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Sevenoaks residents being 'driven insane' by non-stop M&S car park alarm

By: Sean McPolin smcpolin@thekmgroup.co.uk

Published: 05:00, 09 February 2023

Updated: 15:33, 09 February 2023

Furious residents are being "driven insane" by a car park alarm blaring for almost 24 hours.

The alarm at the M&S car park in London Road, Sevenoaks, was set off on Saturday evening and became a nightmare for people living nearby until it stopped the following day.

Actor George Hargreaves, who lives next to the car park, said it's not the first time the alarm has been left to go off for hours and he could still hear the ringing inside his head after it stopped.

"It gets to the point when it drives you insane," the 22-year-old said.

"I’ve got ADHD and am quite sensitive to noise, and so I was supposed to be working from home on Sunday and I couldn’t.

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"Hours after it stopped I could still hear it inside my head, trying to sleep was an absolute nightmare and it’s just a total disregard of public safety.

"I tried calling a number on Google for the car park about 30 times until they eventually blocked my number."

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George Hargreaves, from Sevenoaks, outside the M&S car park in London Road. Picture: George Hargreaves (62308510)

Mr Hargreaves, who is also a video editor, explained how at around 11.30pm on Saturday he rang the emergency services to tell them about the alarm.

He asked them to get in touch with who owns it to make sure everyone was safe.

"They never came, the company is impossible to contact, and at 11:30pm at night there isn’t any way of gaining access to the car park for us to even see if there is an actual fire," he added.

"And of course unless it’s going up in flames emergency services can’t really do anything about it.

"It continued throughout the day and in the morning someone came to open the car park, they opened the shutters and then left."

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Mr Hargreaves says the people who opened the shutters worked for a landscape company and didn't have any access to the security office to check the alarms.

A sign telling people to contact security if there is a problem at the M&S car park in London Road, Sevenoaks, has been left blank. Picture: George Hargreaves (62308512)

He added: "The company number displayed around the car park doesn’t actually put you through to anyone and all calls don’t get transferred once you’ve passed the call option menu.

"There’s a sign to contact security in the car park itself, but there’s just an empty box where there should be a number."

The car park is not owned by M&S, and is ran by Smart Parking Ltd.

A Smart Parking spokesman said: "A smoke detector fault triggered the alarm. We notified the maintenance company immediately, but it took them until the following day to fix the system.

"Although this was an isolated incident, we are obviously unhappy about it and would like to apologise to anyone effected.

"We would like to also reassure residents that the system is fully maintained and inspected annually."

Marks & Spencer have also been contacted for comment.

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