• I TRIED to navigate Camden’s new, unnecessarily difficult, parking website to acquire a permit for a relative arriving from Suffolk for a two-day stay after months of pandemic-enforced separation.

Some 36 hours later, after requiring me to upload to the website a utility or council tax bill which proves I live at the address I have been paying council tax on for the last 29 years, upload proof of my age and after then continually disputing the very existence of the address for which I have an existing parking account sufficiently in credit to pay for several weeks’ worth of visitor permits, the new website was still stating that it was “experiencing problems”.

And I had to leave a note in my guest’s car window explaining why no parking permit had been acquired.

When finally the system was up and running, and I was able to access the site, I discovered that the new website no longer allows us to book permits in advance, as the old system used to do. One can book a permit only as the required parking period begins.

To add insult to injury, the permit I required to avoid a penalty for, the period covering my guest’s departure, had to be paid for by credit card despite the fact that my account is in credit and Camden actually owes me money rather than the other way around.

Perhaps Camden would like to explain what was wrong with the old system that necessitated the council presumably losing considerable income throughout the entire borough while the system was down and why it was thought necessary to expend some, no doubt, exorbitant amount of money of taxpayers’ money modifying a system that was working perfectly well enough before some smart Alec had the bright idea of changing it!

The adage “If something ain’t broke, don’t fix it” springs to mind!

PETER SYMONDS
Canfield Gardens, NW6