DVLA - terrible at data management

Mr Mustard made a Freedom of Information request to DVLA. He did this because a lady, let us call her Jayne, purchased a used car, and posted in the V5C with her complete and accurate address. Mr Mustard has a copy of what was sent to DVLA. Somehow her car got registered to a non-existent address in Mansfield, a town she has no connection with and has never visited.

Let us suppose the motorist lived at 4 Shakespeare Court, 111 Woodville Road, Barnet EN5 4LX (Mr Mustard's former address by way of illustration as he can't use the actual one for Jayne).

Using the Royal Mail postcode checker we can see the following:

Mr Mustard surmises that because the flats had a block name which precedes the street number, blocks don't come up when you search using the DVLA's method. Staff also can't be expected to know every location. There are 1.3 million postcodes and goodness knows how many blocks of flats.

Searching by road name alone brings up the correct address as the fifth choice. An under strain or slapdash DVLA employee might select the wrong one.

It is only by inputting the complete postcode, a maximum of 8 digits, that you can be sure of getting the correct locale.

The system that the DVLA are employing is more likely to end up in error with their partial matching method, which looks to have a huge flaw within in.

Mr Mustard is going to ask a follow up question to test his hypothesis.

In Jayne's case, she correctly wrote on the form an address in London N2, which is a flat in a block which block has a street number. Somehow, perhaps because of the name of the block, her car was registered in Mansfield.

What is worse is that it was registered at an address which doesn't even exist. Using a different address as an example. If the physical address used was 12 Regina Court, West End Lane the postcode used was for 12 Regina Court Lane which did exist but still wasn't Jayne's address and gave the postman a delivery problem.

The first she knew of the PCNs was when the bailiff knocked on her actual front door and demanded £2,000 at the risk of having her car removed and so she paid up even though she had received nothing at all in the post. It has taken Mr Mustard 3 months to ascertain the cause of the problem, which is one he hadn't ever seen before. He much prefers to keep PCNs out of the hands of bailiffs. It isn't clear that the bailiff had a valid warrant as it may have still had the out of date (and obviously invalid) Mansfield address on it. That is a blog for another day.

Some of you might have noticed that you had purchased a car but not received the 'logbook' from DVLA a month later, others wouldn't. As you don't need it unless you travel abroad or decide to sell your vehicle Mr Mustard thinks the non arrival is an entirely understandable oversight. If you buy a used car, make a note for a month later to chase up the missing registration document ('logbook').

Having watched much of the Post Office Horizon Inquiry Mr Mustard is no longer shocked by the incompetence at high levels in large organisations but DVLA's data processing disaster method is of the same ilk. He has seen complaints on the internet in which a resident complains that an unknown person has registered a vehicle at their address. The suspected rogue clearly isn't always a scam artist but could be the DVLA.

The end, for now.

Paying for parking took 59 minutes

The below is an edited version of a recent PATAS adjudication of a PCN issued to a motorist who parked in the Stanhope Road Car Park and did their best to follow the system, if you can call the way we have to pay a system.

There is no dispute as to the whereabouts of vehicle on the material date; namely at a location requiring the purchase of time to park and the display of a paid-for time voucher and/or facilitating the purchase of parking time by telephone payment.

The Enforcement Authority assert the absence of payment/display in respect of the said vehicle.

The Appellant denies liability for the ensuing Penalty Charge Notice on the basis of the prevailing circumstances as contained in her written representations, supported by mobile device screen-shots and Freedom of Information documentation.

The evidence upon which the Enforcement Authority rely to substantiate the assertion comprises the certified copy Penalty Charge Notice, extracts of governing Traffic Management Order provisions, and computer-generated notes made by the Civil Enforcement Officer together with photographic evidence: still frames revealing the said vehicle in situ, and the applicable signage notifying motorists of the restriction.

The Appellant indicated the full circumstances encountered at the location and clearly described the sequence of events to the Enforcement Authority from the outset, including forwarding copy mobile device screen-shots demonstrating the on-going exchange commenced  at 9.41 a.m. and resolved at 10.40 a.m.

The Penalty Charge Notice was issued during the currency of such payment transaction.

