Cille Mhernaig

What Invergowrie Arab said. The tickets have always been enforceable and you are entering a whole different area if you were to provide false name to the company. In England and Wales the Clause 8 of PoFA 2012 puts responsibility for the ticket with the registered keeper if the driver cannot be identified. In Scotland the PoFA is not part of Scottish law, so whilst they can identify the registered keeper, as long as the driver is not identified then the onus is on the company to identify the driver and enforce the ticket. There is no obligation for the registered keeper in Scotland to identify the driver which is why they spam the registered keeper with the letters, hoping they'll either get fed up and confess or grass in the driver. It's not worth the effort going to court/identifying the driver when the RK is ignoring them for a ticket with a £100 charge, however if you start churning up tickets worth £1000's then they will take it to court as it is now financially worth the effort. The other thing is that as soon as the driver is identified then as the ticket is enforceable you need to pay up or contact the parking company to appeal. All successful court case stories so far in Scotland ALL have the same element in that the driver has been identified, the parking companies just hope that by highlighting the fact they have successfully taken a driver to court over £1000's unpaid fines will scare RK's with outstanding tickets in Scotland into fessing up or passing on the drivers identity. The true game changer will be when they successfully take a RK to court and win where the identity of the driver has not been confirmed. Till then if it's one or two tickets with the company not aware of the drivers identity, you can continue to ignore.

The reason they are 'unenforceable' for want of a better phrase in Scotland is due to the contract being between the driver and Private Parking Company. Whilst the company can use the DVLA to identify the registered keeper, there is no requirement on the registered keeper to identify the driver, the onus is with the PPC to identify the driver who the contract is with. In England & Wales the Protection of Freedoms Act 2012 Schedule 4 Paragraph 4 introduces keeper liability, which is where the driver has not been identified they can claim the unpaid parking charges from the registered keeper. PoFa is not applicable in Scotland so that is where the 'unenforceable' opinion comes in as if they cannot identify the driver then they are onto plums as they cannot force the registered keeper to identify the driver or pursue the registered keeper for costs. The moment you confirm the name of the driver to the PPC in Scotland, you are liable for the ticket and the law is on the side of the PPC where they can eventually take you to court. When these stories make the news there are always 2 things - 1) they have confirmed the identity of the driver and 2) they always seem to have racked up thousands in charges making it worth their while to go to court. Although it was interesting the one last year they knew the identity of the driver, and he owed about £5K yet they settled out of court for £2k. The unwritten rule about the ignore advice is don't be a tool and continue to park there, 1 parking charge for £100 where they don't know the driver, just the registered keeper in Scotland is a bigger baw ache for them to take to court, with the odds stacked against them. Numerous parking charges where you rack up 4 figures worth makes it worth their while pursuing in the hope you fold and pay before it gets to court. Again if it is just the registered keeper they know then not good odds of the court finding in their favour. Even though they would probably claim that any registered keeper receiving numerous charges and threats of court action they are not responsible for are the driver responsible if they don't identify the driver at the time. The reason that this is still not good odds in court is it is an assumption, there is no proof the RK is the driver. As long as the driver is not identified then it is fine to keep ignoring for now. The day the front page headline is 'Parking Company successfully take registered keeper to court and win over £100 charge.' is the day that the games a bogey for ignoring them.

The bit I've bolded is interesting as when the 18:07 Neilston service was just 3 carriages, you understandably wouldn't see the conductor till normally Muirend where they would put in an appearance once enough people had disembarked and train was no longer overcrowded. Guess though there is still enough money for them to take a quick walk through even if the train is halfway through the service at the risk of them being found out they had opened the doors late.

The 18:06 to Neilston train used to be dangerously overcrowded, however they have recently turned it into a 6 carriage train so not anywhere near as bad as it was. I'd love to see the maximum capacity figures for that service before they added the extra 3 carriages. Might be worth sending a tweet every few days to Scotrail if the service is full as it may make them pay more attention to these figures and get coupe of extra carriages added to the service. Hopefully not at the expense of the extra carriages on the 18:06 Neilston service mind you. Out of interest on mainly 'commuter' trains are you expected to sell a lot of tickets? I would have thought that people travelling same services 5 days a week would be buying in advance to save some cash, so wouldn't have expected ticket sales (or lack of) to be used as an indicator of a overcrowded service?

