Parking ticket, Southwark Council, car taken by bailiff

[pamanar]

I know where I read this but not sure if it covers every area or council. ask you council to provide you with their bailiffs codes of practice or conduct, it should be there im sure .

 

I don't know, but the document is clearly titled National Standards for Enforcement Agents. That would mean all of them definitely.

[pamanar]

The above link is excellent and clearly this type of underhand method of enforcing an unpaid PCN has not changed one bit since 2007 !!

 

I read through it, and it is astonshing that this sort of thing is still happening. I don't think anyone who has first hand power to take action actually cares.

 

This is theft in my opinion, and from the sounds of it in that speech people are being robbed to the tune of millions with this sort of thing. And when you look at it from a financial point of view, of course the Councils don't care...they get their money when they want it regardless of any mistake or shortcoming on their part, and the 'enforcers' are quids in.

 

They may as well be giving murders a slap on the wrist in opposite relation to what can happen to a person for an unpaid parking ticket.

[ploddertom]

Yet again a clear example of theory & practice not adding up together. I agree the Council now have their money but are they aware of the underhand tactics employed. The Bailiff obviously sees this as a way to inflate his fees and his company turns a blind eye as it is a nice little earner for them. The debtor is now put into more debt to clear the sums of money demanded and obtain his property back, but who cares about that - definitely not the Council, the bailiff or his Company.

 

Needs to be brought to the attention of all those involved - the Council, MOJ, MP, local Councillor, local & national press.

 

PT

[pamanar]

No to slander this country's way of doing things, but I am actually Canadian from Ontario, been living here for 5 years. There is a very effective policy to combat unpaid fines set up over there. There is a similar thing to Road Tax which is a sticker that is applied to your reg plate that must be renewed every year or (or every other year, can't remember) that indicates that you have paid the fees for the period for which is it valid. If you drive your car past the valid period, you are will be fined serious serious money for doing so. The catch in all of this is that you cannot renew this sticker if you have an outstanding tickets/fines etc against your car. Therefore you have to pay them, all of them before you can pay for a new valid sticker. For vehicles that do have an abnormal number unpaid parking tickets (something like more than 10 or around there) they can clamp your car, but it's clamped, not hauled away, and it will cost you to have the clamps removed obviously. This sort of policy could so easily be introduced in conjunction with Road Tax, because it's the same situation. If you get caught out with a Road Tax disc out of date...well we all know what can happen then. I'm just so very disappointed that the UK has such good sense in many matters and yet allowed the evolution of legalized theft (that's the way I see it). I already know that the price they gave us on Friday to release the car was £638, which will be at least £730 to included their charges to hold our car over the weekend and then they will most definitely add on an additional fee for coming round our house on Monday to collect their money. That will most definitely mean we will have to pay in or around the sum of £1000 to get our car back. Having room on a credit card to pay this does not by any means mean we can afford to pay this, but what choice do we have? I can only pray that we will be able to recover the money later.

Edited January 24, 2010 by pamanar

[ploddertom]

Having room on a credit card to pay this does not by any means mean we can afford to pay this, but what choice do we have? I can only pray that we will be able to recover the money later.

 

I'm thinking out loud hear and you do not have to listen to me but do the terms Credit Card & Chargeback mean anything?

 

PT

[pamanar]

On what grounds though? Being forced to pay under duress? I'll be willingly paying them, they are not supplying me with faulty goods, there will be no non-delivery of goods...just me complaining that this is all wrong. If there is a way to do this I'd love to hear it.

[ploddertom]

On what grounds though? Being forced to pay under duress? I'll be willingly paying them, they are not supplying me with faulty goods, there will be no non-delivery of goods...just me complaining that this is all wrong. If there is a way to do this I'd love to hear it.

 

Tomtubby's post 10 on page 1 tells you how to stop this. However it may be that you have to pay to get the car back first. When the Out of Time has been granted then will come the toing and froing of who will reimburse you, that is when you do your chargeback - they were quick enough to take your payment and you want it back immediately - the reason - you were charged unnecessarily for something you didn't owe.

 

I note from an earlier post you have had this happen before. Why not file an OOT about your prior ticket - can do no harm.

 

PT

[pamanar]

Hmmmm...it makes sense. How long does a chargeback take have you any idea?

[ploddertom]

Hmmmm...it makes sense. How long does a chargeback take have you any idea?

 

Think it's pretty much quick but not sure. Of course if you could afford let it rest for 6 months then do it plays havoc with the bailiff apparently!

