Just Park: A parking website has apologised after scammers exploited it by listing spaces on driveways which they do not own.
Written content by Jon Douglas via BBC
Just Park is one of several websites which allow people to make money by advertising parking spaces for hire on their own land.
But some homeowners have been surprised to discover their driveways have been listed without their permission.
Just Park says it has stringent checks in place to prevent fraud and cases are “extremely rare”.
Surprise
Simon Gallagher started getting complaints from tenants at the flat he owns at Bexleyheath in Greater London.
Strangers were leaving cars in their dedicated parking bays, leaving them with nowhere to park.
“This was going on for about a month or so”, says Simon, “until one day somebody had left a note in the window of one of the cars that was parked there with a booking reference for Just Park”.
“I looked it up on the website and to my surprise, found a photograph of the flat advertised out for rent”.
Someone was charging £8 a day for the use of his tenants’ parking spaces.
To prevent them from being used by anyone else, he has now had bollards installed.
Adverts removed
In Edinburgh, Barbara Oliver was alerted by a neighbour to a similar problem outside her property.
She was away on holiday when mystery vehicles began parking right in front of her garage door.
“It appeared that these people had used Just Park and had information to say that they could park there, which, as the property’s owner, I knew was not true”, Barbara says.
Just Park removed the unauthorised adverts after Barbara Oliver and Simon Gallagher complained.
Apology
Speaking on Radio 4’s You & Yours programme, the company’s founder and chief executive officer, Anthony Eskinazi, said “I’d like to apologise to Mrs Oliver and Mr Gallagher for their experiences.
‘We do have stringent checks in place to prevent spaces from being listed fraudulently. On rare occasions where they are added, we immediately remove them once notified and ensure that our community is not adversely affected”.
Just Park says its policies and procedures have successfully reduced instances of fraud to “less than two listings per month, which represents less than one out of every 1000 new listings”. Read more from BBC.
Read other interesting and relevant stories from News Without Politics
Stay informed daily unbiased without media bias and ahead of influence.
