THIS I understand.

Now say I go pay the declamp fee, and prove that I have about 50 valid visitor permits, and that I hadn't outstayed my welcome, and that my girlfriend lives there and I was visiting, and that I wasn't using the spot and then farting about town all day, and that I had just missed the expiration of the one in my window, which are all genuine reasons, will I get the money back? No.

The 90 euro is to declamp the car. If I don't pay that my car can stay there essentially for at the very least a considerable amount of time. That's the rule imposed by NCPS, I understand this, they understand this, and I am adhering to that rule by not moving my car until such time I decide my car is essential, if ever. If I was a*sed, I could put about 30 visitors passes in the window tonight that will cover me at least until the end of the month, clamp or no clamp.

Not really sure what the problem is. Good few visitors parking spots anyway, never seen them all full up.

By the by I rang them last night and told them I won't be paying for a while, they seemed fairly lax about this and said the fee is 90 euro whenever I can pay it. I said I will think about it. They seem very unconcerned about the residents also.

username123 · 13-09-2012 07:09PM

Colonel Sanders wrote: »

Re the legality (or otherwise) of clamping isn't there a poster here who's going to the highest court he can to challenge private clamping?

Considering its already been outlawed in Scotland, with England and Wales to follow on 1st October 2012, hopefully there is a fair chance that a proper legal challenge here could have the same result.

Our man in Havana · 13-09-2012 07:11PM

username123 wrote: »

Considering its already been outlawed in Scotland, with England and Wales to follow on 1st October 2012, hopefully there is a fair chance that a proper legal challenge here could have the same result.

What would the extortionists do then?

username123 · 13-09-2012 07:14PM

Our man in Havana wrote: »

What would the extortionists do then?

Actually I believe in Scotland the clamping companies became towing companies and charged higher release fees!!

Im not sure how that panned out in the end.

Our man in Havana · 13-09-2012 07:37PM

The Court of Session stopped towing in Scotland.

Marcusm · 13-09-2012 07:43PM

Our man in Havana wrote: »

What would the extortionists do then?

Private clamping is very uncommon in England and has been replaced by ANPR cameras and fines sent in the post by retail companies (eg McDoalds/Tesco and people acting on their behalf - usual suspects NCPS, APCOA etc). If the fines aren't paid, a magistate's court liability order or a county court judgement is obtained PDQ followed by a bailiff visit. That's a little more acceptable than a clamp, perhaps. For residential developments, a company called Flashpark operates a low cost system where photos are sent to it of purported overstayers, no permit etc and they simply issue the claim and handle it from there.

Neither system is perfect. From discussing it with some Irish lawyers, they're not convinced that the fines system can easily be implemented in Ireland and the ideas of court sanctioned bailiffs being a regular part of society might be a step too far.

Marcusm · 13-09-2012 07:45PM

username123 wrote: »

Considering its already been outlawed in Scotland, with England and Wales to follow on 1st October 2012, hopefully there is a fair chance that a proper legal challenge here could have the same result.

It's the subject of a review here which could choose to permit it with regulation!

Our man in Havana · 13-09-2012 08:03PM

Marcusm wrote: »

Private clamping is very uncommon in England and has been replaced by ANPR cameras and fines sent in the post by retail companies (eg McDoalds/Tesco and people acting on their behalf - usual suspects NCPS, APCOA etc). If the fines aren't paid, a magistate's court liability order or a county court judgement is obtained PDQ followed by a bailiff visit. That's a little more acceptable than a clamp, perhaps. For residential developments, a company called Flashpark operates a low cost system where photos are sent to it of purported overstayers, no permit etc and they simply issue the claim and handle it from there.

Neither system is perfect. From discussing it with some Irish lawyers, they're not convinced that the fines system can easily be implemented in Ireland and the ideas of court sanctioned bailiffs being a regular part of society might be a step too far.

The opposite in England and Wales is true. Hence the government moving to outlaw clampers and towing.

http://forums.pepipoo.com/index.php?showtopic=46975

Marcusm · 13-09-2012 08:21PM

Our man in Havana wrote: »

The opposite in England and Wales is true. Hence the government moving to outlaw clampers and towing.

http://forums.pepipoo.com/index.php?showtopic=46975

I can see how you might infer widespread clamping from posts like that but the fact is that residential and private and clamping in England (Wales now as its own upgraded parliament so will shortly take ver it's own powers for environment/"/localism" issues) is nowhere near as prevalent as it is in Ireland where clamping is almost de rigeur in apartment blocks, spreading to large rural towns for car parks and some semi suburban housing estates. Further changes to the law just reflect pressure groups - it's a bit like the leylandii stuff which took up lots of time but should never have been a parliament issue)

There have been campaigns in the UK and lots of anti cowboy shows (Watchdog etc) but it doesn't have the impact I've seen in Ireand (I live in apartment blocks both in central London and the Gasworks in Dublin). It's true that the penalty notices ay have dubious validity (although sometimes it's hard to tell - motorway services, shopping centres with bus services can be included in quasi governmental ones) but the fact is any people simply pay up and others don't defend legal claims which then become enforceable. The fact that they hae access to the car reg details is key.

I don't agree with clamping except perhaps for no tax (which is one of the reserved issues) although I've suffered from that one recently as a van was clamped on my very narrow street (on red lines, even). Ifthere's no effective remedy for land owners or parking space users, what will happen?

Anan1 · 14-09-2012 09:19AM

Marcusm wrote: »

I don't agree with clamping except perhaps for no tax (which is one of the reserved issues) although I've suffered from that one recently as a van was clamped on my very narrow street (on red lines, even). Ifthere's no effective remedy for land owners or parking space users, what will happen?

We all know what will happen - the landowners who can afford to physically protect their spaces will do so, and the ones who can't will have no redress against squatters. This is why we desperately need properly regulated clamping with a fully independent appeals process.

antodeco · 14-09-2012 09:41AM

The funny thing is, if the de-clamp fee was €50, I would say there would be a significant drop in people getting annoyed over clamping. It doesn’t seem to be the act of clamping, but more so the cost of clamping

Anan1 · 14-09-2012 09:44AM

antodeco wrote: »

The funny thing is, if the de-clamp fee was €50, I would say there would be a significant drop in people getting annoyed over clamping. It doesn’t seem to be the act of clamping, but more so the cost of clamping

I've yet to see a poster here able to admit that they were legitimately clamped, even when they themselves tell us why. I don't think the problem is with the money, I think it's a sense of entitlement to do whatever they want on someone else's property.

The Dagda · 14-09-2012 09:52AM

Anan1 wrote: »

I've yet to see a poster here able to admit that they were legitimately clamped, even when they themselves tell us why. I don't think the problem is with the money, I think it's a sense of entitlement to do whatever they want on someone else's property.

Or maybe, you know, people simply don't like their own property being kidnapped, and held for ransom?

Stark · 14-09-2012 09:54AM

Anan1 wrote: »

I've yet to see a poster here able to admit that they were legitimately clamped, even when they themselves tell us why. I don't think the problem is with the money, I think it's a sense of entitlement to do whatever they want on someone else's property.

The problem is the pettiness such property owners (or is it long term leasers, hard to keep up, changes so often to suit the argument) respond with when someone (often legitimately there to purchase goods, visit friends, park in their "long term leased" space whatever) makes a minor slip up.

Clamped!

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