Car Broken Down - Multiple Parking Tickets

[msharron]

My car broke down at approximately 7:15pm on Friday 23rd May 2008.

I contacted Brighton & Hove city council parking office first thing on Tuesday morning (after the bank holiday) to inform them that the vehicle had broken down and I been forced to leave it in residents parking bay in good faith. The gentleman I spoke to advised me that he had no way of recording my contact and that I should appeal any pcn’s against the vehicle


Unfortunatly my professional obligations as a school teacher meant that I was commited to attend a school trip from Weds to Thursday the following week.


When I returned the car had been towed away. I demonstrated to a city car pound employee that the vehicle would not start and following a discussion with my garage, the decision was made to scrap the vehicle as it would have cost more to repair it than the car was worth, the city pound were good enough to take the car off my hands, saving me from attending a breakers yard and the £140 recovery fee.

I am however left with 6 parking tickets. I was of the opinion that a vehicle should only be servied a maximum of 2 tickets.


I am in the process of appealing this - does anyone know where I can find some information about statute concerning this matter.

Thanks

[dpick]

Hi similar happened to me last year, broke down had to wait for AA. I was sitting in the car when it was ticketed made no difference to warden.I had to go before adjudicator with paperwork from AA to prove that I had in fact not been parked but that my car was broken down. Ticket was set aside, you will need to appeal this.

good luck dpick.

[green_and_mean]

Councils will waive tickets if a car breaks down but you are also obliged to remove it asap. I cannot see all the tickets being cancelled, being too busy at work is not really a valid excuse for not complying with the law.

[nero12]

Originally Posted by green_and_mean

Councils will waive tickets if a car breaks down but you are also obliged to remove it asap. I cannot see all the tickets being cancelled, being too busy at work is not really a valid excuse for not complying with the law.

get a letter from your employer and state the work obligations you had, and the fact you had no one to act on your behalf while you were away.

Do you have a reciept that the car was scrapped due to breakdown,this will prove that the car had broken down.

Appeal to the LA with your letter from employer and reciept and try to get a discretionary cancellation on the tickets.

It may work.

[nero12]

Originally Posted by nero12

get a letter from your employer and state the work obligations you had, and the fact you had no one to act on your behalf while you were away.

Do you have a reciept that the car was scrapped due to breakdown,this will prove that the car had broken down.

Appeal to the LA with your letter from employer and reciept and try to get a discretionary cancellation on the tickets.

It may work.

Just a quick question about the school trip,
If you cancelled then the trip would be off, a certain amount of teachers per child have to be pressent for health and saftey reasons. You may have a written risk asessement that states as much maybe??

[green_and_mean]

Originally Posted by nero12

Just a quick question about the school trip,
If you cancelled then the trip would be off, a certain amount of teachers per child have to be pressent for health and saftey reasons. You may have a written risk asessement that states as much maybe??

This bares no relevance to the situation next you will suggest you can get off speeeding by saying you will be late for school. The fact is he had from fri to tues night to arrange a garage to collect the car and didn't bother. A phone call to a garage or arranging a relative to move the car was also possible whilst on the trip. I cannot see the Council seeing it any other way.
The Council can legally issue a pcn for every day the car is parked illegally until it is moved.

[nero12]

Originally Posted by green_and_mean

This bares no relevance to the situation next you will suggest you can get off speeeding by saying you will be late for school. The fact is he had from fri to tues night to arrange a garage to collect the car and didn't bother. A phone call to a garage or arranging a relative to move the car was also possible whilst on the trip. I cannot see the Council seeing it any other way.
The Council can legally issue a pcn for every day the car is parked illegally until it is moved.

green im well aware of all that,
however we are here to try and help the LA may with some sort of miracle waiver these tickets . Maybe you have a suggestion yourself to help.

[green_and_mean]

Originally Posted by nero12

green im well aware of all that,
however we are here to try and help the LA may with some sort of miracle waiver these tickets . Maybe you have a suggestion yourself to help.

