Free Traffic Legal Advice

At the start of May my friend received 2 letters on the same day. The first is an APCOA PCN letter informing them that the car was parked without valid payment and the second a letter from a debt recovery company. The original letter is dated March but not received for more than a month later.

Driver usually pays for station parking by scanning the QR code in the car park but on this occasion (it’s never happened before) the payment didn’t go through and the driver didn’t notice. The driver would have paid the reduced fee of £60 had the letter been received in time to do this but now it’s timed out to even pay the full £100 and the fee increased to £170 despite not having received a letter at that time. The keeper has been registered at the same address for several years and the car is owned, not leased etc. Post sometimes takes a few days to arrive but never over a month!

Looking for advice on what to do next please. No appeal can now be raised with APCOA and the defence that the letter has only just been received isn’t likely to succeed with the debt recovery company. Keeper doesn’t want to risk getting a CCJ / prosecution and is worried about the charge increasing even more than £170 yet doesn’t feel that the £170 is justified.

I tried to do some reading first and note that cases taken to court via the railway byelaws are criminal prosecutions rather than civil matters. The Debt Recovery Plus letter certainly mentions Railway Byelaws. I’ve also read that APCOA ‘never take a case to court’ but also that the regs changed in 2026? Not sure what changed or if it’s relevant TBH. Driver admits that sadly a mistake was made and they didn’t check that they had paid but takes issue over a £170 charge given that the keeper has only just been informed. I don’t want to give my friend duff advice and they definitely don’t want to risk a CCJ or criminal prosecution. Many thanks in advance. 

Railway land is no longer not “relevant land” under PoFA 2012.
https://lordsbusiness.parliament.uk/Document/98511/Pdf?subType=Standard
https://www.ftla.uk/private-parking-tickets/read-this-first-private-parking-charges-forum-guide/
APCOA don’t tend to “do” court, and the criminal prosecution route has been ruled out, and a CCJ which affects credit etc. only happens if you lose in court and do not pay within 30 days. Read https://www.ftla.uk/private-parking-tickets/kellys-storage-luton-universal-parking-enforcement-ltd/msg59804/#msg59804

Thanks. Do you think that as the debt recovery letter states railway byelaws and as far as I understand it proceedings under railway byelaws have to be proceeded with within 6 months this then precludes APCOA from taking this to the civil courts within the 6 year period? I can’t see how they can explicitly mention action being taken under Railway Byelaws which the receiver may have expected to time out after 6 months but then proceed with a civil claim 6 years later. Thanks.

Post up the PCN and other docs received so that it can be seen what they are alleging.

The forum guide that jfollows linked to in the first reply includes advice on uploading.

DRP also refers to a Penalty Charge Notice, which it isn’t.

DRP are pretty useless and probably haven’t worked out that the law has changed.

In any case, they are no party to this dispute and what they say is irrelevant. All they do is make threats to hope you pay up, from which they take a cut, but if you don’t they can’t do anything.

Ignore DRP.
This has been issued as a Parking Charge Notice.