My sister had a £40 fine for a driving offence. She wrote a cheque and assumed the payment had gone through. Now apparently the cheque bounced or for some reason the payment failed to go through (not sure of the exact reasons as I have only had a brief chat with her).

She has now received a baliffs' notice asking her to pay £285.34 now or else they will pay her a visit. The problem is that she wasn't informed that her cheque hadn't gone through. There was no communication in between her attempting to pay by cheque and baiiff's notice. She's tried talking to the council but they aren't being helpful.

What can she do in this situation? Should she pay the bailiffs and then try and claim the payment minus the £40 fine back from the council (going through the Small Claims procedure if necessary)? The main issue is that if the council doesn't call off the bailiffs then they will eventually turn up at her door step and the costs will increase even more.

Presumably this was a parking penalty charge. Did she not receive a 'Notice to Owner' document or a 'Charge Certificate' document?

If she didn't then there is a simple solution.

Go to Traffic Enforcement Centre

and download the Statutory Declaration and Application to file the Statutory Declaration out of time form.

Fill it in, giving your reasons that you never received documentation. Get it signed off by a solicitor for a small fee or for free down at your county court.

Send it in to Northampton County Court.

They will force the council to set the PCN back to the original £40 amount.

In the meantime, ignore the bailiffs. If you have to lower yourself to speak to one, tell them that you have filed forms at Northampton County Court and have informed the council of such.

Also check on Neil Herron's excellent site at www.thepeoplesnocampaign.co.uk to see if your council is on his hit list of those many councils unlawfully implementing Decriminalised Parking Enforcement.

Good luck.