Private Parking Fine Appeal Letter

This is a letter that can be used to appeal any private parking fine, imposed by a private parking operator or management company for alleged parking infringements on private land.

Public parking fines, issued by a parking authority such as a local council, are a different matter, and different laws apply. If the person preparing this letter is dealing with a public parking fine, please use our other template, which is called "Public Parking Fine Appeal Letter".

There are numerous grounds which can be used to challenge a private fine. This letter can be easily adapted to include a number of typical grounds of appeal. Additional grounds of appeal may also be added manually.

It is important to note that in many cases, private operators do not have the authority to obtain a person's personal records such as their name and address from motor vehicle registry records. Therefore, if the sender includes these details in this letter, this may make it easier for the operator to find the sender. Before sending this letter to the operator, the sender should consider whether they should provide their personal details such as name and address, or whether they need legal advice. If necessary, it is possible to leave the name or address out of this letter.

So if you or somebody you know has received a private parking fine, our document can be used to provide a quick and simple way to challenge private parking companies as to whether they are entitled to payment of any fines they are trying to impose.

How to use this document

Once the document has been completed, simply post it to the private parking company that issued the relevant fine, and wait for them to respond.

Applicable Law

While private car park operators might issue "infringement notices" or impose other charges, they actually do not generally have the legal authority to issue parking fines.

Therefore private car park operators often argue that the charges they impose are for breach of contract by the car park user. The contract to which they are referring in these cases, is the contract between the user of the car park and the operator of the carpark, and the contract governs the use of the car park. Therefore, ordinary principles of contract law would apply, as provided by the common law. In particular, if the penalty that the car park operator is seeking to impose exceeds the reasonable loss that the operator suffered as a result of the breach of contract, then the operator may struggle to enforce the penalty.

In order to pursue the matter, the operator would need to commence legal proceedings. If that occurs, then legislation in relation to the legal proceedings would also apply, such as legislation in relation to the relevant court or tribunal, as well as rules of evidence in the relevant state or territory.

How to modify the template

You fill out a form. The document is created before your eyes as you respond to the questions.

At the end, you receive it in Word and PDF formats. You can modify it and reuse it.