Birmingham City Council (19 020 326)

Category : Transport and highways > Parking and other penalties

Decision : Closed after initial enquiries

Decision date : 30 Mar 2020

The Ombudsman's final decision:

Summary: The Ombudsman will not investigate the complaint by Mr C about the Council issuing him two Penalty Charge Notices at the same time. This is because it would be reasonable for Mr C to use the right to appeal at the Traffic Penalty Tribunal.

The complaint

  1. Mr C says the Council issued him with two Penalty Charge Notices (PCN) for the same offence on the same day an hour apart.
  2. Mr C says the Council should only have charged him once. He says the only reason he paid was because he felt he had no choice.

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The Ombudsman’s role and powers

  1. The law says we cannot normally investigate a complaint when someone can appeal to a tribunal. However, we may decide to investigate if we consider it would be unreasonable to expect the person to appeal. (Local Government Act 1974, section 26(6)(a), as amended)
  2. The Traffic Penalty Tribunal considers parking and moving traffic offence appeals for all areas of England outside London.

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How I considered this complaint

  1. As part of my assessment I have
  • considered the complaint by Mr C and the complaint correspondence he exchanged with the Council;
  • issued a draft decision inviting Mr C to comment; and
  • considered Mr C’s response to the draft decision.

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What I found

  1. On 3 December 2019 Mr C wrote to the Council to say he had mistakenly driven on the bus lane. As a result, he had been issued two tickets for the exact same offence on the same day but an hour apart. Mr C asked if the second fine could be made exempt.
  2. The Council responded by saying it could not deal with his enquiry because the PCN was a statutory process. The Council went on to advise Mr C to follow the appeals process on the reverse of the PCN.
  3. The Transport Act 2000 and associated regulations gives Council the powers to enforce bus lanes and take recovery action.
  4. When Mr C complained about the PCN on 3 December 2019 the Council told him how he could appeal against it.
  5. Mr C can appeal against this charge with the Traffic Penalty Tribunal. This is the procedure set out in law to handle challenges to PCNs so it would be reasonable for Mr C to use it.

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Final decision

  1. The Ombudsman will not investigate this complaint. This is because it would be reasonable for Mr C to use the right to appeal against a PCN at the Traffic Penalty Tribunal.

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Investigator's decision on behalf of the Ombudsman

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