Glad to have been of some assistance. I doubt very much the council accepted the argument. Most likely they provided no reason for cancelling or they conceded a minor error.

I'm not sure to be honest. All I know is that she got a letter and it had a telephone number which she used to provide her bank details. If I get more info I will pass it on.

TheBogsDollocks, you are the.. dogs bollocks!

My mum in law got her refund and I am very grateful for you help.

I wrote to my local MP and her reply was arsey, arrogant and she didn't answer most of the questions but what do you expect from a politician. They are all full of it and can now do one!

The potential ramifications for your mum in law is that she may get a full refund. The potential ramifications for the council is that they discover they have acted unlawfully for the last 18 years and have to re-examine their methodology behind vehicle removal. What is likely to happen is that the council will reject the appeal and claim they are acting lawfully. The next step is to appeal to the independent adjudicator by submitting another letter (that I will write for you) and then we hope you get an adjudicator who actually has some understanding of the associated laws and gives the appeal proper consideration.

 

Your mum in law has absolutely nothing to lose and everything to gain. Just make sure the appeal is received by the council within the 28 day period.

The letter is being printed tomorrow and being sent to her to sign and send. Will keep you updated.

Thank you.

You can use the appeal below. All you need do is copy and paste it into a letter or email and make sure you quote the PCN reference number

and sign it at the bottom. Keep all text formatting as displayed below for emphasis. Expect the council to reject but hopefully an adjudicator will see sense and require the council to return all monies paid. You've absolutely nothing to lose. I'm happy to write all letters all you need do is send them off.

Thanks, I will give this a go. Ill send a copy to the mother in law so she can sign it.

Before I do this what are the potential ramifications of sending this letter?

Hi and thanks for the offer of help. I didn't have think I had any grounds for appeal after having a quick look but I would be happy to try. When you say the long game, do you mean a series of letters to and fro to test the waters to see how it goes?

Also, I just wanted to add that the purpose of this thread was to see if there was anything we could do collectively so that local politicians can actually do what local residents are in favour of rather than what they think we want. I know its a big issue and probably not simple but I just wanted to see. I mean something like what we saw with the news of the world and the role that Twitter played in getting people (advertisers) to take notice. These days it is much easier to talk collectively to organisations than it was in the past where it is one to one and puts you at a disadvantage. Just an idea.

At the time you was towed the Council just see it as a car without a permit in a permit bay preventing those that have paid for a permit from parking. Usually at least 30 minutes is given afer the PCN is issued before towing so its not like they don't give you a chance to move.

Of course the council see it that way, except it wasn't preventing anyone form parking. All the attendants that walk up and down the road know that there is always space to park on the road. Thats why it's a load of nonsense.

Its very nice of the council to allow drivers 30 mins but pretty useless when you havent even realised you're committing an offence.

Don't park where you are not meant to and if you need to pay or use a permit make sure its valid whilst you are parked. The vast majority of drivers do not get PCNs whilst others seem to collect them like they are going out of fashion which goes to show it is usually down to the drive. The majority of tickets are issued due to drivers ignorance or taking a chance and getting caught, you only have to look at the circumstances on this board and most drivers are in the wrong and claim they didn't know blue badge rules, you could not park on the footway, went to get change etc etc. The number of times I have heard people claim you are allowed to park for 5 mins on yellow lines makes me laugh, if people spent more time understanding the regulations then far less tickets would be issued. The reason the costs have gone up is because it has been shown that increasing the fine increases compliance and if you look at the cost of parking there is not much difference between the penalty for not paying for a days parking and paying. If the penalty for not displaying a ticket was only £10 why would people pay £15 to park for the day?

I can appreciate what you're saying but im pretty careful and I get caught out. I had an accident a while back and I had a courtesy car. I didn't think about a permit or visitors permit and I got a ticket. I contested it and im still waiting to hear. I know why I got the ticket but I should be let off under the circumstances. Just requires common sense.

