Birmingham City Council (21 012 868)
Category : Transport and highways > Traffic management
Decision : Closed after initial enquiries
Decision date : 18 Jan 2022
The Ombudsman's final decision:
Summary: We will not investigate this complaint regarding a penalty charge notice received for Birmingham’s Clean Air Zone charge. This is because the complainant had a right of appeal against the notice.
The complaint
- The complainant, who I will refer to as Mr X, paid the Clean Air Zone (CAZ) charge but then received a penalty charge notice (PCN). Unfortunately Mr X had paid for the wrong date so a PCN was issued for the date he was in the CAZ.
- Mr X would like the payment he made for the wrong date to be transferred to the correct date and the PCN revoked.
The Ombudsman’s role and powers
- The Local Government Act 1974 sets out our powers but also imposes restrictions on what we can investigate.
- The law says we cannot normally investigate a complaint when someone can appeal to a tribunal. However, we may decide to investigate if we consider it would be unreasonable to expect the person to appeal. (Local Government Act 1974, section 26(6)(a), as amended)
How I considered this complaint
- I considered information provided by Mr X which included the Council’s responses to his complaint. I have also considered our Assessment Code and information on the Council’s website.
My assessment
- Mr X paid the CAZ for the wrong day, but was unaware of this until he received a PCN from the Council.
- The Council issued a PCN to Mr X because it believed he had driven in the CAZ without making the required payment. The penalty charge was £120 although the Council could accept a discount amount of £60 within 14 days.
- Mr X requested that the Council take his payment for the wrong day and transfer it over to the correct day. The Council explained it could not do this because it does not manage the payment system.
- Mr X had a right of appeal against the PCN to the Traffic Penalty Tribunal (TPT) which is a statutory tribunal. An appeal to the TPT is free and relatively easy to use. It is also the way in which Parliament expects people to challenge a PCN. For these reasons, the restriction I describe in paragraph 4 generally applies.
- It was open to Mr X to raise any issues as part of an appeal to the TPT. An independent adjudicator would then decide if the penalty charge notice should be revoked.
Final decision
- We will not investigate this complaint. This is because Mr X had a right of appeal to the TPT against the PCN.
Investigator's decision on behalf of the Ombudsman