London Borough of Barking & Dagenham (21 002 325)
Category : Transport and highways > Parking and other penalties
Decision : Closed after initial enquiries
Decision date : 23 Jun 2021
The Ombudsman's final decision:
Summary: We will not investigate Mr X’s complaint about a penalty charge notice as the Council has cancelled it.
The complaint
- Mr X complains the Council will not allow him to pay a penalty charge notice (PCN) in instalments. This is impacting on Mr X financially.
The Ombudsman’s role and powers
- We investigate complaints about ‘maladministration’ and ‘service failure’. In this statement, I have used the word ‘fault’ to refer to these. We must also consider whether any fault has had an adverse impact on the person making the complaint. I refer to this as ‘injustice’. We provide a free service, but must use public money carefully. We may decide not to start or continue with an investigation if we believe it is unlikely we could add to any previous investigation by the Council, or it is unlikely further investigation will lead to a different outcome (Local Government Act 1974, section 24A(6), as amended)
How I considered this complaint
- I have considered what Mr X said in his complaint.
What I found
- Mr X incurred a PCN after driving through a restricted traffic zone. Mr X is unable to pay the full charge and complains the Council will not allow him to pay in instalments.
- The Council says the charge has now been cancelled as it identified a system error in the issuing of the PCN.
- We will not investigate as this matter has now been resolved and we cannot add to this.
Final decision
- We will not investigate as the Council has cancelled the PCN and we cannot add to this.
Investigator’s decision on behalf of the Ombudsman
Investigator's decision on behalf of the Ombudsman