Free Traffic Legal Advice

@Bbwolf and where is the PCN please?

I did not spot any signage, but typically wouldn't look for anything nor look at the pay and display machines as we were parking with the use of a blue badge.

If you carry on with that thought, you're going to get a lot more PCNs !  Being a BB holder does not exempt you from looking to see what restrictions may apply at the parking location. Parking suspensions are common in cities due to the huge demand for parking, so suspensions are applied so whatever is to be done on-site doesn't have to worry about cars obstructing the location.

However, despite the above, the alleged contravention needs checking out. Most councils take photos of the car at the location, and also the applicable sign. Have you yet looked on the Wolverhampton webpages to see if any photos are there to support their PCN  ? Photos are not a legal requirement.

Other aspect is that if you challenge the PCN and it is rejected, and you then do not pay, the council will isuee the next statutory enforcement document, the Notice to Owner. As a leased vehicle, the lessors will hold the V5 Registration Certificate, therefore have legal responsibility for appealling or paying the Notice to Owner. The NtO will be sent to them. Therefore you need to find out what the lease agreement says about PCNs and how the lease company deal with council tickets.

It looks like they make the pictures available at formal NTO stage but you need a webcode for that.

Try emailing them and asking for the CEO's pics.

From what I can see there is no suspension notice on the parking sign and that bagged off machine is not adjacent to the parking bay but somewhere else?

I would send a challenge saying the contravention did not occur as there was no suspension sign on the bay parking sign and as a BB holder you are exempt from payment and had no need to look for pay machines (is it true BB are exempt though).

Problem is if they reject and you want to take it further the notice to owner will go to the registered keeper which is presumably the lease company and you'll need to get them to transfer to you and there may be an admin fee which wipes out the discounted penalty anyway.

But the challenge is well worth doing if facts are as above but wait for others to look at pics.

OP, IMO this case has implications beyond your case, hence the length of my suggested draft. Clearly I don't know the sequence of your events and would apply to any user in principle but whether to you in practice I don't know.

I parked;
I saw the traffic sign immediately ahead which showed that the bay was pay and display and indicated where the machine was located;
There was no other information on the sign indicating that the bay was anything other than operational;
On returning to my car to display my BB, I saw what I now know from the CEO's photos to be a hood but thought this just indicated that it was out of order and as I was exempt from paying did not need to examine further;
I displayed my BB as required and left.

On viewing the CEO's photos, these confirm that other than for the hood, nothing was displayed to indicate the suspension, contrary to regulations, neither did the cover itself indicate the period of suspension, again contrary to regulations. On this point, a suspension is effected pursuant to an enabling power within an order. It has terms and a time period. It does not exist simply because a hood is placed over a machine. I invite the authority to consider the point that it must be axiomatic that there was no warning of this suspension because it only purportedly came into effect when the hood was placed which, according to the authority, immediately brought the suspension into effect.

If this is the authority's standard practice then in addition to being unlawful* in parking terms, it is also discriminatory because any motorist who consults the same sign as me who is of a payment-exempt class has no need or obligation to approach the machine and examine the hood. I strongly suggest that the council's practices needs to be reviewed. If the authority wish to suspend such a bay then all traffic signs pertaining to the bay must carry the signage otherwise, as in my case, a BB holder(or any other payment-exempt class of user for that matter) would be misled.

(*- by unlawful, I refer to the authority then imposing a penalty when prescribed procedures have not been followed)

The PCN must be cancelled.