A motorist must be afforded sufficient reasonable time to comply with the requirements of a parking regime, whether that be attending at a voucher-dispensing machine, obtaining and completing a visitor's permit, or completing a telephone payment transaction.

I find the Appellant's evidence to be cogent and credible and I accept it in its entirety.

The points raised by the Appellant deserved proper consideration and due response, I therefore carefully examined the wording of both the Notice of Rejection itself, and the Case Summary to assist in my determination as to whether or not the Enforcement Authority had accorded requisite consideration as it is obliged so to do. 

I note an overt failure to adequately identify/rebut or retort to the Appellant's issues in the Notice of Rejection; a 'belief' that cancellation would be 'inappropriate' does not meet the criteria. Further I observe there to be a similar lacking of compliance of the same in the Case Summary, which infers that since the scenario did not come within an Appeal Ground it was not entertained.

I concluded that the Enforcement Authority had not discharged its fundamental duty under Regulation 5(2)(b) of the Civil Enforcement of Parking Contraventions (England) Representations & Appeals Regulations 2007 which I find to be a 'procedural impropriety' on the part of the Enforcement Authority.

Accordingly, this Appeal is allowed.  (thus the PCN was cancelled)

What a state of affairs when a motorist has to faff about for 59 minutes making payment in a Car Park where the minimum time you can pay for is 30 mins at a cost of 75p (per the council website) and where the business they wanted to transact might only have taken 15 minutes.

If this doesn't show that Pay By Phone is not the solution, when to insert real coins would have taken less than a minute, then what does?

What an omnishambles.

Well done to the motorist for sticking it out all the way to PATAS, Mr Mustard salutes you. NSL, acting as the council's agent, garner no credit for making the motorist go all the way to PATAS at Islington and for doing a poor job of answering the motorist's challenge.

Yours frugally

Mr Mustard

Park yourselves Councillors and listen

Friern Barnet Photo Archive

as you had to do because having generated a petition with 13,000 signatures the constitution says so. Here is the speech delivered by Helen Michael, the doyenne of the (in particular) North Finchley traders who have dared to stand up and have their voice heard.

I have been a resident in Barnet for over 20 years and I have owned a business here for over 6 years.

Despite the downturn in the economy, I and the other traders were able to run our businesses on a break even basis.

In November 2011 Barnet Council introduced a parking regime without any consultation with traders or residents, increasing the parking  charges by 70%, higher than any other borough and more expensive than Islington, Camden and Westminster.

If I, as an example were to increase my prices by 70% overnight, I would find that my customers would go elsewhere.  This is what has happened to our town centres.

Furthermore, the pay by phone system gives no other choice.  It can be unworkable and your scratch cards are elusive.

Barnet Council has united the whole borough in the issue of the parking.  The other traders and I  can identify to the day our downturn in business to when our meters were removed.

As a result of the strong feelings amongst traders and residents and comments made to us by the public, who are no longer able to pop to Finchley for a newspaper, coffee, sweets or to meet friends without being charge extortionately for the visit.  The traders in Barnet, North Finchley and I prepared a poster campaign and petition.  Over 25 local businesses signed the petition and as you know almost 13,000 members of the public signed the petition supporting our cause.  Most were outraged, some incredulous that Barnet Council could be so short sighted and insensitive to the needs of its traders and residents and more importantly so  undemocratic.

Almost all had concerns about the cost of the parking in our town centres. Others had concerns about standing in the street with mobile phones and credit cards in hand. There is of course an issue regarding the elderly ,the hard of hearing and vulnerable members of our society. A large proportion of people do not feel comfortable registering their details.

As a public facing business who speaks to people from all walks of life on a daily basis, I meet hundreds of people  who share our concerns about the dying high street.  Instead of the Council encouraging shoppers to visit the high street, you are encouraging people to Brent Cross who spend a fortune advertising free parking.

Our car parks now stand empty . Our children play football in the Lodge lane car park and I believe there is dogging in the carp park by Poundland as it is so underused.

