MOTORISTS have their flaws, sure they do. But no one deserves the dreadful fate of bloodchase by a private parking firm.

Here’s my tale of woe: in short, I picked my mum up at a Tesco superstore and it cost me £80.

At length, Ma Stewart is hearing impaired and can’t use a mobile phone for calls so, as it used to be in the olden days, we pre-arranged a pick up point – controversially just outside the store. I was there less than 60 seconds. Confusingly, there was a Tesco sign saying: “Heavy bags? Pick up point” and also double yellow lines. Tesco thought one thing and the Faraday Retail Park Coatbridge parking harpies thought something else.

Days after the infraction I received a fine asking for £80. I wrote to the company to appeal. In response, they doubled the bill and threatened to send the bailiffs round. That, or they’d eat my firstborn. Childless? They’d eat my mother’s firstborn.

I wrote to Tesco customer services twice but never received a reply and so phoned the debt collection agency that had by now sent me three letters telling me the fine was rising and I was responsible for “additional costs”. Allowing them my mobile number was a fool’s error.

The debt collection lady was brutish, cold and clearly an alumni of the Joint Service Interrogation Wing. She veered between trying to persuade me I had no future should I choose not to cough up and telling me that if I fessed up she’d bring the fine back down. “Listen, I’m not like my colleagues; I’m sympathetic.”

I would have told her to shove her sympathy up the exhaust pipe of a 1971 Ford Pinto*but for the stress caused to Ma Stewart from having letters delivered to the house marked Overdue and Debt Collection Agency. She prizes the good opinion of the postman.

I wonder how a more vulnerable person would cope with being harried in such a fashion.

How do these private parking companies find out private details? Well, easily – they buy our home addresses from the DVLA for £2.50. Should a government body be selling the personal details of its citizens to private companies? Of course not.

Worse, last year the Dundee Courier submitted a Freedom of Information request that showed the DVLA loses 34p every time a private parking company submits a request for driver details. So, not only is a government body flogging our information – it’s doing a crap job of it. Tax payer subsidies for these information searches for the tax year ending 2014 ran to £612,000.

At the time of the Dundee Courier report, Labour Shadow Transport Secretary Mary Creagh said: “The UK Government should swiftly review its charging structure.”

Might I respectfully suggest the UK Government swiftly review its charging structure to ensure no one - neither CEO Tom nor senior manager Harry nor administrator Dick of any old private parking company - can rock up and pay for my address. I give them my details to keep safe, not give away.

Parking enforcement is a lucrative industry. These bad boys rake in the moolah from idiot motorists who expect to be able to pop to the shops without needing to keep their eyes peeled for small and unexpected signs detailing convoluted parking regulations.

What is the retailer’s rational behind allowing these parking pouncers outside their doors? I’m assuming financial gain but does it make long term financial sense to alienate customers by setting the hounds on them because they’ve been spending so long purchasing the shop’s goods they’ve overstayed their welcome in the carpark?

The other issue is that no one is entirely sure whether these private fines are enforceable (there is a variety of contradictory legislation that could be applied) and whether the companies have the right to pursue unpaid fines.

The Transport Select Committee, in 2013, suggested more people should contest their parking fines in court (oi, MPs! Don’t get us to do your job for you, ban the bleeding things) and one, a Barry Beavis, has done so. Lawyers for Mr Beavis are arguing in the Supreme Court this week that he should not be bound by an £85 fine for overstaying in a Chelmsford car park in 2013. The outcome is expected later this year.

Fingers crossed for Mr Beavis and his case, which may set a precedent in favour of drivers.

In the meantime, I plan to set up my own private parking company and invite all my new private parking colleagues to an opening party where, while they’re indoors drinking the free margaritas, I’ll be outside ticketing merry hell on their cars.

*Notorious for bursting into flames