Not on the mitigation....no!

However the actual PCNs themselves may not be valid probably a better direction to try.

[nero12]

Originally Posted by green_and_mean

Not on the mitigation....no!

However the actual PCNs themselves may not be valid probably a better direction to try.

Yes I agree on the tickets mate,

msharron can you scan the tickets in so they can be checked for mistakes.

[msharron]

There are no mistakes on the tickets as far as I can tell, I'll get them scanned later.

The only technicality is that half of them were issued within less than 24 hours of each other. I believe you can only issue 1 ticket per 24 hours [please correct me if I am wrong].

The car was towed to the city pound the day I returned.
I signed the car over to the council negating the recovery fee and demonstrated the vehicle was in-operable to chap at the city pound.

I have him on record agreeing that the clutch had gone.

Being a teacher - (Deputy Head) I am also a council employee and the school trip depended on my presence.

So - it'll be an interesting fight. If push comes to shove I'll have to pay.

[msharron]

I was also informed that a vehicle may only have a certain number of pcn's affixed to it. Can anyone confirm that?

[nero12]

Originally Posted by msharron

I was also informed that a vehicle may only have a certain number of pcn's affixed to it. Can anyone confirm that?

I think you may have an arguement inso much as the car had broken down, you can prove this so the situation was ouit of your control

In my view the first couple of tickets you can chalenge due to breakdown, however as more time had elapsed say the fifth or maybe the sixth ticket then they may argue that you should have moved it by then.

You can still argue that you had a school trip to attend which was also out of your control but you should have phoned through as green said.
Did you make any effort to have the vehicle moved?

as for the mutiple tickets within the 24 hour period I believe they cannot do this but not sure.

maybe you can get some of the six tickets reduced down to say 1 or 2 and even challenge these.

Post what you intend to do.

[msharron]

being the boring sod that I am, I did in fact phone the council at 9am GMT Tuesday (first business day after the bank holiday) to inform them of the situation and they advised me to appeal any tickets, however they were unable to make a record of my call because their database did not have a facility for logging such calls.

[PPC Buster]

When dealing with councils regarding PCNs you are best always to deal in writing. phone calls can be denied etc.

[green_and_mean]

Originally Posted by msharron

I was also informed that a vehicle may only have a certain number of pcn's affixed to it. Can anyone confirm that?

No as long as its offending you can get as many as the Council see fit or until the tax runs out and the vehicle will be treated as dumped.

[nero12]

Originally Posted by green_and_mean

No as long as its offending you can get as many as the Council see fit or until the tax runs out and the vehicle will be treated as dumped.

green would you agree with my post earlier regarding that she did break down.

[green_and_mean]

Originally Posted by nero12

green would you agree with my post earlier regarding that she did break down.

Personally I would think it reasonable to have removed the car by the end of the following day so any PCNs after that seem reasonable to me ....but then I am mean!!

[nero12]

Originally Posted by green_and_mean

Personally I would think it reasonable to have removed the car by the end of the following day so any PCNs after that seem reasonable to me ....but then I am mean!!

I think ive just worked out your identity,

your Ken Livingstone!! arnt you?

[green_and_mean]

Originally Posted by nero12

I think ive just worked out your identity,

your Ken Livingstone!! arnt you?

Don't start me off on that subject I'm still trying to come to terms with that buffoon Boris being Mayor! :o

[nero12]

Originally Posted by green_and_mean

Don't start me off on that subject I'm still trying to come to terms with that buffoon Boris being Mayor! :o

he was fairly good on 'HAVE I GOT NEWS FOR YOU' THO. HAHAHAHAHAHAHHAHAHAHAHAHA HAHAAAAA!

Anyways, just to recap for this unfortunate OP.
Dont you agree that the first few tickets could be chalenged as this was out of her control, which she can prove.