Summary: We will not investigate this complaint about the Council’s handling and escalation of a penalty charge notice. This is because there is not enough evidence of fault by the Council.

The complaint

1. Mr X complains the Council failed to put its escalation of a penalty charge notice (PCN) on hold when he applied to the court to take the process back to an earlier stage. He also complains the Council’s enforcement agents (bailiffs) later visited him at home and demanded he pay more than £500 for the PCN when he believed the case was on hold.

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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 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 to justify investigating, or
• any fault has not caused injustice to the person who complained, or
• further investigation would not lead to a different outcome, or
• there is no worthwhile outcome achievable by our investigation.

(Local Government Act 1974, section 24A(6), as amended, section 34(B))

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How I considered this complaint

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

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My assessment

Background

4. The Council issued Mr X a PCN for a moving traffic contravention in November 2024. Mr X did not receive the PCN as he had moved house but had not updated his vehicle details with the DVLA.
5. Because Mr X did not pay the PCN or appeal against it the Council escalated it in accordance with the statutory process. It then registered the case with the Traffic Enforcement Centre (TEC), which is part of Northampton County Court.
6. When Mr X became aware of the PCN he asked his representative to apply to the TEC to challenge the Council’s escalation of the case. He says his representative made this application on 25 March 2025.
7. When a person makes an application to the TEC any further recovery action must be put on hold. However, a council will only have reason to put further action on hold when they are aware they have applied to the TEC. The TEC notifies the Council of any valid applications.
8. The Council passed the case to its bailiffs in April 2025; they added a £75 fee and wrote to Mr X about their involvement on 1 May 2025. The Council then received notification from the TEC about Mr X’s application on 7 May 2025 and put the case on hold.
9. The TEC refused Mr X’s application on 24 July 2025. Mr X says he did not receive the decision and did not therefore take any further action. The Council took the case off hold 21 days after receiving the TEC’s decision to allow for the possibility of a review request, and its bailiffs visited Mr X shortly afterwards to recover payment of the original penalty charge, surcharges and costs.

Conclusion

10. It is unlikely we would find fault in the Council’s actions. Once notified of Mr X’s application it put the PCN on hold and took no further action until the TEC issued its decision. It then allowed a period for Mr X to challenge the decision before asking the bailiffs to continue. This is what we would expect from the Council in the circumstances and it is unlikely we could say its actions amounted to fault.
11. Mr X’s injustice stems more from alleged failures and delays by the TEC and we can neither hold the Council responsible for these nor say it must provide a remedy for them.
12. Mr X also suggests he is unhappy with the way the Council dealt with his complaint. But it is not a good use of public resources to look at the Council’s complaints handling if we are not going to look at the substantive issue complained about. We will not therefore investigate this issue separately.

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Final decision

13. We will not investigate this complaint. This is because there is not enough evidence of fault by the Council.

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Investigator's decision on behalf of the Ombudsman