Summary: We cannot investigate Mr X’s complaint about the Council’s issue of a penalty charge notice and its handling of his appeal against it. This is because Mr X has used his right of appeal to the Traffic Penalty Tribunal. We will not investigate Mr X’s complaint about the Council’s refusal to accept his argument against the penalty charge notice, its delay in refunding his payment or its decision not to cancel other similar penalty charge notices. This is because these issues did not cause Mr X significant injustice.

The complaint

1. The complainant, Mr X, complains the Council wrongly issued him a penalty charge notice (PCN), rejected his representations against the PCN and did not attend the appeal hearing. He is unhappy the Council continues to assert it is right, delayed in refunding his payment for the PCN and has refused to cancel other PCNs which may be affected by the issue he raised in his appeal.

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The Ombudsman’s role and powers

2. We investigate complaints about ‘maladministration’ and ‘service failure’, which we call ‘fault’. We must also consider whether any fault has had an adverse effect on the person making the complaint, which we call ‘injustice’. We provide a free service, but must use public money carefully. We do not start an investigation if we decide the tests set out in our Assessment Code are not met. (Local Government Act 1974, section 24A(6), as amended)
3. The Local Government Act 1974 sets out our powers but also imposes restrictions on what we can investigate.
4. The law says we cannot normally investigate a complaint when someone has a right of appeal, reference or review to a tribunal about the same matter. We may decide to investigate if we consider it would be unreasonable to expect the person to use this right but cannot investigate if they have already done so. (Local Government Act 1974, section 26(6)(a), as amended)
5. 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

6. I considered information provided by Mr X and the Ombudsman’s Assessment Code.

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My assessment

7. Because Mr X has appealed against the PCN to the Traffic Penalty Tribunal we cannot investigate any complaint about the PCN itself or the Council’s response to his representations against it. We also cannot look at the Council’s conduct as part of the appeal hearing, including that it did not send an officer to plead the Council’s case.
8. While Mr X is unhappy about the Council’s attitude to the issue and its delay in refunding his payment for the PCN we will not investigate these issues separately as they did not cause him significant injustice. We also will not investigate the Council’s refusal to cancel other PCNs as the Traffic Penalty Tribunal’s decision does not create a precedent which requires this. If any motorist wishes to challenge a PCN, including for the reasons Mr X raised in his appeal, they may appeal to the Traffic Penalty Tribunal in the same way he did.

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Final decision

9. We will not investigate this complaint. This is because the main issue raised by Mr X falls outside our jurisdiction and there is not enough evidence of fault or significant injustice caused by Mr X’s concerns about the Council’s actions since the Traffic Penalty Tribunal’s decision.

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Investigator's decision on behalf of the Ombudsman