The core legal position is that enforcement power under a warrant of control ceases to have effect once the debt is paid in full. The authority to take control of goods, including the power to remove or sell them, derives exclusively from Schedule 12 of the Tribunals, Courts and Enforcement Act 2007. Paragraph 6 of that Schedule provides that the enforcement power is exercisable only while the sum outstanding remains unpaid. Upon full payment, the warrant is spent, and any further enforcement activity is without lawful authority and amounts to trespass and conversion.
You state that the penalty charge was paid in full in February 2025 and that Newlyn issued a receipt confirming a nil balance. That receipt is not merely evidence of the transaction but a material representation by the enforcement company that the debt was satisfied. Once that occurred, all statutory powers of entry, seizure, and sale were extinguished. It follows that the seizure of your vehicle in August was unlawful unless Newlyn can establish either that the February payment was not actually received or that it was properly reversed before enforcement recommenced. You are entitled to put them to strict proof.
The next step, therefore, is to prove the flow of funds and the discharge of the debt. You must collate and preserve the following evidence: (a) the February 2025 receipt from Newlyn showing a zero balance; (b) any online payment confirmation or email receipt issued at the time of payment; (c) your bank or card statement showing the exact date, amount, and recipient of the funds; and (d) any correspondence with Newlyn confirming that enforcement was closed or dormant thereafter. This evidence will be crucial both to secure the immediate return of your vehicle and to support any subsequent claim for damages or restitution.
As regards the bailiff’s suggestion that the payment was 'cancelled', that assertion is legally and procedurally fraught. If a card payment was reversed or dishonoured, Newlyn was under a duty to notify you and allow you an opportunity to regularise the position before recommencing enforcement. The sudden removal of your vehicle without prior notice or an updated compliance letter breaches Regulation 7 of the Taking Control of Goods Regulations 2013, which requires at least seven clear days' notice unless the court directs otherwise. Moreover, the failure to notify you of the vehicle’s location violates the statutory obligation under paragraph 61(4) of Schedule 12 to keep controlled goods safe and make them accessible to the debtor.
In these circumstances, enforcement beyond February 2025 appears to have occurred without jurisdiction. Your vehicle has been taken when the underlying warrant no longer authorised such action, and the agents have refused to disclose the vehicle's location or basis for their conduct. This conduct is not only procedurally deficient but substantively unlawful.
To protect your position, you have several options. First, if auction is imminent, you should prepare and file an urgent application to the County Court for an interim injunction to restrain sale. The grounds are that the enforcement action is ultra vires, the debt was discharged, and the risk of irreparable loss (through sale of your vehicle) outweighs any inconvenience to the Defendant. A supporting witness statement should exhibit the February receipt and all payment confirmations.
Second, you should write to Newlyn and the instructing authority (usually the local council) placing them on notice of a claim for unlawful interference with goods and conversion. The council must be reminded that it remains liable for the acts of its enforcement agents pursuant to Southwark LBC v Woelke [2013] EWHC 3492 (QB). Demand immediate disclosure of the payment and enforcement history under the Data Protection Act 2018, including all logs showing how and when the February payment was allegedly cancelled.
In Southwark LBC v Woelke [2013] EWHC 3492 (QB), the High Court confirmed that a local authority is vicariously liable for the unlawful acts of enforcement agents it instructs. This directly advances your position by allowing you to pursue the council, not just Newlyn, for the wrongful seizure of your vehicle. Where enforcement has continued after payment of the debt and the authority to act under the warrant has expired, any further action by the bailiffs is ultra vires. If Newlyn acted without lawful justification in removing and threatening to sell your car, the council, as the instructing creditor, is equally liable in tort for conversion, trespass to goods, and breach of statutory duty under Schedule 12 of the Tribunals, Courts and Enforcement Act 2007. This principle ensures that you are not left at the mercy of evasive enforcement agents and can hold the council accountable for securing redress, damages, and return of your vehicle.
Third, while it is open to you to pay the amount demanded under protest (mitigation on further damages) to recover your vehicle, that payment must be explicitly made without prejudice and accompanied by written notice reserving all rights to bring proceedings for restitution and damages. If you choose this course, the principle in Burton v Ministry of Justice [2024] EWCA Civ 681 supports a subsequent claim that fees or actions taken without lawful authority may be set aside and repaid.
In Burton v Ministry of Justice [2024] EWCA Civ 681, the Court of Appeal held that enforcement agents who act outside the scope of their statutory powers, such as pursuing fees not lawfully due or enforcing against exempt goods, commit actionable wrongs. This authority supports your position that once the debt was paid in full and the warrant thereby exhausted, Newlyn no longer had any legal power to seize your vehicle. Any fees demanded or actions taken thereafter fall outside the statutory enforcement scheme and are therefore unlawful. The case affirms your right to seek recovery of improperly charged fees, damages for wrongful interference with goods, and restitution where payment was made under protest to avoid further loss. It confirms that statutory limits on enforcement activity are strictly construed and that agents who exceed them may be held liable.
Lastly, you may consider, if the original PCN was already the subject of enforcement and is now being enforced a second time, whether to file an out-of-time witness statement with the Traffic Enforcement Centre under CPR 75.7(3), asserting that the enforcement is improperly duplicative or abusive. However, that mechanism is more appropriate where the underlying PCN was not known to you; in your case, the issue is the unlawful continuation of enforcement after payment.
The legal foundation of your position is therefore as follows: enforcement authority ended when payment was accepted in February 2025. Any subsequent action taken by Newlyn is without jurisdiction and unlawful. You should act immediately to stop the auction, compel return of the vehicle, and preserve all rights to compensation.
You have a strong argument in estoppel by representation. Newlyn confirmed the debt was paid in full and issued a zero balance receipt. You reasonably relied on that, took no further steps, and have now suffered loss. It would be inequitable for them to contradict that position. Estoppel therefore prevents them from reasserting liability or enforcing further fees based on the same debt.
