IT engineer Anton Wheatley believed he had found the cheapest council car park in Bournemouth.

Mr Wheatley, 39, of Mayford Road, Poole, paid £1 for an hour’s parking at the council-owned Alumhurst Road car park in Westbourne and was staggered to discover it was valid for two years.

He bought three more of the tickets and says he believes the council has no choice but to honour them.

Mr Wheatley joked: “I parked there as we were going for a meal at Café Rouge. I noticed that the ticket said October 25 2012. I thought it was amazing.

“As far as I’m concerned the council are going to have to honour that ticket.

“I think that’s the legal side of things. I’ve now got three of them. For all I know that machine could still be dishing them out.

“At two years’ parking for £1 I’m sure there will be a lot of people going there.”

Bournemouth council’s parking management and enforcement section however said that the ticket would not be considered as valid as it must have been obvious that there was a mistake with the machine.

Margaret Leslie, operations manager, said: “As we all know, machines and technology do not always work perfectly.

“The prices and parking durations are advertised clearly on the machine and it would be very obvious to anyone that in this case the machine made a technological error. The ticket machine has been inspected and the problem now resolved.”