Summary: We will not investigate this complaint about a parking penalty charge notice as it is reasonable to expect Mr X to have appealed against it to the independent tribunal.

The complaint

1. Mr X complains the Council wrongly issued him with a parking penalty charge notice (PCN) for blocking the access to a dropped footway. Mr X disputes this and says he was parked entirely within his property boundary. Mr X is unhappy as he feels the Council failed to properly consider his representations against the PCN, bullied him into paying it and did not deal with his complaint. Mr X wants the PCN to be cancelled and for officers involved to be disciplined.

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The Ombudsman’s role and powers

2. The Local Government Act 1974 sets out our powers but also imposes restrictions on what we can investigate.
3. 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. However, we may decide to investigate if we consider it would be unreasonable to expect the person to use this right. (Local Government Act 1974, section 26(6)(a), as amended)
4. We investigate complaints about ‘maladministration’ and ‘service failure’, which we call ‘fault’. We must also consider whether any fault has had an adverse impact 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 or continue an investigation if we decide there is not enough evidence of fault causing injustice to justify investigating or we cannot achieve the outcome someone wants (Local Government Act 1974, section 24A(6), as amended, section 34(B))

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How I considered this complaint

5. I considered information provided by the complainant.
6. I considered the Ombudsman’s Assessment Code.

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My assessment

7. The Council responded to Mr X’s representation against the PCN, saying it had considered his submissions but that it would not cancel the PCN as it remained of the view that he had parked blocking a dropped footway. The Council stated that a vehicle does not have to be fully obstructing a dropped kerb to commit a parking contravention but that a contravention has occurred if any part of the vehicle is physically over the point where the footway meets the road. While the Council did not go in to detail regarding property boundaries, the inference from this is that the Council did not accept Mr X’s argument in this regard.
8. I recognise Mr X is unhappy with the Council’s response, but we will not investigate. The PCN was issued under the Traffic Management Act 2004, and this provides a procedure by which Mr X could have formally appealed against the PCN, first to the Council and then to London Tribunals. We are not another level of appeal and cannot cancel the PCN. It is reasonable therefore to expect Mr X to have used his appeal right. That he chose to pay the fine does not impact on this view. The procedure allows for a discounted payment amount but if a motorist choses to appeal, the full PCN, double the discounted rate, becomes payable. This is the procedure in law and that the Council advised Mr X of this does not constitute evidence of bullying by the Council.
9. Mr X feels he was issued the PCN due to a vendetta a neighbour is pursuing against him. Again, this could have formed part of Mr X’s appeal case, in mitigation, against the PCN.
10. That Mr X says the Council did not properly deal with his complaint, in isolation, does not cause him an injustice sufficient to justify our further involvement. My understanding is that the Council, in response to further contact from Mr X, referred him to the statutory appeal procedure. It is unlikely, in any case, that we would find this to be fault by the Council.
11. We cannot ask the Council to discipline individual officers as we have no remit to do so.
12. For these reasons, we will not investigate.

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Final decision

13. We will not investigate Mr X’s complaint because it is reasonable to expect him to have appeal against the PCN to London Tribunals.

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Investigator's decision on behalf of the Ombudsman