Terms and Conditions

AppealPilot is operated by Benjamin Bowker, a sole trader trading as "AppealPilot" ("we", "us", "our"), based in the United Kingdom. We provide a paid administrative service that prepares and submits private parking charge appeals on behalf of customers in the UK.

We are not a law firm, we are not solicitors, and we do not provide legal advice or legal representation. Nothing we write or submit constitutes legal advice. If your matter involves court proceedings or you need legal advice, you should consult a solicitor or contact Citizens Advice.

Contact: support@appealpilot.co.uk · Phone: 07534 973480

By purchasing, you instruct us to:

• review the documents and details you submit;
• draft a parking charge appeal using the strongest grounds reasonably available on the information provided;
• submit the appeal to the parking operator on your behalf;
• if the operator rejects that appeal, tell you whether POPLA is available on your charge and, where it is and you ask us to, prepare and submit the POPLA appeal at no additional cost;
• keep you updated by email at each material stage.

POPLA is the last stage we act at. Escalating is your decision, not ours: if you do not ask us to take it further, our work ends at the operator's decision.

The service does not include:

• council-issued Penalty Charge Notices, police fines, or fixed penalty notices (these follow a different statutory process);
• appeals to the Independent Appeals Service (IAS), or to any independent scheme other than POPLA. Where your operator belongs to the International Parking Community rather than the British Parking Association, our work ends at the operator's decision. The escalation remains free and remains open to you, and we will tell you what we would have argued;
• anything after a POPLA decision, including further review, complaints to a trade body, or any subsequent claim;
• representation in court proceedings, defending county court claims, or correspondence with solicitors or bailiffs;
• negotiating with debt collection agencies;
• telephone support (we work by email; see section 12).

We will perform the service with reasonable care and skill, as required by the Consumer Rights Act 2015. We do not and cannot guarantee any particular outcome.

We offer two routes, selected by you at checkout:

• Covered operators and locations - the operators, locations, and charge types listed in the intake form at the time of purchase (for example APCOA, listed airport drop-off zones, railway and station car parks, and late-notice cases). This route carries the money-back guarantee in section 6.
• "Any PCN" best effort - any other UK private parking operator. We will prepare and submit an appeal using the strongest available grounds, but this route is not covered by the money-back guarantee and the fee is non-refundable once we have begun work, whatever the outcome (your statutory rights in section 8 are unaffected).

To use the service you must:

• be at least 18 years old;
• be the registered keeper of the vehicle, or have the registered keeper's authority to act on their behalf;
• hold a private parking charge notice issued in the United Kingdom.

You agree to:

• provide accurate, complete, and truthful information and documents, including the full parking charge notice and any Notice to Keeper or reminder letters you have received;
• respond to our requests for further information or documents within 5 days;
• tell us promptly about anything relevant that happens during the case - including new letters, debt collection contact, court papers, or any contact you make with the operator yourself;
• keep your email address current and check it (and spam) regularly.

One fee covers one parking charge notice. Each additional notice requires a separate purchase.

The fee is shown at checkout (currently £10 per notice) and is paid in advance through Stripe. We do not see or store your card details. The price includes any applicable taxes.

For covered operators and locations (section 3), we will refund the fee in full if:

• your case is out of scope - we review your submission and decide we cannot take it (we will tell you why and suggest a next step); or
• your appeal is unsuccessful - the route you chose concludes without the parking charge being cancelled. If you asked us to take the case to POPLA, that route concludes at the POPLA decision. If you did not, it concludes at the operator's rejection, and we refund then.

The guarantee does not apply where:

• the charge was cancelled at any stage. An appeal the operator rejects but POPLA then upholds has succeeded, and the fee stands;
• you chose the "Any PCN" best-effort route (non-refundable);
• information or documents you provided were false, materially incomplete, or misleading;
• you did not provide requested information or documents within 5 days, and the delay affected the case;
• the appeal deadline had already passed when you purchased, you had already named the driver, admitted liability, or paid the charge, or the matter was already with a debt collector or in court;
• you contacted the operator yourself during the case, withdrew the appeal, or paid the charge before the process concluded, in a way that undermined the appeal.
• you take a refund and then use the appeal we drafted, as described in section 7.

Refunds are made to the original payment method, normally within 10 business days of our decision. This guarantee is a contractual promise in addition to - and does not limit - your statutory rights.

