This would be my considered response to the lease company:
Subject: Rejection of Invoice – Unauthorised Payment of Fraudulent APCOA “Penalty Notice” (Ref: GT02434155)
Dear [Name],
Your latest response is deeply flawed and continues to demonstrate a worrying lack of legal understanding regarding the nature of the so-called Penalty Notice issued by APCOA. Let me make it absolutely clear:
• You paid an unlawful demand from a private company pretending to issue criminal penalties.
• You have no right to recover that money from me.
• You have been scammed.
1. This Was Not a Fine or Penalty – It Was a Private Contractual Offer Masquerading as a Statutory Penalty
The notice issued by APCOA was not a lawful Penalty Notice under the Railway Byelaws. APCOA is an unregulated private parking contractor, not a prosecuting authority, and has no power to issue criminal penalties. What you paid was not a fine. It was a speculative civil demand (invoice), no different from a regular Parking Charge Notice (PCN), misrepresented as a statutory penalty in order to create the illusion of criminal enforcement.
The Department for Transport (DfT) has made it clear—most notably in its 2018 response to POPLA—that minor parking contraventions under the Railway Byelaws are not to be prosecuted under Byelaw 24(1). That route is reserved for serious offences. Following the introduction of the Road Traffic Act 1991, most parking violations in the UK were decriminalised, and the DfT has confirmed that enforcement for such matters is to proceed via civil, contractual charges (PCNs), not through the criminal courts.
To that end, the DfT accepts that operators may issue PCNs for contractual breaches under Byelaw 14(4)(i), but these are civil in nature, based on implied contractual terms. Nowhere has the DfT ever said that private companies like APCOA are authorised to prosecute or to issue genuine criminal Penalty Notices. In fact, the DfT has been careful to distinguish these civil charges from statutory penalties under Byelaw 24(1), which must be pursued by a Train Operating Company (TOC), Network Rail, or a delegated public authority, via the magistrates’ court.
If APCOA truly had the power to issue enforceable statutory Penalty Notices, the following would be true:
• The notice would clearly identify the prosecuting authority and cite the specific byelaw breached;
• It would advise that failure to pay may result in a summons to court, not simply “further action”;
• Payment would be made to the public purse, not into APCOA’s own account;
• And most importantly, APCOA would be able to produce a contract showing explicit statutory delegation, which it cannot.
If you are in any doubt, I invite you to request a copy of APCOA’s contract with the landowner or TOC. You will find that it grants APCOA the limited right to manage parking and issue Parking Charge Notices for breach of contract, but it does not confer any statutory authority to issue or enforce Penalty Notices under the Railway Byelaws. There is no lawful basis for them to suggest they have the power to prosecute or issue criminal penalties. They are relying entirely on your ignorance of the law.
Let me also be clear:
• APCOA has never prosecuted a single notice under the Railway Byelaws in the magistrates’ court—they cannot, because they lack authority.
• They will not sue in the county court, either—because if they did, their fraudulent misrepresentation of legal power would be exposed under cross-examination. A statutory penalty cannot be heard in the county court.
Instead, they rely on threatening letters, official-sounding language, and recipients who can be relied on to pay out of ignorance and fear. That is the entire model.
Had you conducted the most basic legal due diligence—or simply read the notice with a critical eye—you would have recognised that this was a civil contractual offer, masquerading as a criminal penalty, and designed to mislead. There was no statutory instrument, no summons, and no compulsion to pay. What you paid was a fraudulent demand, and your error has directly funded a scheme that depends on fear, misrepresentation, and legal ignorance to extract money from innocent parties.
2. You Denied Me My Right to Appeal and Acted Without Authority
The back of the notice clearly states that recipients have 28 days to appeal. You could very easily have issued a simple cover letter authorising me, as the Hirer, to deal with the matter directly—something that is both standard practice and explicitly anticipated under the lease. Only after an appeal had been submitted and rejected, would you even begin to consider whether payment was appropriate.
Instead, you acted with no due diligence, made no effort to transfer liability, and unilaterally extinguished my right to challenge a plainly unlawful and misrepresented demand.
As already pointed out multiple times, you have been suckered—just like all the other low-hanging fruit on the gullible tree—into funding a scam by blindly paying a fraudulent notice without question. That is your error, and you alone must bear the consequences.
3. This Was a Criminal Offence – APCOA Should Be Reported for Fraud
What APCOA is doing amounts to a criminal offence under the Fraud Act 2006, specifically:
Section 2 – Fraud by false representation: where a person dishonestly makes a false representation intending to make a gain or cause a loss.
• APCOA falsely claims to have legal authority to issue enforceable penalties under the Railway Byelaws.
• They threaten criminal prosecution while never intending or being able to follow through.
• They demand payment into a private account under the false pretence that a criminal offence has occurred.
That is fraud, plain and simple, and the fact that your company paid them without question shows you were deceived—which is the very definition of being defrauded.