The other traders and I suspect the revenue collected from parking has taking a nose dive.  This is obvious to anyone  monitoring the use of the car park sand the parking bays which are now empty, where they were previously  over subscribed.  I am sure that this is the reason why the Council is so reluctant despite repeated requests to furnish us with the revenue figures,. This parking system has been a failure from start to finish for locals, parking traffic and traders.   Even more so for the tax payer whose assets are not being realised to its full potential. If the Council can’t get the parking right, what hope is there with the One Barnet Programmes.

Contrast the council car parks with the Spires in Barnet.  A privately owned car park who  made a proactive commercial decision to cut their charges in order to encourage shoppers/businesses which has a been a roaring success and it is now very difficult to get a space both at weekends and during the week. They still operate cash meter which is commercially viable unlike the Council car parks which are seriously under subscribed.

To date I have attended about 9 Council run meetings regarding our town centres.  I  have been interviewed on national TV and until this came along the only positive action take  by Barnet Council was a visit from the Police regarding our poster. Not satisfied with the local constabulary paying me a visit in the first instant,  Barnet Council have insisted that I be interviewed by the anti terrorist squad of New Scotland Yard. Two trips by two high ranking officers and a two hour  interview, two weeks from the Olympics. Need I say more…

A review is now being undertaken some nine months after the Council introduced this system and the funding from this is from the Outer London Fund.  Surely this matter can be better spent on the High Road.   Note from the questionnaire it does not ask  the traders about the change in turnover, nor the parking needs of their customers, nor what percentage of their customers come by car.

The Council have been aware of the issues regarding their parking regime from the outset.  You have accepted that there is a major problem and we have given you several alternative solutions which will not only benefit the council, but may also help local businesses stay in business in these difficult times, providing we can entice people back to our high roads all of which  have been ignored.

I have visited both East Finchley and Finchley town centres. The parking controls on the side streets appear to be for only one hour per day.   In North Finchley parking controls run all day for the whole of the day.  I notice that both Finchley Central and East Finchley have regenerated themselves, whereas North Finchley is in serious decline. This has got to  be as a direct result of a very expensive parking charges in North Finchley. There is no station around the High Road, North Finchley, so there is no issue regarding commuters.

The questions I wish to have answered on behalf of the Traders are:

How much is this survey costing?

Why is there such a discrepancy between Whetstone, East Finchley, Finchley Central and north Finchley?

The parking revenue, both before and after the parking was introduced for 10 months either side?

The traders want to be involved in any consultation and decision making in advance of any  changes and perhaps a trader or two could sit on the committee. The London Borough of Barnet is struggling.  What is their timetable for review and action. Dean Cohen has suggested 50p for 15 minutes.  Does he think he is doing us a favour.? There is concession for that. It is still £2.00 per hour, far too expensive. We would urge the Council to give shoppers half an hour free parking in order to entice people back to the high road. It seems like it is a foregone conclusion as he still wants to charge 50p for 15 minutes.

How much did it cost to rip out our meters?

Businesses are seriously struggling and some cannot wait a year for something to be done. We need a date when any changes are going to be implemented.

We need your assurances in future that anyone involved in supporting campaigns will not be harassed by the Police opposing Council policies.

Mr Mustard did not make it to Tuesday's full Council meeting at which this fine speech was delivered although he has seen the film. It was slightly cut short at the end by a flustered looking Councillor Richard Cornelius who, like the biased referee at a fairground boxing match, cuts the round short when his man is losing. Your administration are all looking a bit punch drunk at the moment though aren't they? We are only in about round 3 of the One Barnet boxing match and the opposition keeps getting stronger, has lots of energy left to taunt you and is showing every sign of being still standing at the end of Round 10 whilst team One Barnet will be out cold.

Time to take up golf maybe Richard?

Yours frugally

Mr Mustard

Move over MetPro : here comes another Barnet Council procurement scandal, and this one is even bigger.

This is an open letter that was emailed to all councillors very early this morning by the Famous Five Barnet Bloggers:

Dear Councillor

Barnet bloggers earlier this year exposed the scandalous use by Barnet Council of MetPro, an unlicensed security company which was paid a total of more than a million pounds worth of residents' money despite the absence of any tender process, contract, or properly regulated payment system.

