£18,500 in parking tickets for parking in front of her own garage

Carly Mackie, a 26-year-old from Dundee, has received an incredible £18,500 in parking tickets - for parking in front of her own garage. She has been targeted by wardens from a private parking company almost every day for a year, and received a warning letter from Vehicle Control Services, demanding she pays £18,500 in fines.

The garages have double yellow lines in front of them, but a wide cobbled area in front of the lines, which she parks on. She told the Daily Record that she has the right to park outside her own garage, and says she will fight the charges all the way to court.

The company told the newspaper that it would pursue her for payment. A spokesman told the Record: "The site in question is covered by a contract that restricts use of the rear car park to permit holders only and prohibits motorists from parking in the covered vehicle access passage ways."

"The terms and conditions are clearly displayed on prominent signs around the site. It is therefore not unreasonable to expect motorists to adhere to these terms and conditions by not parking in restricted areas and displaying a valid permit in the car park."

"Ms Mackie has constantly breached the terms and conditions of this contract by repeatedly parking in a restricted area/parking without displaying a valid permit."
%VIRTUAL-ArticleSidebar-motoring-guide%
It also told the Daily Mail that none of the individual tickets had been appealed, and that the cost rose partly because the firm had to track down the owner of the car and pursue payment.

It seems in this instance that the courts will have the final say on whether Mackie has contravened any rules - and whether those rules were fair and clear. Certainly social media is divided between those who say she is parking on public land and should have learned from the first ticket - to those who argue she's basically parking on her own driveway and shouldn't pay a penny.

Your rights

Parking fines are contentious, because many people believe that a fine from a private company is merely an unenforceable invoice that they can ignore. However, if the terms and conditions were clearly signposted, then by parking there, you are accepting these terms, and by breaking the rules, you are subject to their fines.

You are entitled to appeal, and if the fines are unfair, you can go through the appeals process to try to get them withdrawn. However, if your appeal fails, then even though they are just invoices, invoices still need to be paid.

If you don't pay, the parking company has the right to take you to court to enforce payment. It's not known what percentage of these cases end up in the courts, and it is commonly assumed that the percentage is small. However, that's absolutely no guarantee that the company won't decide to make an example of you.

Biggest ever parking fines

The idea that parking fines are unfair and unenforceable has led to a number of people running up huge bills over the years. The record for the largest up until this case was a £14,000 fine run up by a Mondeo driver in Lincolnshire by September last year - after picking up 140 tickets in a year for parking on private land.

He repeatedly parked in disabled bays and across multiple parking spaces, with a note on the dashboard saying the fines were unenforceable. He was served with four court judgments amounting to more than £3,000, and the firm said it planned to pursue him for £10,000 more, plus £1,000 in costs.

This equals the £14,000 bill run up by the owner of a Mercedes S Class, which has been in the Broadway Plaza car park in Birmingham for three years - at a cost of £13 per day. The car is apparently unlocked, but is damaged so cannot be driven away. Police have been unable to trace the owner

Both these fines are closely followed in the hall of fame of largest fines of all time by Mario Balotelli - who reportedly picked up almost £10,000 in parking fines when he played for Manchester City in 2011, and had his white Maserati towed a number of times.

Parking on AOL Money

Family faces £400 fine for taking too long over pub lunch

DVLA makes £25 million selling your personal details

Abandoned Merc clocks up £14,000 in parking charges