 

PT

[pamanar]

I don't know about that really, it sounds like I could be putting myself in a bad position for a claim to recover our money if it came down to facts and playing by the rules. I'm filing the Out of Date declaration first thing tomorrow, and considering the last time we managed to recover most of the money we paid I rather go that route. Can't drag myself down to the underhanded ways of the bailiff

[ploddertom]

I don't know about that really, it sounds like I could be putting myself in a bad position for a claim to recover our money if it came down to facts and playing by the rules. I'm filing the Out of Date declaration first thing tomorrow, and considering the last time we managed to recover most of the money we paid I rather go that route. Can't drag myself down to the underhanded ways of the bailiff

 

 

Fully understand and respect that.

 

However if they do drag their heels then you could always submit a N1 in the County Court for recovery. Sometimes amazing how quick you can get a result this way as a CCJ plays havoc with the Bailiff renewing their Credit Licence if they are doing other Debt Collection work. As the Council are a party to this they could also be named as co-defendant providing of course you have written to them previously asking for your cash back.

 

Please remember they never gave you much notice.

 

PT

[pamanar]

Oh, I'll be writing to the Council for my cash back no doubt about that, thanks very much for your insight

[tomtubby]

It is simply astonishing the number of cars that are removed by bailiffs every day in identical circumstances as yours with statutory notices going to a previous address.

 

The bailiff WOULD KNOW that you had not received any previous notices because he would have the warrant of execution with your PREVIOUS ADDRESS on it !!

 

With the severe state of the economy as a result of the recession, it is almost impossible to borrow money and for this reason we are hearing of so many cases where the motorist is unable to raise the money to pay the bailiff and his car is therefore sold.

 

We have also heard of many cases where a motorist believed that his car had been stolen and it was not until he received notification from DVLA that somebody has applied for a new log book that they were made aware that the vehicle had in fact been removed by a bailiff for a parking ticket that he had never known about and the car has been sold !!! This is now VERY COMMON !!

 

In two such recent cases we have a BMW that was purchased 5 months before being seized ( the owner was in Spain on holiday when it was removed). The purchase price was £19,000 and "apparently" it sold for £2,300 !!

 

The second car was removed after being located by an ANPR vehicle. It had been purchased 2 months earlier for £10,500. It was sold 7 days later and once again "apparently" sold for under £1,000.

[Fair-Parking]

Going back to Tom Tubby's post 12. Southwark's senior legal compliance officer Ian Mark sent an email claiming that whilst parking in that borough is decriminalised - it is still 'illegal'. This from anybody in that Council is bad enough but completely inexplicable coming from a SENIOR legal compliance officer.

 

In replying to complaint we made to that council a Mr Mahammod stated that the Traffic Enforcement Centre issued 'warrants' whilst a Ms Meehan, senior officer investigsating complaints officer blindly agreed with him.

 

Having explained to these council officials that 'decriminalised' does not go with 'illegal' and having sent an email the TEC wrote confirming that they do NOT issue warrants of execution, the silence of a meaningful reply by Southwark is deafening.

[pamanar]

If anyone's interested in how our car came to be towed by a bailiff...read this post from another site....we weren't the only one's who were shafted by Southwark's online parking payment website...

 

Southwark parking payment website epic fail - MoneySavingExpert.com Forums

[seanamarts]

me thinks, is this done on purpose so they get more money out of you, I wouldnt put it past them

[pamanar]

Okay so after all this business we filed an Out of Time and it has been refused.....what now???

[High Court Enforcer]

How does a £638 equal, even if approximately, the value of a car currently valued at £5800? Even at auction you'd get more than £638 for it. Very wrong.

 

Just for your info, if the vehicle is the only asset available to the bailiff it cannot be considered an over-levy.

 

And whilst Tomtubby may band around these tales of £10k cars being sold for £1k dont believe the hype. TT can you prove any of these claims? Of course not.

 

One point I would add is that it is not unreasonable for a car that if sold privately might fetch £1500 to only realise £150 after auction fees. Remember these cars are usually sold without keys, without log book, without MOT, without service history and at auction without a test drive to a car dealer.

[tomtubby]

Just for your info, if the vehicle is the only asset available to the bailiff it cannot be considered an over-levy.

 

And whilst Tomtubby may band around these tales of £10k cars being sold for £1k dont believe the hype. TT can you prove any of these claims? Of course not.

