Free Traffic Legal Advice

Your biggest problem is gonna be the fact that it's a rental car. If the council writes to Europcar and tells them there's a penalty charge notice against the car, Europcar will charge a £50 admin fee.

Europcar will also either:

• just pay the penalty charge notice, then bill it to your credit card
• supply your name and address to the council, transferring liability to you

Europcar also say they won't refund the £50 admin charge if you win the appeal. They'll only refund it if you win and the council confirms in writing that the penalty charge notice should never have been issued. That's a really weird requirement and councils don't usually give that. So it looks like you won't be getting that £50 back easily.

That kind of changes your priorities when dealing with appeals. Instead of doing "the right thing", you're focusing on "what will cost me less?". There are some places in England where a penalty charge is only £25 if you pay up quickly - it makes more sense to pay those than it does to pay the £50 Europcar admin fee, for example.

Your most important question is, do you have good reasons to appeal, or should you pay the £80 before it goes up to £130 or £210 once Europcar get involved?

Councils are allowed to have yellow lines that have different enforcement days and times to the bays. That isn't unusual - it happens in a lot of places. Assuming the lines will have the same times as the bays generally isn't a good idea.

The sign for the single yellow line (the small yellow one) being twisted and facing away from the road is a potential problem. That makes it much harder to see, especially at night in the dark. Some councils would back down if you showed photographic evidence of that - I know my local council would. But London councils are known to play hardball and reject everyone's first challenge. That's probably your strongest appeal point if you do decide to appeal.

You’re in a really bad spot here.

In England, there’s a special court that acts as the last line of defence in these cases. It gives councils the final go-ahead to use bailiffs, and can order them to stop.

That’s not the case in Scotland. Councils can go straight to bailiffs without touching a court because they have debt collection powers that English councils don’t have.

I don’t know the process to get this sorted, and I don’t think anyone else here does either.  If I had to guess, I’d say it’s probably a specific piece of paperwork at the Sheriff Court.

You should speak to Citizens Advice Scotland immediately. There’s a substantial danger of you having to pay these penalties, plus Sheriffs Officers costs. They absolutely can and will just take the money from your bank account.

Generally none. They’ll have a look around and see if anyone is using the machines or walking between the car and the machines. If not, they’ll issue a penalty.

The moment you walk off and either leave the car park or disappear round a corner into another street, you’re fair game.

Walking away to get change from a shop, and things like that, generally aren’t allowed. Walking out of an underground car park to get better mobile signal is somewhat OK.

Generally if you paid within two or three minutes of getting a PCN, you’ve got an OK appeal. More than five is tough unless you’ve got a very good reason.

It is free after 6PM, but only until 7:30PM. Then it becomes no parking overnight until 8AM.

Sign looks fairly standard. There’s a set of rules councils are expected to follow.

Were you the registered keeper or hirer of this car at any point in the past, or is it a completely phantom car?

Here’s your problem. There’s a process to go through and hoops to jump through when appealing a PCN. You have to do the right thing at the right time. Penalty charge notices are a civil process that works on “guilty until proven innocent”. Unless you can convince someone to cancel it, you’re on the hook for the amount.

There’s a fairly substantial chance you’re going to have to pay this unless you plan your next move very carefully. You’re probably at a stage where you need actual legal advice from a lawyer, not parking ticket advice. That will probably cost as much as just paying TfL.

What happened with the appeal to the tribunal, and how did you end up at a court in Peterborough?

It’s a restricted zone. E1 is the number of the zone.

Assisted boarding and alighting is allowed on double yellow lines. Don’t need to display a blue badge.

The dropped kerb is irrelevant because they didn’t issue a code 27 PCN for the dropped kerb, they issued a 01 for the double yellows.

Should be an easy win.

The fact it’s a hire car changes things, as you’ve already found out.

If it was me, I would probably just pay this one since it’s only £25. If you don’t, the penalty will double to £50, the hire company will find out, and they’ll charge an admin fee, which is usually about £20.

They’ll also do one of two things: either pay the penalty and charge your credit card (which leaves you with no way to appeal) or supply your details to the council, who will issue a new penalty to you that you can pay or appeal.

Do you want a 100% chance of losing £25, or a 10% chance of losing £20 and a 90% chance of losing £70?