Disabled woman considers legal action over parking charge in Didcot

Sally Cherrill, 57 from Didcot has wound up with an unfair parking charge after a day of shopping at the Orchard Centre.

Ms Cherrill originally tried to find a disabled parking space in a car park at the Orchard Centre Complex off Broadway in Didcot town centre.

However, after waiting for more than 50 minutes for one of four disabled parking bays to become available she decided to try elsewhere.

Ms Cherrill then drove to a nearby car park and found a disabled parking space and went shopping.

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Later Ms Cherrill received a parking charge for returning to the car park within the hour.

Confused, she decided to call the owners of the car park to question the charge as she did not understand how this could be possible.

She received a letter containing two photographs from SR Security LTD, the company which owns the car park.

The first picture showed her on August 19 at 12.45 in one car park located off Broadway and the second photo is at 12.46 in another car park close by.

It was then revealed that the two separate car parks are owned by the same company, and therefore Ms Cherrill in their eyes returned to the same car park within the hour despite it being at a different location in the town.

Now Ms Cherrill is disputing the parking charge as the signage does not explain that customers cannot leave one car park and then use another.

Ms Cherrill said: “It does not say on the signage that you can’t move out of one and into the other, that is our concern.

“All it says is no return within one hour, which is fair enough, for that car park, but it does not say that you can’t go into any of their other car parks.”

She added: “As a customer I did not think that they might own the other, it doesn’t enter your head.”

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Distressed and angry at the parking charge and lack of information on the car park’s signs, Ms Cherrill decided to appeal.

However, after speaking with the customer services she feels her argument ‘fell on deaf ears’ and she was not listened to.

The company argued that she did return within the hour and their camera footage showed her going in and out.

However, Ms Cherrill argued that the footage does not show her waiting around the corner for a disabled parking space to come available for almost an hour.

The owners of the car parks, SR Security LTD responded to Ms Cherrill’s appeal and said: “Thank you for your appeal but having carefully considered the evidence provided we have decided to reject the appeal.”

After disputing the parking charge and calling customer services Ms Cherrill said: “They don’t want to listen; they just want the money.”

Ms Cherrill explained that she is on benefits and will struggle to pay the parking charge and she is looking to take legal action.

She said: “I will pursue this and take legal action, go to Citizens Advice and take action from there.”

Car Park owners SR Security LTD have been contacted but did not respond at the time of publication.