 

One point I would add is that it is not unreasonable for a car that if sold privately might fetch £1500 to only realise £150 after auction fees. Remember these cars are usually sold without keys, without log book, without MOT, without service history and at auction without a test drive to a car dealer.

 

With respect HCE you are talking nonsense.

Both cases that I have mentioned are completely true and please do not think otherwise.

 

As somebody within the industry, you will know that most bailiff companies do not sell vehicles by way of a "traditional" auction such as British Car Auction (to name a good example) but instead, most rely upon auction house that either use a website that is only available by way of subscription

or to use auctions that are not available to the public.

[RaeUK]

... As somebody within the industry, you will know that most bailiff companies do not sell vehicles by way of a "traditional" auction such as British Car Auction (to name a good example) but instead, most rely upon auction house that either use a website that is only available by way of subscription

or to use auctions that are not available to the public.

 

 

That's sneaky.

 

Best wishes.

Rae.

Edited March 5, 2010 by RaeUK
tie poo [or should that be 'bailiff poo'?]

[kiptower]

not sneeky Rae, the **** have been doing it for years, then cry wolfe when exposed

[pamanar]

Just a recap...we had to pay the bailiff to have our car released, then filed an out of time. For anyone who hasn't read the whole story, they sent all notices to an old address, even though we updated our details with the DVLA as soon as we moved, but then they subsequently picked up our car from the new address, without ever leaving any notice at the new address. Having contacted our old neighbours about this, they confirmed that a notice had been dropped through the letter box at our old address the same morning they removed our car from the new address. Clearly they had no intent of every letting us know that there was a warrant out for an unpaind parking ticket. What I want is my money back. £676 is what we paid the bailiff plus another £90 to the place that was holding our car. Now that the Out of Time has been refused, how do we take this further?

[ploddertom]

Just a recap...we had to pay the bailiff to have our car released, then filed an out of time. For anyone who hasn't read the whole story, they sent all notices to an old address, even though we updated our details with the DVLA as soon as we moved, but then they subsequently picked up our car from the new address, without ever leaving any notice at the new address. Having contacted our old neighbours about this, they confirmed that a notice had been dropped through the letter box at our old address the same morning they removed our car from the new address. Clearly they had no intent of every letting us know that there was a warrant out for an unpaind parking ticket. What I want is my money back. £676 is what we paid the bailiff plus another £90 to the place that was holding our car. Now that the Out of Time has been refused, how do we take this further?

 

I think this has been answered before - not knowing much about these I may get this slightly wrong.

 

From memory if your OOT is refused - don't forget a lot of these OOT are dealt with by the very people who have nicked your car - you have to submit Form N244 cost £75. Suggest you look back over some of the other parking threads unless someone better comes along.

 

PT

[tomtubby]

Just a recap...we had to pay the bailiff to have our car released, then filed an out of time. For anyone who hasn't read the whole story, they sent all notices to an old address, even though we updated our details with the DVLA as soon as we moved, but then they subsequently picked up our car from the new address, without ever leaving any notice at the new address. Having contacted our old neighbours about this, they confirmed that a notice had been dropped through the letter box at our old address the same morning they removed our car from the new address. Clearly they had no intent of every letting us know that there was a warrant out for an unpaind parking ticket. What I want is my money back. £676 is what we paid the bailiff plus another £90 to the place that was holding our car. Now that the Out of Time has been refused, how do we take this further?

 

This does ring a bell. I am sure that I helped you with the OTT!!

 

An N244 has to be filed IMMEDIATELY. You need to ensure that you pay the £75 fee.

 

In addition, you MUST obtain a copy of the Statement of Truth provided by Southwark. This is very important.

 

You can download the N244 and post back here for assistance in completing the various boxes on the form.

 

Did you complain to your MP?

[Fair-Parking]

High Court Enforcer. These vehicles - the ones you say are the only 'asset' - do they include the ones snatched off the street by ANPR equipped vehicles and without warrants or any attempt to contact the owners which would determine just what 'assets' they have?

 

As for sale value. Tom Tubby is right. Perhaps that is because the only auctioneers who would sell cars without log books or keys are those who most of us would view with great suspicion, but who may have an 'understanding' with those bailiff companies trying to make money from their illegal actions.

 

Oh and finally and before I forget - do you think it might be possible to show just ONE instance wherein a bailiff has returned one penny to the owner after the vehicle has been sold at auction without his/her knowledge?

 

Only for some unfathomable reason, I can't find one.

 

You must have the proof there somewhere.