How to Legally Reach the Owner of an Illegally Parked Car
A car is blocking your driveway, overhanging your space, or preventing the bin lorry from passing. Before calling the tow truck or making the situation worse, know that there are several fully legal ways to reach — or at least alert — the driver. Here is how, step by step.
What you cannot do
First, the reflex to avoid: running a licence plate online to find the owner's name. France's vehicle registration system (SIV) is strictly reserved for law enforcement, notaries, insurers, and a handful of authorised professions. Any website claiming to give you an owner's name from a plate is, in 99% of cases, illegal or a scam.
You also cannot:
- Move or push the car yourself.
- Deflate a tyre, scratch the bodywork, or cause any damage (criminal damage carries up to €1,500 fine).
- Block the car in with your own vehicle as a "lesson."
Stay legal. Less satisfying in the moment, but it stops you from becoming the responsible party.
A note on the windshield: simple but limited
The most common move: a Post-it or folded sheet under the wiper, with a neutral and factual message. "Hi, your car is blocking the exit of no. 12. Please move it as soon as possible."
Good practices:
- Stay polite, even if annoyed. The driver may not be inconsiderate — emergency, breakdown, misread markings.
- Never write threats or insults. In a complaint situation, they come back on you.
- Don't leave your phone number in plain sight on the windshield.
The problem: if the driver doesn't come back until the next day, the note is useless in the moment.
Calling the police or gendarmerie
For genuinely obstructive or dangerous parking (garage exit, pedestrian crossing, disabled space, double-parking blocking traffic), you can call:
- The municipal police (police municipale) during the day.
- 17 for urgent situations or when emergency services are being blocked.
Officers can issue fines and in some cases arrange towing. Response times vary widely: 20 minutes in a city centre, over 2 hours in suburban areas. Towing costs around €121 for the driver — worth it for serious cases, not for a neighbour who parked a few centimetres too close.
Solutions that let you connect without exposing anyone
More and more drivers now put a discreet contact method on their windshield precisely to avoid these situations. The historical problem with writing a phone number on the glass: spam texts, midnight calls, and harassment.
That is the exact problem a service like Klaxie solves. It is a QR code sticker on the windshield. A passerby scans it with their phone camera, writes a message, and the driver gets a push notification — without ever seeing their phone number. Convenient for both parties: the person alerting them needs no app, and the driver's privacy stays intact.
Whatever tool you use, the principle is the same: a car with a contact method gets moved in minutes; a "silent" car can block your exit for hours.
If nothing works
If the vehicle has been there for several days and appears abandoned (broken windows, flat tyres, no registration papers visible), report it to your local council or police. The abandoned vehicle procedure exists but takes time: 7 to 30 days depending on the area.
For everyday situations, prevention is your best tool: a polite note, a call to the municipal police for genuine obstruction, and the idea of equipping your own car so you never become that car everyone is trying to reach.
Want to be alerted if your car causes a problem, without sharing your number? Join the Klaxie waitlist to be notified at launch.
Read next: Car blocking your driveway: 5 solutions · Neighbour parking in front of your house
