Has anyone actually been taken to court for not paying a PRIVATE parking fine?

Yes. There is a lot of old outdated advice given out by people who think they don’t bother. They absolutely do, because they realise that if they don’t then people will not bother to stay within the rules. You have to understand it’s not a fine, it’s a charge. Only a small proportion of their users are paying customers, but they pay £60+ a go. In fact, they can be very aggressive about it: I was once sent a charge erroneously for an overstay as their ANPR didn’t catch me leaving. I expected them to cancel it during the appeal as I had obvious evidence but no, turns out they just automatically rejected it. Next was Popla (industry arbitration appeals service) who also rejected it, sending the same automated letters. (Popla is run by people who come themselves from the major parking companies). Next came the court summons. I entered my defence, they still pressed on. It was only the day before the court date when the court arbitration service called me and told me they had offered to settle for £0. It got this far before any human being ever looked at my case (ie their solicitor). I was actually annoyed as by then I had spent hours and hours proving the unreliability of their technology and wanted to present it in court, but I was worried if I didn’t accept the court might be annoyed for wasting their time. Their business model is brinkmanship - threatening people right up to the wire to strong arm them into paying, as it’s much cheaper than employing people to actually check. But it doesn’t make them automatically right. So I would say that if you DO get a notice and don’t have much grounds to appeal it (eg unclear or insufficient signage etc) then pay it, but there are plenty of mechanisms that serve as grounds so check the pepipoo group.