Sir,

We visit Tenby every year and spent a lovely week in Warren Street during the Easter holidays. We were a party of nine, arriving in two cars. My husband arrived first and parked immediately in the train station car park, walked into town and collected the keys. An hour or so later, the remaining eight of us arrived, parked directly outside the house, and proceeded to unload the car of both luggage and five children (ages 10, seven and three). I sent a text at the point we arrived, so I know accurately the time we arrived. Imagine my surprise, when, just 11 minutes later, when the driver went outside to take the car to the station car park, we found the following note on the windscreen:

Thanks very much for parking in a 'residents only' area without a valid permit.

If you persist in parking illegally, why not park on the double yellow lines across the road to save inconveniencing genuine residents? If you persist, your reg. no. will be reported to traffic wardens who will issue you with a £60 fine.

Whilst I fully appreciate that there must be visitors to Tenby who do ignore the resident parking rules and try to avoid paying parking fees, please do give some of us the benefit of the doubt, or at least, a little more time to state our intentions before you are so quick to react. We know all of the parking restrictions in Tenby, all of the car parks and had no intention of parking either permanently, or even temporarily longer than required in one of your spaces.

I really do think that 11 minutes is more than acceptable to park, unload and attend to the thirst and toilet needs of five children before sorting moving our car. In fact, it wouldn't have been as long as this, had we not have been actually calling the car park company to confirm the tariff we needed to pay to avoid a penalty, as the tariff was changing the next day to the summer prices and we wanted confirmation if paying the winter tariff would cover us for the week, or if we needed two separate tickets.

Our holiday was therefore tainted slightly from the start, especially as we were with new visitors to Tenby. Hardly a welcome to celebrate from the usually delightful residents. It's just a shame a second note - of apology, wasn't issued as promptly as the first!

Kim Sheppard,

Swindon.