A tradesman claims Tewkesbury traffic wardens for driving business out of the town.

Fire alarm engineer Dennis Hayden was handed a ticket after he parked his van in the town’s Quay Street.

Mr Hayden said he parked on the single yellow line for nine minutes to repair a fire alarm at a pub. He said he unloaded his tools and put a sign in his window to say he was doing work at the Anchor pub at 10.30am but returned at 10.39am and saw the ticket.

He said: “The warden must have been a fast writer and walker if she observed the vehicle seven minutes before writing the ticket.”

Mr Hayden, who lives in Bishop’s Cleeve, has written to Tewkesbury Borough Council, which took over parking enforcement from the police in 2007, to complain.

He said he walked up and down the road when he went back to the van but could not find a traffic warden in sight.

He said: “They are so abrupt, I am just trying to do a job. It gets to the stage where they are stopping people from doing their work – and even the local people are saying that.”

When Mr Hayden, who works for Mainpoint Fire Protections in Cheltenham, told customers in the pub what had happened they told him it was a common occurrence in the town centre. He said: “You just cannot park there at all, even for fixing a fire alarm.”

He believes the council is using parking tickets as a form of income – his ticket was for £35.

In September last year the Echo revealed Tewkesbury’s four parking enforcement officers issued more than 8,000 tickets in the financial year 2008/9.

The authority made a profit of £378,000 from off-street parking, which was spent on public passenger transport services and environmental improvements.

Councillor Phil Taylor, Tewkesbury Borough Council’s lead member for economic development and promotion, said drivers can only stop on single yellow lines to drop off passengers or to continuously load or unload a vehicle for a maximum of 20 minutes.

He said: “In this case, an officer observed the vehicle for seven minutes to determine whether any loading was taking place. After observing no action, a ticket was issued.

“Civil enforcement officers are not allowed to accept notices placed in vehicle windows. This is based on guidance from the Traffic Management Act 2004.”