The appeals we draft are written from scratch for your case. They are our original work, and the copyright in them stays with us. You are not buying the document; you are buying the service of having it written and submitted for you.

What you get is a licence to use it, and the licence is straightforward:

• You may use it for your own parking charge - at the operator stage, at POPLA, or afterwards - for as long as you have paid for it. It is your case and we want you to win it.
• Taking a refund ends that licence. If we refund the fee, you have not paid for the work, so you may not then submit the appeal we drafted, or a copy or a lightly reworded version of it, as your own.

This applies particularly where we have drafted a POPLA appeal and sent it to you. If you read it and decide you would rather not go to POPLA, that is entirely your choice and you can ask us to stop. But you cannot both keep the fee back and keep the work: choose the refund and the draft goes with it, or keep the draft and the fee stands. Tell us before we draft the POPLA appeal if you are unsure, and we will hold off.

Nothing here stops you making your own appeal in your own words, using anything you have learned about your case, or using the free guides and tools on this website. We claim no ownership of the facts of your case, of the law, or of any argument you write yourself.

You have a statutory right to cancel this contract within 14 days of purchase. Because parking appeals are time-sensitive, by purchasing you expressly request that we begin work immediately, within the cancellation period.

• If you cancel before we have submitted your appeal, we will refund the fee in full (we may deduct a proportionate amount for work already done only where we have told you work has begun).
• Once the appeal has been submitted, the service has been performed, and you acknowledge that you lose the statutory right to cancel - the money-back guarantee in section 6 continues to apply to covered routes.

To cancel, email support@appealpilot.co.uk from the address you signed up with.

By ticking the authorisation box at checkout you appoint us as your agent for the purpose of preparing, submitting, and corresponding about the appeal, including using your name and address and our service email address in correspondence with the parking operator and any independent appeals service. We record this authorisation with a timestamp and IP address.

You may withdraw this authority at any time by email. Withdrawal after the appeal has been submitted does not entitle you to a refund except under section 6 or your statutory rights.

The parking charge is a matter between you and the parking operator. Appealing does not pause your obligations unless the operator says so:

• discounted ("early payment") periods may lapse during an appeal - some operators freeze the discount while an appeal is considered, others do not. If the appeal is unsuccessful, the full charge may become payable;
• statutory and operator deadlines remain your responsibility; we will work promptly but rely on you submitting in good time;
• if an operator escalates to debt collection or court, that is outside the scope of this service (section 2).

Our drafting and submissions rely entirely on the information you provide. We are not responsible for outcomes caused by inaccurate, incomplete, or late information, or by events you did not tell us about.

We communicate by email only, from our service addresses. We will not phone you unless agreed in writing. Operator correspondence may be routed through our service email so we can manage the appeal thread on your behalf.

The telephone number published on this site is for contacting us about this agreement, a complaint, or your data protection rights. It is not a support line for case updates, and your case is not progressed by phone - please email support@appealpilot.co.uk.

How we handle your personal data - including what we collect, who we share it with, and how long we keep it - is explained in our Privacy and Data Handling policy, which forms part of these terms.

Nothing in these terms excludes or limits our liability for death or personal injury caused by our negligence, for fraud or fraudulent misrepresentation, or for anything else that cannot be excluded or limited by law, and nothing affects your statutory rights as a consumer.

Subject to that:

• our total liability arising out of or in connection with the service is limited to the fee you paid for the relevant notice;
• we are not liable for the decisions of parking operators or appeals services, for the underlying parking charge or any increase in it, for debt collection or court action by an operator, or for losses that were not foreseeable when you purchased;
• we are not liable for delays or failures caused by events outside our reasonable control.

If you are unhappy with the service, email support@appealpilot.co.uk with "Complaint" in the subject line. We aim to acknowledge complaints within 2 business days and resolve them within 14 days.

We may update these terms from time to time. The version in force when you purchase is the version that applies to your case. The current version is always available on this page.

If any part of these terms is found unenforceable, the rest remains in force. These terms are between you and us only; no one else may enforce them under the Contracts (Rights of Third Parties) Act 1999. We may transfer our rights and obligations to a successor of the business; your rights under these terms will not be reduced if we do.

These terms are governed by the law of England and Wales, and disputes may be brought in the courts of England and Wales. If you live in Scotland or Northern Ireland, you also have the protection of the law of, and may bring proceedings in, your home country.

Benjamin Bowker, trading as AppealPilot

Email: support@appealpilot.co.uk

Phone: 07534 973480