On Tue, 16 Jan 2007 21:12:00 +0000, The Medway Handyman wrote:

Hi All

Recently had a PCN issued by the local fascist parking dept, in the course
of my handyman endeavours.

Three 5 page letters & a formal complaint to the CEO later, they haven't
caved in and are insisting on the £30.

I sympathise. After several PCNs and a lot of faffing around buying
scratch'n'sniff 1-day tickets I bit the bullet and bought a
£100+lot-of-bureaucracy tradesma^H^Hperson's parking permit. So when I
got PCNed with my permit displayed I got somewhat ****ed off! Letters to
the parking dept were as much use as ****ing into the wind, but you have a
right to appeal to an independent adjudicator which I did, and I elected
to have the hearing in person (since I was fed up with writing letters).
In my case the parking dept sent 2 of their more senior droids to the
hearing which caused more effort from the sort of people who were
responsible for the dept's overzealousness than the minions further down
the food chain who'd have had to count my pennies if I'd done what you're
proposing. I still lost mind you, and had to pay the regular whack rather
than the half-price-special-offer :-(

And even if I'd won I'd still have been paying for the dept's staff's time
through my council tax, but it was the principle ...


But if you do do the coin trick do make sure to throw in a few
similar-looking foreign coins so they have to fish them out ;-)