An unemployed single mother of two is being forced to pay £100 in fines for parking despite owning a permit.
Leominster resident Keira Thorpe, 22, was shocked to find she had been fined for parking last month.
Ms Thorpe pays £400 a year to be able to park in the Broad Street car park.
She parked her car there as usual on September 2 and on her return, two days later, she found two yellow penalty charge notice envelopes stuck to her windscreen.
“My heart sank as I opened my door and noticed the green pass was no longer on my dashboard,” she said.
“I thought ‘no bother, I’ll just appeal these as I have this pass therefore I should not need to pay more money to the council for parking in a car park.”
She appealed online and included a photo her said parking permit.
However, weeks later Ms Thorpe received an email saying her appeals had been rejected.
“I was told even though they ‘appreciate’ I have the pass, I still have to pay the fines.
“I was told the fines would be reduced to £25 each if I was to pay in 14 days, which I am not in a position to do.
“After this, it will increase to £50 each. I physically do not have this extra money to pay these fines. I barely managed to scrape enough together to buy the three month pass.
“I feel so let down that the council do not care.
“To pay this, the budget for food and baby essentials will have to drop by £100 for October, or we will have to choose which utility bill to go into arrears with.”
A council spokesperson said: “No-one wants to return to their car to find a parking ticket on the windscreen, so we would like to remind people to take two seconds to check that they are clearly displaying a valid parking permit in their parked vehicle.
“Season tickets provide a cost effective way to pay for parking (Broad Street, Leominster car park costs around a pound a day).
“To provide flexibility the permit does not include vehicle registration details, so it’s important the permit is clearly displayed as there is no way of verifying whether it was being used for another vehicle at that time.
“We would like to encourage anyone who is going to have difficulty paying a PCN to contact us directly so that we can discuss their individual circumstances with them.”
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