A customer of a South Hams seaside car park has slammed its operator after receiving a parking fine despite paying for a ticket.

On New Year’s Eve, Professor Jonathan Bradshaw, a visitor to the area, parked at the Hope Cove pay-and-display car park, adjacent to the Hope and Anchor, and paid £2.40 for two hours of parking.

By mid-January, Mr Bradshaw had received a notice from Newton Abbot-based parking management company Premier Parking Solutions.

The letter stated that Mr Bradshaw had not paid for his parking and must now either pay £60 or £100 if the payment is not sent immediately.

Luckily, Mr Bradshaw’s ticket was still on the dashboard of his car, but on presenting PPS with evidence that he had paid for parking, the response was that “we had no trace of Mr Bradshaw having paid and so the fine still stands”.

Mr Bradshaw said: “They didn’t make it clear to me whether this was because it took me three minutes to pay after entering the car park as there was a queue, or if the machine had failed to record my full number plate.”

The ticket had in fact recorded the letters of the car’s registration and the ANPR camera had also picked up the registration.

Mr Bradshaw added: “It’s surely inconceivable that a car of identical make with my letters could have parked there for the same time, so why can’t they accept my ticket as evidence?”

Mr Bradshaw had considered not pursuing the argument after the response from the company.

But after he found out his son had suffered a similar fate in November, he decided to do some more investigation, which flagged up four pages of negative reviews about the car park on TripAdvisor.

Mr Bradshaw said: “I discovered that the car park had recently changed hands for £1.2m.

“It must be hard to pay that mortgage with charges of £1.20 per hour per car. They surely have an incentive to fine as many people as they possibly can.

“There’s a right of appeal to an independent appeal service, but it’s funded by the private park operators. It’s web-based and requires a lot of patience and skill.

“I appealed, but do not expect to win.

“I told my local district councillor and she recommended I bring it to the attention of the police. I have.

“It puts people off going to Hope Cove. The Hope and Anchor will be losing business, as will others.”

Last year a recently bereaved resident of the area also reported similar problems when her challenge to PPS was met with an equally unsympathetic response.

A representative of PPS contacted the Gazette after going to press and said: “We are unable to comment on individual cases. We are not aware of any issues.”