Erewash Council's Plea: Why Are Drivers Still Paying for Free Parking?

Imagine a shopkeeper standing outside their store, physically stopping customers from handing over money they don't need to spend. That's essentially the situation Erewash Borough Council in Derbyshire has found itself in. The authority has issued an unusual public appeal asking drivers to stop paying for parking at weekends, because in some of its car parks, weekend parking is completely free.

It sounds like the sort of problem every cash-strapped council would dream of having. Yet it reveals something far more interesting about how confusing, inconsistent, and poorly communicated parking rules can be, even when the message is "good news".

What Happened

According to the BBC report, Erewash Borough Council says a significant number of drivers using its car parks continue to pay for parking on Saturdays and Sundays, despite some of its sites not charging at all during those periods. Rather than quietly pocketing the extra revenue, the council has gone public with the plea, urging motorists to check the signage before feeding a meter or tapping their card on a payment terminal unnecessarily.

It's a rare example of a local authority actively discouraging people from paying it money. Councils are far more commonly in the news for raising charges, extending enforcement hours, or tightening penalty notice rules, so a story about a council saying "please don't pay us" stands out precisely because it runs against the grain of most parking headlines.

The underlying issue seems straightforward on the surface: drivers are either not noticing that weekend parking is free, misremembering the rules from a previous visit, or assuming that if a payment machine is switched on and ready to take money, then payment must be required. That assumption is entirely understandable. Most of us have been conditioned by years of pay-and-display culture to treat an active machine as a sign that charges apply.

Why It Matters

On one level, this is a small, local story about one council in the East Midlands. But it taps into a much bigger and more persistent problem across the UK: parking signage that fails to communicate clearly, consistently, or in a way that matches how real people behave.

Free weekend parking is not unusual. Many councils operate variable tariffs, charging during the working week to manage turnover for shoppers and commuters, while easing off at weekends to support local high streets and encourage leisure visits. The trouble is that these variations are often communicated through small print on a sign post, a QR code, or an app menu, rather than through anything genuinely eye-catching.

The result is a strange kind of financial leakage in reverse. Instead of drivers underpaying and risking a Penalty Charge Notice, they are overpaying for a service that costs nothing. Multiply that by however many bays are in a car park, across every weekend of the year, and it becomes a meaningful amount of money that residents are handing over needlessly, money that could have stayed in their pockets, or been spent in the very high street shops the free parking scheme is presumably designed to support.

There's also a reputational angle here. Councils spend a great deal of energy managing public perception around parking charges, especially given how often parking fines and rising tariffs dominate the news. A council openly admitting that people are overpaying, and trying to stop it, is a small but genuine trust-building move. It suggests the authority sees itself as more than just a fee collector, at least in this instance.

The Legal Angle

Parking in council-run, off-street car parks is governed primarily by the Road Traffic Regulation Act 1984, along with local Traffic Regulation Orders (TROs) that set out exactly when and how charges apply at a particular site. These orders are legally binding documents, and any charges displayed on-site must reflect what's actually permitted under the relevant order.

Crucially, councils have a legal obligation to display parking terms clearly. Signage in council car parks must comply with the Traffic Signs Regulations and General Directions (TSRGD) 2016, which set out requirements for how information about charges, restrictions, and time limits should be presented. If a sign is missing, ambiguous, obscured, or contradicts the actual terms of the Traffic Regulation Order, it can potentially be challenged, particularly if a driver ends up disputing a Penalty Charge Notice as a result.

In this Erewash situation, there's no suggestion that anyone has been wrongly fined. The issue is the opposite: people are voluntarily paying when they don't need to. But it does highlight a subtler legal and consumer point. If signage is unclear enough that drivers routinely misunderstand whether payment is required, that's a signal the signage itself may not be doing its job properly, regardless of which direction the confusion cuts.

It's also worth noting that unlike private parking companies, which operate under a code of conduct and often face criticism over aggressive enforcement, council car parks operate under public law obligations. Councils are expected to act reasonably and transparently, and persistent public confusion about basic charging structures is the kind of issue an ombudsman or auditor might reasonably expect to see addressed.

What Drivers Should Know

This story is a useful prompt to think about how you approach parking payments generally, not just in Erewash.

Always check the specific signage at the car park you're using, every time. Charges can vary not just by location but by day of the week, time of day, and even bank holidays. Don't rely on memory from a previous visit, since Traffic Regulation Orders and tariffs do get updated.

Look for weekend or evening exemptions. Many councils, not just Erewash, operate reduced or free charging outside peak commercial hours as a way of supporting local businesses. It's always worth reading the full tariff board rather than assuming a machine being switched on means payment is compulsory.

Be wary of paying "just in case". If you're unsure whether a charge applies, it's tempting to pay a small amount just to feel safe. But if free parking genuinely applies and you've paid anyway, that money is very difficult to reclaim after the fact. It's far better to take thirty seconds to read the sign properly before parking.

If you've overpaid, it may be worth contacting the council directly. While there's no guarantee of a refund for a payment made in error, especially where the driver simply chose to pay without checking, some authorities will consider goodwill refunds, particularly where signage genuinely was confusing. It costs nothing to ask.

Apps can complicate things further. Many councils now use cashless payment systems such as RingGo or PayByPhone, and these apps don't always make free periods obvious within their interface. If an app defaults to showing a payment screen, that doesn't necessarily mean payment is required. It's worth cross-checking against the physical signage on-site before confirming any transaction.

Looking Ahead

Erewash's public appeal is a small story, but it points to a wider truth about UK parking: clarity is often the missing ingredient, whether that confusion benefits the driver or the enforcement authority. As councils continue to juggle variable tariffs, cashless payment systems, and the pressure to support struggling town centres, the challenge of communicating rules clearly is only going to grow.

There's a reasonable chance other councils quietly have similar issues without ever raising them publicly. Erewash's willingness to flag the problem, rather than accept the extra income, is arguably a model other authorities could learn from. In an era where parking charges and enforcement dominate motoring headlines for all the wrong reasons, a council actively trying to save its residents money is worth noticing, and worth other local authorities reviewing their own signage to check they aren't causing the same silent, needless overpayment.