"Parking charges"

My husband was in the high dependency unit and then in the copthorne ward following a heart attack. Whilst he was in hospital one of the nurses on the ward gave me green tickets I could use in the car park, these would make the parking charges slightly lower given that I needed to visit daily as he was very ill.

One Sunday the ticket did not work, I called the number of the board by the ticket machine and got through to a recorded message saying there was no one there and please leave a message. What was I meant to do?

Being stuck, I went to the A&E dept nearby, a lady there said she would get a porter to come and have a look for me. After 20 minutes, there was still no one, went back to A&E even though I felt as if I was being a nuisance. Still no one came, in the end I left after paying the full charge.

I was told the ward staff would let me have the tickets for the period my husband was in hospital. I didn’t want to keep asking for them but they were extremely helpful. I guess this system was put in place to help families of people who were in high dependency units in recognition of their need to visit daily.

I did write to PALS about this and was told they would reply to my concerns by 20 Sept but have not heard from them.

A further observation: I believe this hospital is the emergency hospital linked to Gatwick Airport, this make it harder to understand why the car park management people are not available on Sunday.