Free Traffic Legal Advice

The PCN from Smart was issued on 26/6 with a presumed delivery date of 30/6. This is more than 14 days after the “Date of Contravention” of 13/6. This, in turn, means that the liability can not be transferred from the driver to the registered keeper. However, in your appeal you seem to have identified the driver.

Normal advice would be to appeal to the IAS, not because they will uphold the appeal but because you can be seen to be following the process. A subsequent court claim will fail, usually because it will be discontinued at the eleventh hour.

However, first of all you should examine what you’ve told them about the driver. If the driver has been identified, then they do not need to use PoFA 2012 ( ) to transfer liability from the unknown driver to the registered keeper. Your appeal may have ruled out this defence.

Also, if you are resident in Scotland, keeper liability under PoFA 2012 does not apply. But, again, if you’ve told them who the driver was at the time this is irrelevant. This may well be the case for the registered keeper, from whom you rented the van.

Essentially, you could have told them to get lost in the first place without identifying the driver. But we are where we are now.

Just to be clear, the driver entered into a contract by parking acording to the terms displayed on the signs, but the identity of the driver is not known unless you tell them, and the liability can be transferred to the registered keeper if the requirements of the legislation are followed, however the legislation is not applicable in Scotland.

Indeed.
If the driver has not been identified, then you can tell them to get lost, however this probably means they will end up pursuing the registered keeper, the person from whom you hired the campervan, who can also tell them to get lost but may not want to do so.

You could tell them that since keeper liability does not apply in Scotland, the registered keeper can not be held liable and the driver has not and will not be identified. You might add that even if keeper liability did apply, the PCN was issued too late anyway. But this would best come from the registered keeper who might not be interested in engaging with these details.