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CARS PARKED WITHOUT a valid ticket or permit was the number one clamping offence that Dublin City Council received complaints about since last May.
According to information received under a Freedom of Information request, Dublin City Council recorded 63 complains about clamping on its appeals system from May 2016 – May 2017.
Of those complaints, almost one-third were in relation to vehicles parked without displaying a valid parking permit (21) with a further 11 over no valid Pay & Display ticket.
Parking on a clearway and on a footpath were the next most popular, with five complaints referring to each of those offences.
The majority of complaints (24) were from offences that happened in the city centre.
The highest number of complaints were received from offences that took place in Dublin 1 (13) but Dublin 2 wasn’t far behind with 11 complaints.
The next most popular areas for complaints were over offences that occurred in Dublin 6 and Dublin 8 – with 10 complaints each.
Eight of the complaints received by Dublin City Council were in relation to offences in Dublin 4, while seven were in relation to offences in Dublin 7.
Some 56,000 vehicles were clamped in the Dublin City Council area last year, bringing in over €4.2 million in revenue for the local authority.
Two roads in Dublin 4 – Mespil Road and Waterloo Road – were the most clamped roads with Gardiner Street Lower in Dublin 1 the third most clamped road.
Your submissions
A maximum clamping fee of €100 came into effect from 1 June this year under the Vehicle Clamping Act 2015.
The average council clamp costs €80 to remove, but private companies had been charging up to €300.
The Act designates the National Transport Authority (NTA) as the statutory regulator for clamping.
The main provisions provided for under the Act are:
The NTA has published draft regulations relating to clamping, signage and clamp release charges. It has also invited submissions from members of the public on those draft regulations.
Members of the public can view the proposed regulations here and make submissions.
Transport Minister Shane Ross said that once the submissions have been considered, the National Transport Authority (NTA) will assume all its new responsibilities from 1 October.
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Clamped at the Luas Red Cow car park 10.10pm with a VALID ticket in May.
Ticket clearly states the car Reg. But they said I had input an o instead of a 0. I didn’t. My ticket is clear. Released with out paying fine but still battling for an apology!!
@Antoinette Mullen: Same happened to me same car park place RD instead of RN and got clamped, took it off then informed if happened again would have to pay 40 euro have not park there since I now get the bus to work, ok a little more time is spent but honestly far less stressful, also people who use the bus have to pay, no hassle from passengers who hop on the luas and abuse the the paying passengers just got myself a few good books and far less stress – better for your mind
@Antoinette Mullen: just invest in an angle grinder!
@oliverjumelle:
Have you ever used one?
@P.J. Nolan: yes!
@oliverjumelle:
So have I and the battery ones will barely cut a 10mm rod, even using slim jims, let alone 2 cuts through a 16mm link.
So unless you intend people carry a generator full of petrol around in the boot of their car telling them to bring a angle grinder is pointless.
Don’t park your private property in public spaces without paying the appropriate fee and there’ll be no reason to complain!
@Dub_Right: haha if only it was that easy.
@Mark Kelly: so you think that people are never incorrectly clamped ?
Just carry a bolt cutters
@Dub_Right: My car got clamped with a valid ticket well displayed on the dashboard. The clampers were from a private company and they decided to clamp as my ticket had only 10 minutes left on it. I was lucky to caught them doing it, and I was lucky that the Gardai were just a few meters away as at first the clampers refused to remove the clamp. When confronted by Garda they claimed they didn’t see the ticket! These private companies clampers are obviously paid by the numbers of cars they clamp, so they don’t hesitate to target cars with a valid ticket too.
@Mark Jones: But only use it if is a private clamping company clamps. Do not use it on county council clamp.
Don’t park illegally and u won’t get clamped. How is this so challenging for people
@Nick Allen: the tickets no longer have stickers on them and can get blown off the dash.
You may get caught up feeding a baby etc.
Hope you are wearing a helmet on that high horse
@brian magee: Oh sorry dear Mr. Clamper, I was feeding the baby and the ticket blew away! Oh..look, over there, a pink talking elephant! :-D
@Nick Allen: I didn’t park illegally. Had valid ticket. Their excuse was that their system does not recognise the difference between the letter o and the number 0.
We should all carry super glue and if you see a car clamped put glue in the lock. This might stop them if they know every clamp will have to be taken off with an angle grinder. Just watch out for cctv when you are doing it
@Steve Watson: which will delay the driver of the car even more .. and everyone is more frustrated and angry ..
@Steve Watson: Saw a couple in Talbot Street yesterday had been clamped. They just went off and bought a hammer and whacked the clamp off. Mind you they also looked like they don’t pay for much. But I didn’t wait to see what they did with the ticket on the windscreen.
@Mary Murphy: what does someone who doesn’t pay for much look like?
