Birmingham City Council (24 013 360)
Category : Transport and highways > Parking and other penalties
Decision : Closed after initial enquiries
Decision date : 31 Oct 2024
The Ombudsman's final decision:
Summary: We cannot investigate Mr B’s complaint about a Penalty Charge Notice for an alleged moving traffic contravention. This is because Mr B put in an appeal to the Traffic Penalty Tribunal.
The complaint
- Mr B complains about a Penalty Charge Notice (PCN) he received from the Council for an alleged moving traffic contravention. Mr B says the notice did not make it clear that if the Council rejected his representations he would lose the opportunity to pay the PCN at the discounted rate.
- Mr B also complains that when he put in an appeal to the Traffic Penalty Tribunal, the Adjudicator wrongly dismissed his appeal.
The Ombudsman’s role and powers
- The Local Government Act 1974 sets out our powers but also imposes restrictions on what we can investigate.
- We cannot investigate a complaint if someone has appealed to a tribunal about the same matter. We also cannot investigate a complaint if in doing so we would overlap with the role of a tribunal to decide something which has been or could have been referred to it to resolve using its own powers. (Local Government Act 1974, section 26(6)(a), as amended)
- The Traffic Penalty Tribunal considers parking and moving traffic offence appeals for all areas of England outside London.
How I considered this complaint
- I considered information provided by Mr B.
- I considered the Ombudsman’s Assessment Code.
My assessment
- Mr B put in an appeal against this PCN to the Traffic Penalty Tribunal. The Adjudicator considered the issue Mr B complains about and decided the Council was entitled to enforce the full penalty charge.
- This means the restriction to our powers set out at paragraph 4 of this statement applies to Mr B’s complaint. We do not have the power to investigate this complaint and have no discretion to start an investigation.
- Also, we do not have the power to investigate a complaint about an appeal decision by a Traffic Penalty Tribunal Adjudicator.
Final decision
- We cannot investigate Mr B’s complaint because he appealed to the Traffic Penalty Tribunal.
Investigator's decision on behalf of the Ombudsman