Was directed here from elsewhere after posting this.
I live in a block of flats and we own the leasehold. At the back of our block is a parking area with some bays and garages but also some free space. Some of the bays and free space belong to the flat, but some of it was bought by a local shop owner years ago for his customers to use. He has eight bays and somehow also the land at the end of the free space.
A few years ago we were having problems with parking as people were taking the mickey and we couldn't get out of garages etc. so our management company brought in a permit system controlled by a parking company. Each flat gets one permit and you can park in the bays or the free space. This solved a lot of problems.
Recently people have been starting to take the mickey again but this time they started parking on the shop's land. Understandably the shop owner finally had enough of this, and engaged a parking company of his own (CPM) to patrol his land. This parking company ripped down all signs from our parking company, and a few days later I went to my car (parked in our free space) to find a ticket from them, not the company engaged to patrol our land.
Obviously I'm not going to pay the ticket and I'm going through the motions of appeal with the IAS, but the parking company is adamant they are able to issue tickets on all the land, not just the bits that belong to the shop. They are stating that the ticket is valid purely because I wasn't parked in a bay. It's currently with the IAS but I am aware that this was set up by the parking companies themselves. I've submitted the Land Registry printout showing our land, and the email I received from our management company stating that this seems to have been a mistake, but they're saying they don't recognise the management company and their client hasn't been in touch with them to say it was a mistake (I suspect this will not happen as the shop owner would love all our parking).
We actually have our flat up for sale and the latest letter from the parking company mentions a CCJ if I don't pay, which obviously we could do without when applying for a new mortgage. There's nothing in our lease that mentions parking restrictions. Any advice would be gratefully accepted!