A mum has blasted the “ridiculous” £170 airport parking fine she received after a ‘five-minute drop-off’ led to the threat of court.
Josie Eccles had travelled to the airport with her husband, 33, to catch a flight to Malta with her mum and three-year-old son.
The 32-year-old claims her husband pulled into the Terminal Two drop-off zone at around 2pm, unloaded their luggage and said goodbye before heading off.
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But the couple later realised they had forgotten to pay the airport’s £5 drop-off charge within the required 24-hour period.
Josie says they accepted they would have to pay a penalty and even tried checking the airport’s payment portal for the charge – but no fine appeared.
“My husband was there for under five minutes,” Josie, a marketing consultant from Cheshire, told What’s The Jam.
“A couple of days later, I was still in Malta and was speaking to my husband on the phone and asked if he had remembered to pay the charge.
“I was frustrated that both of us had forgotten to pay within the allocated window, but aware that these things happen and just accepted we would probably have a penalty to pay.
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“My husband then checked the payment portal on the website where you usually pay the charge and entered the vehicle details, expecting to see a penalty fine, but nothing was there.
“I tried again a few days later, and still no charge appeared, so we thought we’d just wait and see if we got a letter in the post.”
But it wasn’t until almost two months later that Josie says she opened a letter from a debt collection firm.
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The letter claimed she had ignored previous correspondence and said the charge had risen to £170.
Josie was given the option of paying the £170 in full or £42.50 over four months, while the letter warned the amount could increase further and potentially lead to court action.
She says she was stunned because she had never received the original parking charge notice.
Josie said: “I was very confused, as it had been two months since the airport drop-off and I had received no correspondence at all so to receive a letter from a debt recovery company seemed rather extreme.
“At this point, I thought it must be a misunderstanding, and I would be able to resolve the issue by speaking with them.”
Josie claims she immediately tried to appeal the charge through Manchester Airport’s car parking operator, APCOA.
But she says she received an automated response telling her that she had missed the appeal window and that the matter had already been passed to debt collectors.
She then called the debt recovery firm to explain what had happened.
According to Josie, they told her that Manchester Airport had evidence that a letter had been sent to her on June 5.
But when she asked whether it had been sent by tracked or recorded delivery, she was allegedly told it hadn’t.
Josie says this left her in an impossible position because the original letter contained the information she needed to pay the penalty.
She said: “Not at any point did I try to get out of paying anything.
“I just wanted the opportunity to pay the initial fine, which would have been £60 if paid within 14 days.
“The only way I would know how to pay the penalty fine was by reading the instructions sent in the letter, so without the letter I had no chance of ever paying the charge before it was handed over to debt recovery.
“He said my options were to either pay the fine in full, which is £170, or I could seek independent legal advice and email in a dispute that they would look into it.”
In the meantime, Josie says she received two further letters threatening potential court action and warning that the amount could rise to up to £235.
Josie claims she contacted the debt firm again and says a member of staff confirmed that her emails had been received but told her the company would not investigate disputes.
She says she was told her choices were to pay £170 or go to court, where the charge could potentially rise.
She alleges she was then told that Manchester Airport would be responsible for taking any court action.
Josie said: “I completed an online enquiry for Manchester Airport explaining I wanted to pay the £60 fine, detailed my communication with the debt company and reattached the dispute I had submitted to them with all the legal grounds.
“Within 10 seconds of submitting, I had received an AI response stating this had been handed over to debt recovery and I should liaise directly with them.
“I then forwarded that response along with my online enquiry submission to the complaints department, saying that was not an adequate response and I would like somebody to review the case so I can resolve this and pay the £60 fine.
“I have still not had any response or acknowledgement.”
Josie insists that she accepts responsibility for forgetting to pay the original £5 charge on 30 May but she believes the escalation is unfair because she claims she was never given the opportunity to respond to the original penalty.
She said: “I’m extremely frustrated.
“I hold my hands up; we forgot to pay the standard £5 charge within the next 24 hours, so a fine was expected, but to increase it to up to £235 was ridiculous.
“If I had been ignoring communication, it would maybe be justified, but I have responded to every bit of communication I have received, which surely shows I would have responded had I received the initial letter.
“I can afford to pay the fine; it’s not about financial difficulty.
“It’s about the principle of the system being set up to catch you out and the lack of reason they have.
“If the letter is so important, surely it would be sent tracked?
“Or at least they would try a few attempts before sending it over to debt collectors.”
She believes airports should introduce a free grace period for motorists who are only at the terminal for a few minutes.
Josie added: “I’ve used Manchester Airport many times both before and after this encounter and always paid the drop-off charge on time.
“They’ll have a record of this on their system, which validates the fact I did not intentionally avoid paying.
“Sometimes people forget and these things happen.
“Other passengers could easily make the same mistake.
“It’s very easy to forget.
“There’s no option to pay at a machine or barrier while you’re there, so they are relying on people remembering to pay later on, which, whether you’re the person travelling through the airport or the person doing the drop-off, it’s easy to get distracted.
“I’m sure that’s why they removed the barriers, as they knew it would catch people out.
“The cars are logged using ANPR on their registration plates, so surely you should be able to pay on the same payment system even if outside the 24-hour window, with an additional penalty charge added.
“I think it’s ridiculous airports charge you for drop-off and pick-up.
“I think under 10 minutes should be free, but unfortunately all airports in the UK at least charge these days.”
An APCOA spokesperson said today (3 September): “We have been in contact with the customer and offered the original charge of £60.
“The customer has since made payment of the £60, and the matter is now resolved.”
Manchester Airport has been contacted for comment.
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