Free Traffic Legal Advice
Live cases legal advice => Civil penalty charge notices (Councils, TFL and so on) => Topic started by: Hamish on May 30, 2026, 06:33:25 pm
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Yup I'm afraid I've sent the above. Do you mind explaining the issue with the PCN and their NORs please?
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AI = BS. Have you sent this above? There is an issue with the PCN and currently with their formal NORs.
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Thanks all, this is what I've conjured up with some help from AI:
I am writing to make an informal challenge against the above PCN.
The PCN states that my vehicle was observed from 12:37 to 12:43 and that the alleged contravention was “parked without payment of the parking charge.” I ask the council to cancel the PCN on the basis of the circumstances set out below, or alternatively to exercise discretion.
I arrived at approximately 12:40 and attempted to pay for parking using RingGo. I was not trying to avoid payment; I was in the process of arranging payment. I successfully purchased a RingGo parking session at 12:47, only a few minutes later. I attach evidence of the RingGo payment.
The short delay was caused by difficulty completing payment on my phone. This occurred during an exceptional spell of hot weather affecting London and the South East. On 23 May 2026, the UK passed 30°C for the first time that year and the day was reported as the hottest day of the year so far at that point. In those conditions, my phone overheated / stopped operating properly, which delayed my ability to complete the RingGo transaction immediately.
Because my phone was not working properly in the heat, I went into Tolworth Library, which was immediately across the road from where the vehicle was parked, to get into the shade / cooler environment and wait for the phone to turn back on so that I could complete the RingGo payment. I then completed the RingGo payment at 12:47.
There were also no working parking payment machines available on the street, so I had no practical alternative but to use the phone/app payment method.
I appreciate that payment should normally be made promptly on arrival. However, in this case the delay was short, payment was made at 12:47, and there was no deliberate attempt to park without paying.
I also do not accept that the vehicle was present from 12:37, as my recollection is that I arrived at approximately 12:40. The council’s online evidence does not appear to substantiate that my vehicle was present and continuously observed from 12:37 to 12:43. If the council does not accept this challenge, please provide the Civil Enforcement Officer’s contemporaneous notes, all photographs taken, and any other evidence relied upon to show that the vehicle was present and observed for the full period stated on the PCN.
For these reasons, I ask the council to cancel the PCN. In the alternative, I ask the council to exercise discretion given the very short delay, the fact that payment was made, the unusually hot conditions affecting phone-based payment, and the lack of a street payment machine alternative.
If the council rejects this informal challenge, please address each of the points above and confirm whether the discounted penalty will be re-offered.
Yours faithfully,
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So, OP, you need to submit something by midnight ! They may accept a late submission, but are not legally obliged to.
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Thank you! I didn't realise. I thought it was 14 days after the contravention.
I'm going to write up a short appeal now based on what I've said above.
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Tomorrow is the 14 day deadline in which to make an appeal to Kingston Council.
??
The 14-day period ends TODAY because day 1 was 25 May, the date of the contravention.
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Thank you all for your responses.
Tomorrow is the 14 day deadline in which to make an appeal to Kingston Council. Am I ok to appeal on the basis that I made payment within 10 minutes which I feel is a reasonable amount of time, given there are no parking meters, and my phone overheated so I had to wait around 10 minutes inside the library to let it cool down and therefore operate?
Thanks
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Yes, of course time is allowed by adjudicators to pay and to fetch a visitor's permit etc.
But each case turns on its facts and there is no grace period. It's true that authorities specify observation periods and here there were 6 minutes but whatever time only comes into play if there was reasonable process to obtain parking rights underway.
I expect the OP is thinking of the 10 min grace that does apply after the expiry of paid time.
Here we have an overheating phone - a first for us I think.
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I think I have to disagree that no time is allowed to make payment. Clearly there is nothing in statute or regulations about this, but custom and practice, and adjudication decisions.
If no time was ever allowed, nobody could ever park legally. There surely has to be time allowed between parking a car, and then making payment as this takes a finite time. Indeed there have been cases where a parking space demanded a person buy and display a disc. Some years ago this came up for Carlisle where the appellant argued that he arrived and parked, read the sign which told him a disc was needed and to buy one from local shops, which he did, only to find a PCN on the car when he returned. The council lost the case. The adjudicator said that if the council provided no quicker means of paying than buying a disc from a local shop, then it had to accept there would be longer delays between a car parking and a disc being displayed.
