How annoying is it when you drive around the car park and find the Parent and Child spaces are all full up? It's easy to accept that if the people using them have a child in tow. Getting baby in and out of a car seat can be a task and a half when parked in a normal space. It's not even about being closer to the shop, it's about being able to get your children in and out of the car without scratching the car next to you with your car door.
When I read about a mum getting fined £70 for parking in a Parent and Child space I wrongly assumed she had parked in it with no children AT ALL with her. Once I had finished reading it I saw that she was in fact VERY heavily pregnant, eight days before her baby came.
The company Asda uses (Smart Parking) to tend to their car parks, have fined her on the grounds that she had no children with her which technically isn't true. The couple have been said to have stated that the car park was 'half empty'. On this basis, I am to disagree with Smart Parking. Providing it was a quick trip in and out and there was other spaces available I don't see the need of the fine. I needed the extra space getting in and out of the car when I was with child, although it never entered my head to use the Parent and Child spaces.
I am quite shocked that Asda's Parking Attendants (Smart Parking) have fined anyone for parking in spaces they shouldn't be, as I am forever frustrated in my local for encountering those naughty people who use them when they shouldn't.
What do you think? Were they entitled to park in this space on the grounds that the Mother was carrying a full grown baby inside her, or is the fine justified as they were taking up a space for a parent that needed to get their kids in and out of the car with ease?
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