4. This Is Your Error – You Must Pursue APCOA/b]
You cannot pass this invoice to me. You are not entitled to recover the cost of your own misinformed and unauthorised payment of a fake penalty. If you wish to recover your money, the correct course of action is:
• Report APCOA to the police for fraud by false representation, and
• Initiate legal proceedings against APCOA to recover the payment, plus your costs.
What you must not do is attempt to offload your mistake onto me.
5. Next Steps
I require your written confirmation within 14 days that:
1. The invoice has been cancelled in full;
2. The admin fee has been removed;
3. No recovery or collection action will be taken; and
4. You accept that the payment was made in error and without my consent.
If you refuse, I will escalate this complaint to the British Vehicle Rental and Leasing Association (BVRLA) and, if applicable, the Financial Ombudsman Service, on the grounds of breach of contract, unauthorised action, and denial of my legal rights.
I also reserve the right to initiate legal action against you for recovery of any losses or costs I incur in defending against your improper demand.
Yours sincerely,
[Your Name]
[Lease Agreement Reference / Vehicle Registration]
Just to clarify... Have you been charged the fee already and are simply disputing it or is the lease company now chasing you to pay the charge and the admin fee? I need to know this in order to formulate a suitable response that educates the lease company about fake Penalty notices from APCOA.
If they are now chasing you for the money, they will have to try and collect it from you through the small claims track of the county court and that is easily defenced. If you are chasing them to refund money they have already taken from you, you will need to try and collect it from them through the small claims track of the county court.
Either way, the core issue will be the fact that the lease company paid a fake penalty notice and they should be reporting the matter to the police. This was not a real Penalty Notice. APCOA is a private company with no legal authority to issue or enforce penalties under Railway Byelaws. Only a Train Operating Company or other 'authority' can issue a genuine Penalty Notice, and any money must be paid to the public purse—not to a private company.
This also cannot be a Parking Charge Notice (PCN), because a PCN is a civil matter based on a contract. It must be clearly presented as a civil contractual charge, not disguised as a criminal penalty. If a private company issues a notice that looks like a fine or uses legal-sounding language to suggest criminal consequences, that is deliberately misleading.
What laws are being broken?
Under Section 2 of the Fraud Act 2006, this is:
Fraud by false representation – when someone dishonestly makes a false statement to gain money or cause someone a loss.
APCOA is pretending the notice is a real criminal penalty, when it isn’t, and demanding payment by threatening prosecution they cannot carry out. That is a false representation made for financial gain, and is why it should be reported to the police.
Their response is dismissive and fails to address the core issues raised in your complaint.
Key Issues with Their Response:
1. Incorrect Assertion That Payment Was Required
• They claim they were "required to pay" because some APCOA fines are issued under railway byelaws. However, your complaint made it clear that this particular notice was not a valid railway byelaw penalty, but rather an unlawful demand misrepresenting legal authority.
• Even if a legitimate byelaw penalty had been issued, payment should have been made to the Train Operating Company (TOC) or Network Rail, not directly to APCOA.
2. Failure to Engage with the Substance of Your Complaint
• Your complaint detailed APCOA's misrepresentation of railway byelaws, its attempt to extort money using misleading threats, and the unlawful wording of the notice. Their response does not acknowledge or address any of these points.
• Instead, they offer a generic response about appealing the fine—despite the fact that you are not appealing, but challenging their unauthorised payment.
3. Failure to Accept Responsibility for Their Unauthorised Payment
• They ignore your point that their lease agreement only allows them to pay fines, penalties, or charges "where necessary to avoid incurring liability."
• They have paid an unlawful demand without first verifying its legitimacy and now expect you to appeal instead of seeking a refund themselves.
4. Shifting the Burden to You
• They state that you should appeal and, if successful, provide confirmation so they can "follow up to secure a refund."
• This is entirely inappropriate—APCOA scammed them, not you. It is their responsibility to seek a refund, not yours.
Recommended Next Steps:
1. Escalate the Complaint to Senior ManagementSend a follow-up complaint stating that their response is wholly inadequate and that you require immediate reimbursement. Make clear:
• The payment was unauthorised and contrary to your lease agreement.
• Their assertion that they were "required" to pay is incorrect.
• You are not responsible for securing a refund from APCOA. They must take action against APCOA for fraudulent misrepresentation and seek reimbursement directly.
• If they do not immediately refund you, you will escalate the matter to the Financial Ombudsman Service (FOS) (if applicable) and/or take legal action.
2. Demand a Formal Investigation and Legal Action Against APCOARequest that they:
• Investigate how they were misled into paying this fraudulent demand.
• Report APCOA's actions to the police and relevant authorities.
• Seek legal action against APCOA for misrepresentation.
3. Escalate to the Financial Ombudsman Service (if applicable)If the lease company is regulated by the Financial Conduct Authority (FCA) (which many are), they are subject to FCA rules on treating customers fairly. If they refuse to reimburse you, escalate the complaint to the Financial Ombudsman Service (FOS).
4. Consider Legal ActionIf they refuse to refund you, you should consider issuing a Letter of Claim (LoC) and filing a Small Claims Court claim against them for the unauthorised payment.
Let me know if you want me to draft a follow-up complaint letter.