Free Traffic Legal Advice

Hi,

Please find the attached parking charge notice. I went to this car park and the app was not working. We were in a rush so we were not able to pay for the session.
Is anyone able to assist me with the appeal for this?

PS i found an earlier post about something similar but that was about putting in the wrong reg number so not sure if relevant.

Greatly appreciate any advice

Hi,

okay apologies I have re-uploaded this now.
This is addressed to LeasePlan since my car is a lease and the lease company send me any parking fines. I have not had anything addressed to me specifically.

Invariably, receiving a PCN in a leased/hired vehicle is an easy one to beat, as long as the driver is not identified. Do not make the mistake of appealing before the lessee/hirer receives a Notice to Hirer (NtH) in their own name.

I have yet to come across a single PPC that fulfils the requirements of PoFA to hold the hirer liable. You need to understand that the PPC does not know the identity of the driver and no inference or assumption can be made.

Because of the PPCs typical failure to fulfil the requirements of PoFA, only the driver can be liable for the alleged charge. Unless you have identified yourself as the hirer AND the driver, there is no liability for the PCN.

If the PPC is a BPA member, this is usually concluded at POPLA if the PPC refuses to acknowledge that only the driver is liable. If you are dealing with an IPC member PPC, you may have to wait and see if they are stupid enough to tra a court claim. The IPCs secondary appeal service, the IAS, has a reputation for ignoring facts and upholding their members interests over an appellants arguments. Appealing to the IAS has around a 4% success rate compared to around a 45% success rate at POPLA.

Saba and TFL have a little scheme going whereby they try to make POFA apply at TFL railway car parks which involves TFL hiving the car parks into a wholly owned TFL subsidiary. I’ve been unable to force TFL to explain how they think the scheme works legally via an FOI request because they say this is all covered by legal professional privilege (which it probably is) so I’m awaiting an opportunity to test it in court.

This is all academic for this OP because they will eventually get a POFA non-compliant notice to hirer and can appeal on that ground.

OP should read everything they received from the lease company because some lease companies authorise the hirer to respond on the lease company’s behalf. If that’s the case, OP should reply on the lease company’s behalf as keeper, naming themselves as hirer and enclosing in the envelope (or attaching to the online response or email, as applicable) all the documents required to be supplied by the lease company under POFA paragraph 13.

Please get any notion that you received a “fine” of any sort out of your head. As a “hirer” of a vehicle, you may or may not be the driver. Exactly the same as a “keeper”.

The hire company transfers liability from themselves to you as the “hirer”. Nobody knows who was the driver. When you receive the NtH you appeal as the “hirer”. There is no legal requirement to say you don’t know who was the driver. You simply appeal as the “hirer” and the burden of proof to prove that you were also the “driver” is on the PPC. Of course, thy have no way of doing that.

As I am yet to see any PPC correctly serve an NtH to anyone, because they all fail to do so in compliance with PoFA para 13(2)(a), (b) and (c}, and therefore can only hold the driver liable. There can be no inference or assumption that the hirer was also the driver.