As I said on the Things you want to share with Pie and Bovril thread - This, she's admitted she was the driver so they know for sure who the contract was with, she's broken a parking contract 245 times (based on the assumption it is £100 a notice), they have even appeared to have been in discussions about this with the offer of a parking permit being declined. She's made it too easy for them to go to court and get the win. Now her stupidity will mean they can probably cite this case on their notices and con more people into paying up when it can be safely ignored if it's a one off charge and the only information they have is when the charge occurred and who the registered keeper of the vehicle is.

This, she's admitted she was the driver so they know for sure who the contract was with, she's broken a parking contract 245 times (based on the assumption it is £100 a notice), they have even appeared to have been in discussions about this with the offer of a parking permit being declined. She's made it too easy for them to go to court and get the win. Now her stupidity will mean they can probably cite this case on their notices and con more people into paying up when it can be safely ignored if it's a one off charge and the only information they have is when the charge occurred and who the registered keeper of the vehicle is.

If I'd ventured west end I'd no doubt see some hipster p***k sporting such a look.

Yeah could tell straight away she was gonna hit me with peak charge as she is the type that was properly inspecting tickets, i.e. looking at them, taking them off people and scoring with a pen to show they've been used when 90% were going to be swallowed up by the barrier at central. I know that technically she was correct, it was just the computer says no attitude when I explained why I didn't buy at the station. That coupled with the fact her genuine suggestion was to stay in the queue at the station, miss the train and wait 30 minutes for the next one if I wanted a cheap day return that day that got my back up. If I boarded at a station where the trains were more frequent then I'd have no complaints as I made the choice to chance it rather than wait, but outlying stations where it is a 2 train an hour service, I don't think so. Fingers crossed though Flexipass solves my issues and I can wander to the station at whatever time I like going forward with my only concern being if there are any metros left at the station.

The trend for holes ripped in knees of jeans reached a new low today when out at lunch and I saw a guy walking about Glasgow with jobby catcher joggy's with holes ripped in the knees. Also on way back to the office saw a guy in formal trousers that were too short, formal shoes and no socks. Stay classy Glasgow.

I will check at the station what the cost is and more importantly if it is available on that line as I had already asked at the ticket office who had said there was nothing I could do except buy on the day. Hopefully it is available as that looks like exactly what I am after. Thanks very much.

Question for the Scotrail employees. I work from home 2-3 times a week and the days in the office, I travel at off peak times. The days at home and in the office can vary week to week. I usually just buy my ticket at the station which 9/10 times is no problem. However on the odd occasion that the station is busier than normal or I'm running late for whatever reason I would just buy on he train. However the last time this happened the old sour faced boot charged me peak travel citing conditions of travel and stating that I should have waited in the queue to buy my off peak ticket. Given that trains are every 30 minutes from my station, waiting in the queue if the ticket office is busy to buy my ticket and missing the train is a no no. Additionally season tickets are not value for money and the smart cards seem to need you to specify which days tickets will be used on which isn't of much use as I can end up having to work from home last minute some days which again is not value for money. I've tried to look at the holocaust that is the scotrail ticketing website to no avail. So my question is given my particular situation is there any form of ticket I can buy in advance or on the occasions that life gets in the way and I am unable to buy a ticket before the train departs the station am I at the mercy of the conditions of travel, and old sour faces lack of common sense when implementing said conditions?

I've seen that, one of the reasons I left was the poor salary, and a few that left not long after me cited the same reason. That was just over 5 years ago. Good to see they haven't learned, even some of the more senior role that I noticed on their careers page a while back the salaries are crazily poor for what they expect you to have experience of and do on daily basis.

This has a lot to answer for with regards to unrealistic expectations IMO. My first job I started with a small company on £16,500 at aged 22 and got few decent wage rises but then didn't start increasing salary properly til i moved jobs & learned new skills to be worthy of the new role and increased salary. However, I recently worked for a Global company with a grad scheme where the grads starting salary was £25,000. Once their 2 year scheme is over if they don't get kept on then they are looking for jobs with minimum salary £25,000. Out of the roughly 25 grads that worked in the same area as I did, there were only 5/6 that were decent at what they did and out that 5/6 there were only 3 that I would say were worth the £25,000 salary. That was in just the area I worked in around 22 grads getting paid £25,000 a year at 22/23 years old and expecting that as a minimum going forward, but realistically most weren't skilled enough at that age to be worth that salary, never mind the 8/9 of those grads that were absolute waste of space and had no hope of being kept on once the scheme ended. Of course though as poor as they were they have the large company on the c.v. and have had the £25,000 salary so there is no chance they will be looking at jobs relevant to their skills set as the salary will be too low for them.

Err thanks I think...?

Hopefully not ruined your quiz, but when I was at uni there was a Rangers shop in Paisley High Street.