Finally, some good news from Barnet Council

Although this decision arrives somewhat late in the day, as the first illegally over-priced permits and vouchers were sold in April 2011, Mr Mustard does welcome it as the council are doing the right thing for which they should, finally, be gently applauded.

Mr Mustard does have some sympathy with the council who must have thought that after all the free bad publicity about the permit price hike and the judicial review in national newspapers like the Guardian, that residents would be  stampeding up to the Town Hall with their refund applications. That turned out not to be the case.

What the council probably overlooked was their own statistic about resident churn in the borough in that 8% of residents change each year so those who have moved away (or sadly died) wouldn't have known that a refund is due.

So far only about 5,200 out of the estimated 12,000 who are eligible for a refund have received a collective £1.2m with another £1.3m still to be distributed.

Mr Mustard's only concern with this 9 page report (he has shown you just the main 2 pages) is that as far as Mr Mustard can tell Civica are only going to contact residents at the address on file. There is no indication that any tracing action will be taken if the resident does not respond in order to verify if the resident is still resident or if they have moved away and to obtain the new address.

Mr Mustard thinks that another report to effect tracing will be required later on.

Yours frugally

Mr Mustard

CPZ refunds coming soon

Manyana (beach)

Mr Mustard always thought the 8 weeks and everyone will be paid out promise was going to be hard to meet and since his claim was acknowledged on 5 August (one of the first to claim probably) he has heard diddly squat.

He is grateful to the friend who brought this Delegated Powers Report to his attention (are they not still numbered nowadays?)

Civica - Parking Refunds Contract Award by MisterMustard

Mr Mustard is well known for pulling officers up who break the rules and issue single supplier purchase order arrangements (they often forget the actual contract) but in this case he perfectly understands and agrees with the logic. In addition, the Civica proposed fee seems reasonable and they don't look like they have tried to abuse their monopolistic position.

Mr Mustard notes that of four officers mentioned on the front cover of the DPR, two are interims. He does hope we are soon going to have an absolute minimum of interims and consultants now that most of the "transformation" has been decided upon. Using the paragraph numbers of the report Mr Mustard has the following observations:

3.2 That would be the advertising done by the CPZ campaigners, BAPS, Bloggers and the LidDems in High Barnet (not sure who else). Mr Mustard hasn't seen anything from the council other than on the website which somebody who has moved out of borough is unlikely to look at. Have you had a permit renewal reminder in the last month? Did it have a note saying you might be due a refund? Do please comment below if it did.

3.3 If only the council had said this at the beginning "every effort will be made to contact them" i.e. residents who are due a refund.

5.2 If all 12,000 applications are made that will be a cost of about £7 per refund.

8.7 Mr Mustard doubts that all refunds will be made within 8 weeks of the decision not to contest the judgment, which was made on 2 August. Perhaps this means within 8 weeks of the DPR i.e within 8 weeks of 3 September?

This DPR did set Mr Mustard thinking. Civica will not have entered into a contract which could lose them money and so will doubtless have allowed for the worst case scenario that all 12,000 refund applications will be made. They are therefore confident that they can process a refund for less than £7. 

The council could ensure they get value for money by taking out advertisements in the 3 local papers (include the Ham & High as it has readers from Barnet) one in Barnet First (the odd person must actually read it) put a flyer in with every document from the parking department and NSL, a footnote on every email from the council (instead of that stupid one about saving the environment - Mr Mustard can decide for himself what he wants to print thank you very much) in the advertising hoardings around the borough and on the backs of buses. Traffic wardens could also put helpful leaflets on every car they pass which is sporting a CPZ permit.

The question that we then need to ask is at what cost they could process an application for a permit? There are documents to check so let us allow another £3 for the brief time that should take (a logbook say and a proof of address) and we have a cost to process a permit of £10. We are charged £40 for a permit so aren't they still being used for revenue raising?

I feel a judicial review coming on if the council vote for even an inflationary increase to the cost of a permit.

Yours frugally

Mr Mustard