Village Halls and Parking. Has anyone had any experience of policing the space?

Most village halls are charities. Their primary purpose is to provide facilities for the benefit of the local community. Letting others use the parking spaces, may or may not align with the hall's charitable objectives. Obviously you don't want to put its charitable status at risk.

Maybe if income can be generated you could then use it to further the hall's charitable purpose? As hers is a commercial enterprise this would presumably be the way to go.

The hall should have a governing document - a trust deed or constitution I think. That will outline the permitted uses of the hall and its land, including the car park. It may restrict commercial activities or require specific permissions.
Would it need "planning" permission for example?

If parking spaces are "let out" on a regular basis, (even free) i think you need a formal agreement around the terms of use, things like the hours they will be there, maximimum number of cars etc. any fees, and liabilities

The village hall's insurance policy needs to cover the risks associated with letting parking spaces be used by non-hall users and the trustees would need to consider their liability for vehicles and any damage or theft.

The purpose of the car park is normally for people using the hall. Maybe it would be a good idea for the committee to consult with the local community and regular hall users before allowing any changes.

The village hall committee remains responsible for the health and safety of all users of their premises which inevitably includes the car park.

I'd look at the governing document first - it may specifically rule out use by people not using the hall.

Tell the resident that she needs to hire the village hall if she wants to provide off-road parking for her customers…….sorted.

Surely the VH car park is there for the VH users, not random people - VH committee need to look at this as an income generating opportunity - the resident is benefitting from her customers but should not assume the right to use the VH car parking facility without paying.

You are not being unreasonable! Why should she use the village hall car park to profit from her business!? The car park is for village hall users.
Get your committee members to send an official letter explaining why this is not acceptable- she has no right to use the village hall car park to benefit her business. I hope she takes the news well and there are no bad feelings! Good luck.

The document extract you have attached is about annexing part of the hall not the car park.

All of what NS says but if there is nothing to preclude it, I’d say it very much very much depends on how many spaces there are, to what extent they are used and when e.g. is the car park busy at the same time she runs her class(es)?

Our village hall has 60 spaces. There is a barrier demarcating which are reserved for activities in the hall (of which there are several every day, most well attended) and which can be used by people doing other things e.g. dog walking in the park that the hall is part of.

We have a village coach outing group (full day and evening trips) which picks up at the hall. It is running two sometimes three trips a week. Most sell out very quickly. People going on the outings are allowed to park in the village hall car park for the day as long as they don’t use the spaces beyond the barrier reserved for hall users. Any overflow uses the pub car park next door.

I suspect the people running the coach outings are paying the parish council and pub for these facilities.

How often is she running this class?

Would it not be simpler for her to run it in the village hall? Ten people (or more assuming some may arrive in the same car) is a lot to have exercising in someone’s home. I can only assume it’s something like seated yoga. If she hired the hall she would have scope to expand the business. The extra income she could generate would pay for the hall hire.

Thank you to you both. * NotSpaghetti* we are a charity and from what I understand we are within our rights and obligations to refuse.. We will just have to sit down and word our response in as conciliatory way as possible, emphasising that it isn’t in our remit to allow it. I don’t think it will be well received though.
Astitchintime the car park is for the hirers of the hall, unfortunately the business woman can’t quite understand that.
She couldn’t pay. Her classes are quite frequent, she would be giving us all her profits.
I’m beginning to feel I live in Dibley, we need a Geraldine! I don’t think that I will be doing any more volunteering.

Can you gate it?

Our library has a car park which gets used when the library is open - by people using the shops despite the warning notices saying it will be locked shut when the library closes. People get quite irate when they get locked in but soon stop abusing the facility.

If you charge to hire the hall out there is no reason why a modest fee for car parking by this resident should not be charged
Make sure you get a proper agreement signed.

As an aside, I would be interested in what her position is regarding business rates because someone selling goods or services to people who visit their property might be.

www.gov.uk/introduction-to-business-rates/working-at-home

I would also be interested in whether she is adhering to health and safety provisions and whether she even has permission to run the business. There are regulations about running fitness businesses from home including DBS checking, first aid training, public liability insurance, a music licence if her customers are exercising to music to name just a few.

