Free Traffic Legal Advice

Hello,

I returned from holiday yesterday to find my car had been towed from a residents' parking zone in Tower Hamlets. According to TRACE, it was impounded on 20/01 for being parked in a suspended bay. I was away from 18/01 to 25/01 and did not notice any suspension signs when I parked or left.

I have now collected the car from the pound, paying £505 in fees (£65 PCN + £200 removal + £240 storage). Upon collection I noticed that the rear right tyre is completely flat and won't inflate - presumably punctured. Prior to impoundment, all tyres were in perfect condition.

I need the car for work which is why I paid the fee immediately. But I will hold off contacting the council or initiating a challenge until someone has a chance to lend some advice on this forum.

This is the parking location: https://maps.app.goo.gl/SPo3KBXrffLJPsAz5

Timeline of Events:
16/01 (~23:00): Parked in a residents' bay. No suspension notice was present (or I would have seen it).
18/01: Left for holiday in France. Did not notice a suspension sign when leaving, but it is possible I missed one if it had been put up after I parked.
20/01 (08:59): Car towed.
25/01: Returned from holiday.
26/01: Discovered car was missing, located it via TRACE, paid the release fees, and noticed the flat tyre.

My concerns:
Parking Suspension Notice: Even if the council put up the sign on 17/01 (day after I parked), this leaves only two working days' notice before towing, which seems unreasonable.
Tyre Damage: The flat tyre was not present before the car was towed.

Next Steps:
Should I ask the council for evidence of when the suspension notice was put up (including photos)?
Should I repair the tyre and keep the receipt for a potential claim?
Is there a specific template or wording I should use for my challenge?
Thanks in advance for any advice!

I've just found that evidence is available on https://towerhamlets.tarantoportal.com/PCN/ViewImages using the PCN number (TT58451082) and contravention code (21). There are 51 images in total, I have attached the most relevant at the bottom of this post.

From these, I see that seven bays were suspended for one day for tree works. However, the suspension notice does not include a "display date," which seems unusual. Current suspension notices in the area do include this information - for example, a notice outside my house for 27th-28th January states it was erected on xxth January. From the evidence images, there’s no clear indication of when warning of the suspension was provided.

After reviewing the images, I should revise my earlier comments. Given the location of the suspension notice, at least 2-3 car lengths behind where I parked, I suppose it’s possible the notice was in place on 16th January but was obscured by parked vehicles. Since my house is in the opposite direction, I wouldn’t have walked past the notice after parking, which might explain why I didn’t see it.

One observation: in the evidence photos, my rear right tyre is clearly inflated. This provides good evidence that the puncture occurred while the car was in the council’s care, either during towing or storage.

Lastly, the final few evidence photos are confusing. They show generic line drawings of a car marked up with yellow lines as if to indicate extensive pre-existing damage across the entire vehicle. I’ve attached an example below, but similar images exist for all sides. These markings don’t reflect the actual condition of my car, as seen in the other evidence photos. This seems like an overly broad attempt to pre-empt damage claims. Has anyone encountered this kind of evidence before?

The bottom line on this, is that you've now paid all there is to pay, so it is a total and absolute no-brainer to submit representations, and then, (when inevitably rejected), take them to London Tribunals as you could get some or even all of the money back. If you lose, you've already paid.

This will depend on when the suspension notice went up and if you were parked there before.

I assume you hold a resident's permit.

Tower Hamlets policy is clear in the document we hold:

Any vehicle recorded as having been in the suspended area when the suspension notices were erected must only be
relocated to the nearest available legal parking place.

Damage to your car is a separate issue to challenging the PCN.

Correct, I hold a resident's permit.

Okay, so my next action should definitely be to enquire as to the date of **** of the suspension notices. Is there a suggested best way to do this? Let's say the council tell me it was erected on x date, do they require any sort of proof in respect of this?

If it turns out the notice was in place prior to my parking there on the 16th, do I have any further recourse to challenge the fees given the distance from suspension sign to parking bay for example?

Regardless of the outcome, any advice for addressing the separate issue of damage to my car whilst in council hands?

Tremendously unfortunate that I was parked in one of seven suspended bays, and that the suspension was on the Monday of my week away! Also tremendously annoying for the council to impound a car in this situation rather than simply moving it a few places down or across the street.

We can look at the if the sign was reasonably placed - what is the layout of the bay and what was the parking sign you relied on when you parked, and where was the suspension sign.

I was parked roughly where the white Prius is shown in this Google Street View link:
https://maps.app.goo.gl/Yvak3MAFLDxtrDGu7

I now know, from the PCN evidence images, that the suspension notice was affixed to the lamp post visible on the right side of the image, which also hosts the closest parking sign to the space. When I parked on the evening of 16th January I didn’t explicitly check the sign as this is a spot I regularly use outside my house and the road was also occupied by other residents' cars at the time.

I will contact the council tomorrow to confirm when the suspension notice was erected. Based on the PCN photos, I suspect the answer may be that it was in place before the 16th, and I didn’t see it due to the the presence of other parked vehicles and my house being in the opposite direction.

If this turns out to be the case, the lesson I take on board is that I must in future review the parking sign near my house every time I park. Whilst true that I failed to explicitly check the sign, the £505 fee feels disproportionate. Are there grounds to challenge the decision to impound the car rather than move it a short distance within the residents' parking zone? Or are there other angles I could pursue?

Thanks again for the advice on this.