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blowpipe
Member Since: 07 May 2009
Location: lightwater
Posts: 1111
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Got a phone call this evening from my sister's husband, down from Norfolk for a conference tomorrow at the Premier Inn at Heathrow.
In the dark he pulled into the car park access road at the Park Inn, a stone's throw from his hotel, realised he had gone wrong and stopped to study the directions for under a minute. He was just about to carry on when a bloke knocked at the window and told him not to drive, as he'd been clamped.
They'd been hiding in the bushes, wouldn't let him pay the £150 by card and gave him 30 mins to find the cash with the threat of removal and a trebling of the 'fee'. I had to drive it up to him, and in the time it took me to get there they'd done another one under similar circumstances.
Two monosylabic thugs dressed in black combat fatigues in a tatty Fiesta van, brandishing their SIA badges by way of authority. The sooner legislation takes these thieves off the road, the better. I've no objection to a measured and sensible use of clamps by landowners, but this was nothing short of criminal.
***sorry, mods - can this be moved to the appropriate off topic forum?**
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 1st Mar 2010 11:38 pm |
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Gareth
Site Moderator
Member Since: 07 Dec 2004
Location: Bramhall
Posts: 26705
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Was there not some chap you could call, and he would come along and cut the clamp off for you?
I think if you can remove the clamp and return it undamaged, they find it difficult to prosecute?
I stayed at the Travel Inn in Croydon a few weeks ago, and when we left for work in the morning, all the cars that parked outside the hotel were clamped. Luckily mine was elsewhere, but in the dark, you want to park outside the hotel, and there were no obvious signs.
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| 1st Mar 2010 11:46 pm |
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Ken
Member Since: 20 Feb 2006
Location: Here
Posts: 10865
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I've got just the thing in my motor for tosser like that 
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| 1st Mar 2010 11:49 pm |
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Gareth
Site Moderator
Member Since: 07 Dec 2004
Location: Bramhall
Posts: 26705
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I knew there was someone
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| 1st Mar 2010 11:50 pm |
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90BHP
Member Since: 18 Oct 2006
Location: Half way along the road on the right
Posts: 3706
 
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I know the clamps at my local shopping centre won't fit 19" wheels
Honest it was somebody else, I passed comment to the warden - he said he would love to clamp the RRS but the clamps were too small "To finish first, one first has to finish ...."
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| 1st Mar 2010 11:54 pm |
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DG
Site Moderator
Member Since: 12 Dec 2005
Location: The Gaff
Posts: 50944
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Ken wrote:I've got just the thing in my motor for tosser like that
Your not going to play "Do I look like a slut" out loud again Ken  21 year LR veteran > D2 GS 2003 > D3 S 2006 > D3 HSE 2009 > D4 HSE 2013 > D4 HSE 2015 > D5 HSE 2018 > DS HSE R-Dynamic P300e 2021
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| 1st Mar 2010 11:56 pm |
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NoDo$h
Member Since: 02 May 2006
Location: Finding new and exciting ways to milk badgers.
Posts: 19689
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Next time call the police. Demanding money like that IS still extortion. And tell BIL to issue a small claims recovery against SIA - he'll get his money back.
I hope those twunts and all their inbred spawn have a slow, lingering death.  I know it's not considered "kind" to say no these days, but no. Just no, ok? And if it's not ok, still no.
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| 2nd Mar 2010 12:15 am |
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ad15
Member Since: 14 Dec 2008
Location: up that tree
Posts: 4866
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like ND says, just call the poilce then and there. say you're being threatened, they'll get there quick start, just spoke with my larger brother ( copper) about this, he said when this happens they get the clamp removed and go after the clampers..
BTW he also mentioned on two occasions the clampers removed the clamp and left before they arrived, not legal to clamp a car with someone in it, it is technically npt parked until you get out..
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| 2nd Mar 2010 11:13 am |
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blowpipe
Member Since: 07 May 2009
Location: lightwater
Posts: 1111
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On his behalf I called the Duty Manager at the hotel. They maintain there's signs all over the shop, lit up at night, warning people not to park or even stop on their service road, though I didn't see them. I do have some sympathy as it was clearly a cracking waiting up spot for mini cabs and chauffeurs until they got these thieving scumbags on board. Interesting that the clamping company's website offers as part of their contract £15 out of every clamping straight back to the customer....
Not sure about any effective police action that would result from a call, as I suspect it would fall into a civil dispute category seeing it's it's on private land, licenced contractors working with the permission of the land owner and in all fairness the demand for payment was very polite and robotic so no threatening situation per se.
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| 2nd Mar 2010 7:49 pm |
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Discotres
Member Since: 25 Jan 2010
Location: London
Posts: 8491
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blowpipe wrote:On his behalf I called the Duty Manager at the hotel. They maintain there's signs all over the shop, lit up at night, warning people not to park or even stop on their service road, though I didn't see them.
Come on cough up, it was you wasn't it 
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| 2nd Mar 2010 8:23 pm |
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blowpipe
Member Since: 07 May 2009
Location: lightwater
Posts: 1111
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Thankfully not, I was just the cash courier - I did go back and have a decko, though. They'd got another one, a Merc S class, within ten minutes 
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| 2nd Mar 2010 8:25 pm |
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Discotres
Member Since: 25 Jan 2010
Location: London
Posts: 8491
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Highway robbery! 
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| 2nd Mar 2010 8:27 pm |
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blowpipe
Member Since: 07 May 2009
Location: lightwater
Posts: 1111
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Top man
The attitude of the hotel was clearly a case of the end justifying the means. The actual clamping company are based in Harrow, I think, so the council authorities may have a similar view to Hillingdon, despite the geographical area of the shysters operation.
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| 3rd Mar 2010 12:31 am |
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