I mention these as it could be one of your arguments to refuse. The parish council can’t be seen to be accommodating a business that may not be adhering to the law.

No, I think she has a cheek expecting to have the free (I assume) use of your car park.

If she has no parking at her home, it doesn’t sound a good advert for her business actually.

If you were to let her use the car park, who would be liable if cars got pranged, someone got knocked down, a car got stolen…?

A whole can of worms would open up, as she wouldn’t be a ‘user’ or ‘hirer’.

Sounds like she should hire the hall for her classes, and have legitimate use of car park.

I checked the cost for hiring our village hall’s smaller of two rooms. It can accommodate 50 people. It costs just £18 an hour - which is enough time for an exercise class. Assuming your hire charges are similar and if she has around ten people doing the class, the cost of hire could easily be incorporated into the cost of the class.

I see no reason to be ingratiating with this indivdiual. It is quite clear that the village hall car park is for the use of people using the village hall.

If she wants her clients to use the village hall carpark, she must hire the village hall for her class.

Just write to her courteously staing just that end of. Doing the right thing is far more important than whether people like you or not.

I don’t know this woman personally and obviously she has a room big enough to accommodate her exercisers so wants to use that, we aren’t as pricey as your hall Silverbrooks but she has set up at home now. I don’t think she thought the problem of parking would be such an issue.
We have a meeting coming up next week and will go through our obligations to our paying hirers.
Kitty we haven’t got that far yet! Let’s hope we don’t.
David one of the problems is that we are talking a few cars, not just one and although we have regular groups that hire the hall we also get one off events, eg.wakes, and that usually means the car park is full.
Luckily I m not an ‘important ’ member of the committee so won’t have to wade through all the old paperwork but I hope, after the points that have been made on here, that I am now in a better position to ask useful questions.

Thanks for popping back, Querty

I hope this is soon resolved.

I am a trustee at our village hall. We have parents using our car park to pick up their children at the adjacent sports club. The sports club have a car park but it would mean walking another 100 yards!

We are monitoring it - ATM it doesn't interfere with our hirers. How about some notices? If that doesn't work send her a letter. Or, you could try a marshal for a few days - turn them away after explaining it is not a public car park.

It's not on. We actually encourage parents to use the VH for school drop offs and pick ups - only 10 minutes or so and it stops them blocking off the residential road opposite the school, but again, it means walking 200 yards!

We have a real battle on our hands increasing our rate for commercial groups who have been using the hall for many years - the previous committee had let the hall fall into disrepair and it was run by an autocratic elderly woman. Fortunately when we became a charity they all resigned. We have a fitness group with a turnover of £100k a year paying £11 an hour and a commercial nursery. Of course they are saying they benefit the community. Anyway that is another topic.

I was on a VH Committee so have some experience. The simplest answer would be for lady to move her class to the village hall from her home; income for the VH, cars able to use the car park with no issues. The VH insurance policy will probably not cover non-users of the hall. There is also an issue around timings. The VH will have a schedule of events so will know when there is likely to be more traffic in the carpark. Users will resent non-users taking up ‘their’ spaces.
The carpark will be classed as private land under the auspices of the committee so it can draw up reasonable conditions of use. In Kent( where I am) there is a county wide advisory board for parish councils which usually have an interest in the VH. I would approach them. Good luck! Village halls are a hot bed of emotion!

My first question would be does the woman have a license to operate a business from home, I suspect she has not and probably no public liability insurance for those going to her classes. She is obviously charging them at least £5 each if not more and does not want fork out hiring the car park for an hour. At the moment she is not incurring any costs and I guess would like to keep it that way. Definitely wants her cake as well as eating it.

I think any yoga teacher will have insurance or else will not get many clients?
I asked about insurance at the gym re personal trainers and at a local pilates studio.

Maybe I'm just odd?? (no need to answer!!)