I can understand the penalty needs to be substantial but my mum in law having to pay £230 and it was removed even though it wasn't causing an obstruction or preventing people form parking where they live. Was this really necessary? No

Hi, im not sure if this belongs here or in the general motoring forum but I just wanted to ask for advice with regard to what we can do to stand up against the councils and their ridiculous charges for parking offences?

I'm sick to the teeth of councils treating me like a criminal if I make a mistake like forgetting to return to my car on time or not renewing my parking permit. I understand it's my duty to do these things but the charges imposed by the council are excessive. We elect these "idiots" so why can't we do something which will at least puts a fairer system in place?

I've had a fair few tickets in my time for bus lanes, being late and I've also contested a few which I've won. I live in Brent in London and last week my mum in law stayed round. Normally we never forget to put a visitor's pass which costs £1. We did forget and the next day as she was going out she realised the car was missing. £230 later and after a visit to the pound she got her car back. It was a pretty stressful situation for her which isn't good as her health isn't brilliant. She's retired so £230 is a hell of a lot of cash for a simple mistake. Why the car was removed was another matter. There was no need but I guess it's a nice revenue earner.

Anyway, I'm sick to the teeth of these excessive charges. What I want to know is what can we do to take action against these idiots that impose these ridiculous charges and that we elect? I could be delusional but I thought I'd ask.

Remember the "Controlled Zone" sign doesn't have to be present on the street where you actually parked, it only needs to be placed at the entry of the zone (all of them though). So you may need to check for the zone sign further out than the single street you parked in. Even if you discover that you had in fact driven past a control sign, you then need to check whether you could have got to your parking place by any route without passing a sign. If you can, irrelevant of the fact that was not the route you took, then the fine can be contested as not correctly signed.

Thanks for the clarification and I will check this.

If there is no plate

 

 

for the yellow line then it can't be enforced UNLESS you are in a controlled zone, in which case the times and days are listed on the controlled zone plates ie

 

.

 

These are usually situated on the entrances to streets, or in smaller towns the roads in and out of the town. If that makes sense.

Ive checked and neither of these signs are available. Im going to contest it as a result. I will let you know the outcome but Im confident it will be waived and rightly so.

Great and thanks for the speedy reponses. Im sure these signs arent available but I will check of course.

Cheers

I received a ticket last Saturday but I genuinely believed I was OK at the time of parking my car. The problem was there were no signs to indicate the situation wih regard to the meters/yellow lines (I was parked on a single yellow line) on the road where my car was. There were a couple of signs but theye were referring to disabled parking bays. These signs were divided in two parts (top and bottom) and the bottom part referred to the hours being from Monday to Friday. This caused me to belive I was OK and is the reason I have the ticket. Surely the signposting should be better/clear/there in the first place. Normally Im quite thorough but perhaps I should have done more.

Anyway Ive had a look around for info on signs on this site but havent had much luck. Can someone explain the situation and/or point me to any info on the legalities of this?

Thanks:)

The cynic in me says it is because councils want to discourage people from making appeals, regardless of the legitimacy of their claims.

Thats exactly the reason.

I think youll be OK as you have a valid ticket.

Hi there, the same thing happened to my other half in a London council but not once but twice in the same day. These tickets didnt have adhesive so you simply left them on your dashboard and I think one of the tickets was upside one while the other one was dislodged by the door beig slammed shut.

I wrote a letter explaining the situation enclosing a copy of the tickets to show I had complied. They dismissed it and said I still had to pay. In the meantime they were asking me to pay the penalty otherwise ti would go up. The whole process took a while and 2 letters later the charge was £100 (each) going to up to £150 if I didnt pay. Their tactics were out of order as they were basically trying to scare us into paying even though we had valid tickets. Luckily I held my nerve and we were left off but the prospect of paying £300 in total was quite daunting. I was adamant that I was in the right.

That was my situation but I cant guarantee the same thing will happen to you.