Waterloo road has parking spaces all down both sides, but on one side it magically becomes a bus lane at 4pm, the meter will still take your money and having a paid for ticket on your dash won’t stop you from being clamped and/or towed. It’s a total con job, just don’t allow parking there at all or CLEARLY mark on the pay station that where you are parked will become a bus lane at 4pm.
@802.1x: exactly. That’s the sort of thing I was referencing in my post above. Anytime I’m walking near that area I see numerous people shafted. Clampers know this and just collect there every day
@802.1x: what if you want to park on the other side of the waterloo road?
@802.1x: Well, looking at the signs I think it’s pretty clear that you can’t be parking there. Of course the pay machines take the cash because they start adding time from the next period so you don’t have to come down to your car. For most machines it has to be X hours before the next pay period begins or X hours after the pay period stopped.
Misleading zones with multiple signs. Then the same cu-n-ts who clamped you tell you to write a letter to the council to complain as they arrive to take it off to avoid hassle
Drive from Camden st to Rathmines garda station any day and any time youll encounter multiple illegal and dangerously parked vehicles which are never clamped or towed. In fact opposite Rathmines Garda station are double yellow lines and always minimum of three cars parked and never ticketed.
On ballymun the only 24hr bus lane is opposite the garda station right out there window and it’s full of parked cars all the time..
This clamping business is a bloody money raciti, I was in a Dub hospital parked all night I was running in an out feeding ticket machine in the poured rain as I was about to be called to see a doctor I went out to put money in the machine only to find my car had been clamped 80 Euro is alot to pay for apensioner lto have clamps remove ed
Wish councils would p*ss off and stop smothering citizens in regulations. Councils are just more inefficient and more unaccountable than government. Load them all up and sack them.
What’s the difference between a dead hedgehog on the road and a dead clamper,?????
There ll be skid marks before the hedgehog
Can anybody explain why ipcoa have the right to clamp in Grand canal down by the theatre. They charge €2.40 per hour even if you only want 5 minutes. Release fee is €135 and they cover the whole area.
I just cut the clamp as always carry my cordless grinder around they can’t prove I cut it
@Laurence O Neill: cool story Laurence, unfortunately that only works on clamps from the likes of ipoca / ncps…. You’ve Clearly never done that with a Dublin city Council clamp as if you did you wouldn’t be writing that.
There have been over 500 cases similar to your fairytale and in the end they got fined and had to pay into the charity box.
Some fantasist indeed
Have seen the clamping lads take pics of cars they clamped from all angles.
@Mark Kelly:
You do have to laugh at all angle grinder experts here. I have used them, the vast majority of battery operated angle grinders would never have the power or last long enough to cut through a heavy duty chain. Grand for a bit of polishing, useless for cutting anything substantial.
The only way an angle grinder is going to do the job is with a generator.
Cheaper pay the fine.
There HAs to be a deterrent because a lot of motorists think they can park where they like and they can’t ok.Obey the rules or just get the bus,simple as!
Lucan village is a cun t
They would show gagngsters a thing or two
Angle grinder is yer only man. Sometimes you can get delayed, sometimes you may not have any change on you, sometimes the ticket can be blown from view and everytime the clamper says “no”. They should really ban this dreadful practise.
Only special types of vermin become clampers. A vile job authorised by a money hungry & inefficient council. It’s nothing to do with parking legally, it’s 100% to do with revenue.
@Bar O’Choc: I disagree completely. You must have tunnel vision if you can’t see why it’s necessary.
Though, for some places it’s odd that someone is clamped when they’re really parked in a location that should be towed.
No, I don’t work for them or the council.
Stop the clamping, start towing
Also, we were walking from Heuston station to connolly station last Sunday and my jaw nearly dropped to the pavement when I saw a woman paying a clamper to take the clamp off her car! And three cars further on there was a man sitting in his car, also clamped, waiting for them to release his car. ON A SUNDAY!!!!
Dublin must be city mean enough to do this cause I have travelled the country up and down and nowhere else have the clampers worked on Sundays. It’s their day off everywhere else… except for the greedy Dubs… couldn’t give drivers a break! Oh no! (PS. I don’t drive. But I hate greedy clampers who can’t stay at home like their peers around the rest of the country )
Dublin Street Parking are not doing full enforcement on Sundays . Doesn’t suit thier rosters it appears Time for a DCC to get in a new opperator who will do 7 days
I had my 90 year old father at Vincent’s – both car parks full so parked at church on Merrion Road. At end of procedure my father took bad so I ran over and purchased another ticket – it was extremely windy so wedged my ticket on passenger windscreen. Ticket kept blowing over when placed on dashboard. When I went back to my car, ticket was still valid and I was clamped!!! Had to pay €120 as my father was waiting for me at hospital entrance. Appeal was denied – had to pay another €20 to appeal to “independent ” body – appeal denied because my ticket wasn’t on dashboard!!! Still fighting for my money back.
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