THE COMPANY which runs the car parks at Ninewells Hospital in Dundee has come under fierce criticism from a young patient’s mother and a senior doctor.

Management at Vinci Parks, the company in charge of the sprawling site, were accused of not listening to people’s circumstances and wasting NHS staff time dealing with disputes.

Dr Stanley Callaghan, a senior consultant cardiologist for NHS Tayside, paid for a parking ticket while he was conducting “important investigations” at Ninewells last Monday.

He forgot to display his ticket and was fined £10 as a result.

Having written to Vinci Parks, he has now been told that he must still pay his fine.

He said, “I was conducting some very important investigations last Monday morning and though I paid for my ticket, I forgot to display it.

“I sent a letter explaining my situation to Vinci but they told me I would still have to pay the fine.

“The people at Vinci don’t listen. There have been similar problems in the past but they don’t listen to anybody.

“Also there are many elderly people who use this car park and many people easily confused, and I wonder what would happen to them in this situation.

“They could end up forgetting to display a ticket and then be charged these exorbitant prices. Somebody should have their chops rattled over this.”

In a separate incident on Thursday, Angela Shannon accompanied her son Robbie to Ninewells for an operation during which he would be under general anaesthetic.

Mrs Shannon said she had been notified at a previous visit that if she went over the limit of parking time due to the length of an operation she could avoid the fine by taking her penalty notice to the attendant and explaining what had happened.

She followed this advice but said she was shouted at and told she would have to obtain a letter of confirmation from a nurse at her son’s ward.

“I was a bit shocked but listened while he explained that I could call the ward and ask them to post a letter to my home address and then once I had the letter I could then post it to them and they would cancel the ticket,” said Angela.

She claimed that her husband Paul had called the manager at Vinci and was also shouted at and forced to contact the ward nurse to obtain confirmation.

“The manager was rude and unhelpful and explained that it was no good putting in a complaint as he has the final word on everything that happens in the car park,” she added.

Eventually Mr Shannon went to speak to the management and after a further dispute managed to have the fine revoked.

Management at Vinci Parks were asked to comment on the complaints but had not responded by the time of going to press.