I think the basis of time to pay is that it has to be reasonable in the circumstances. Of course, councils with their venal and rapacious practices, refuse reps where some minutes may have elapsed from parking to payment even when the reason is obviously genuine. Most people know little about parking law and are hence fearful of adjudication, thinking it will just railroad through a council refusal, and cost them an arm and a leg. So councils get their money albeit at the discounted rate, but with London councils getting well over £600 million per year in PCN penalties, the system is ripe for reform.
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There is no time allowed to pay. CEOs will often observe to check if someone is in the process of paying but if you're not by the car or a ticket machine you are fair game as all they can see is a vehicle in contravention.
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Thank you. I will try and argue on the grounds that it was one of the hottest days of the year, if not the hottest, and therefore, could a little bit more discretion leniency be applied in how long it could take to get a ticket?
Furthermore, I was under the impression that we had 10 minutes in which to pay for parking, not 5 minutes?
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Any argument regarding your phone goes to mitigation. Yes, you can advance this to the council and hope they exercise discretion, but I suggest you be realistic about your chances. An adjudicator cannot consider mitigating circumstances.
As with any other situation, the council's reply is likely to be that if you don't have the wherewithal to comply(in this case pay) then you should park elsewhere where legal.
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Yes, it overheated in the car. I have it connected in my car to charge and for music, however on that day, I got a message on the iPhone stating it had overheated and it needed time to cool down before it can be used again.
It is an iPhone 13. I've had it since new for about 4 years, so not extremely old.
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Are you saying the phone stopped working owing to heat? What model is it?
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I was at Tolworth Library which is on the opposite side of the road. My original reason for the trip was to print something at the library, however I also went in there to cool down my phone, as I needed my phone to access the library services.
As soon as my phone returned to normal operating mode, I used it to pay for parking via the RingoApp at at 12:47
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So where were you when you paid?
Why did you park there?
Leaving the car unattended is a common reason we see for PCNs, and adjudicators are alert to people starting a session when they see a PCN was issued.
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I will look at the portal later. There is a tiny issue with the wording - which they do not understand - and currently there is an issue with their Noticed of Rejections - the formal one.
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Hi all,
I received a PCN from the Royal Borough of Kingston upon Thames (RBK) on Tolworth Broadway on 23/05/2026.
The PCN says the vehicle was observed from 12:37 to 12:43 without payment of the parking charge. I later purchased parking through RingGo at 12:47.
My account of what happened is as follows:
I arrived at around 12:40, parked, and attempted to pay using RingGo. It was during the unusually hot weather/heatwave on 23 May 2026. News reports from that day state that the UK recorded its hottest day of the year so far and the first May temperature above 30°C since 2012. The same reports also mention amber heat-health alerts across parts of England, including London and the South East.
My phone was overheating / not operating properly, which delayed me from immediately completing the RingGo payment. There are no parking meters on that street anymore as far as I could see, so I had to use the phone/app payment method. I managed to complete the RingGo payment at 12:47.
I have checked the Kingston PCN evidence page and, unless I am missing something, I cannot see evidence showing my vehicle was continuously observed from 12:37 to 12:43. I can see that the PCN alleges those observation times, but I cannot see proof that the car was there from 12:37. My position is that I arrived around 12:40 and paid shortly afterwards. The first photo on the RBK website shows the first photo at 12:42
I have not yet submitted an appeal. I wanted to ask whether there is any realistic appeal point here, or whether this is likely to be treated simply as “payment was made after the PCN was issued”.
Points I am considering mentioning in an informal challenge:
1. I arrived at approximately 12:40, not 12:37.
2. I paid through RingGo at 12:47, shortly after arrival.
3. The short delay was due to difficulty using my phone/app during unusually hot weather, when my phone was overheating / not operating properly.
4. There were no street parking meters available as an alternative payment method.
5. The council evidence page does not appear to show proof of continuous observation from 12:37 to 12:43.
6. If they do not cancel, I would ask for the CEO’s notes, all photos, and evidence relied upon to show the vehicle was present throughout the observation period.
Please see below for both sides of the PCN. I also have screenshots showing I have valid parking via RingGo that I can upload here if required.
https://imgpile.com/p/2WFY9rD
Google Streetview is here: https://maps.app.goo.gl/pDzq4vFZfjzEEpqd8
Would you advise submitting an informal challenge on these facts, and if so, is there any particular wording or legal point I should use/avoid?
Thank you all!