MetPro proved to be just one among hundreds of similar irregular arrangements sanctioned by the Tory authority, which is currently negotiating the outsourcing of £1billion worth of our council services to the private sector under the One Barnet programme.

During the months of the outsourcing tender process, in blatant defiance of the government’s stated policy commitment to transparency and greater accountability by local authorities, Barnet has consistently resisted, delayed or obstructed Freedom of Information requests by bloggers in relation to matters of public interest, including the much criticised procurement of contracts with service providers. We think we know why that might be.

At this coming Thursday’s audit meeting, 8 December, we are submitting questions to the committee about another case investigated by local bloggers involving the council’s long term use of another private company, RM Countryside, which has been paid more than £2 million pounds of local tax payers’ money with an apparent lack of compliance with the proper processes of tendering, contractual arrangements and the regulations set out in the Constitution.

We are questioning the efficacy of the internal and external audit procedures which are supposed to regulate the commercial activity of the London Borough of Barnet.

The integrity of the One Barnet outsourcing programme is clearly fatally compromised by the failure of the authority to regulate its own procurement, contractual and payment processes and we call therefore for an immediate halt to be made in this programme, and for an urgent, independent inquiry to be held into the disastrous lack of control of the authority’s commercial activities. MetPro was a warning: a warning which has been ignored. Now is the time to stop, investigate and hold the authority to account to the residents and tax payers of Barnet.

Signed:

Derek Dishman
John Dix
Vicki Morris
Theresa Musgrove
Roger Tichborne

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The following is Mr Mustard's view alone.

After bloggers had discovered that procurement  was a disaster ( one wonders how the Commercial Director, Craig Cooper, £132,480 p.a. could fail to know the basic workings of his own department ) a Procurement Action Plan was put in place. Progress on this plan is reported to successive audit committees of which there is one tomorrow ( 7pm Hendon Town Hall - do come along and say hello to the bloggers in the public gallery ). However last night at the Budget & Performance Overview & Scrutiny Committee there was a sign of what is to come. 

One of the key performance indicators that was measured in quarter 2 ( July to Sept 11 ) was #7004 ( see page 16 of agenda item 6 here ) and it related to the number of vendors under formal contract. 

A councillor ( Schama? ) asked Mr Travers what percentage of the top 50 vendors were under formal contract and there was a lot of hedging by Andrew Travers, the Chief Financial Officer, on £1,000 a day, as to what from memory, the number was and he plumped for 70%. 

Oh dear, the councillor pointed out that the report in front of him said it was already 80% and shouldn't it really be 100% we are only talking about the top 50 vendors after all ( note to self, ask to see a list of the top 50 ). At this point the question got shunted back to Thursday when doubtless Craig Cooper will get put up to be cross examined.. 

So what do you get for £1,000 a day, you get a Chief Financial Officer with his head so full of fluffy OneBarnet figures that there isn't room for any knowledge of how far the repairs to the disaster of procurement, with all the attendant financial and legal ramifications, has progressed.

Yours frugally

Mr Mustard

Follow my leader ( into obscurity? )

Follow My Leader

This game is widely played among the Indian tribes, particularly by the boys, and also by the girls. The Leader improvises the steps and the movements, which all who follow must repeat and keep time to the song. The song here given is traditional in the Omaha tribe. It has been handed down from one generation of young folk to another—for how many, "nobody knows."

The Game

A Leader is chosen, and all who join in the game must go where he goes, dance as he dances, move the arms, hands and feet as he does. The skipping and dancing must be in exact time with the song that all must sing. The game gives opportunity for fancy steps, winding, intricate figures, "cutting capers" and merry pranks.

Song

Follow my Leader where'er he goes;

What he'll do next, nobody knows.

Mr Mustard doesn't only point out shortcomings at the Council; he likes also to be helpful and to write to officers and councillors suggesting money-saving and/or face-saving ideas and in the case of the Leader, Cllr Richard Cornelius, the opportunity for him to show some leadership on what has turned out to be a very controversial measure; "cashless parking". That is an idea which is fine in principle but flawed in practice especially when sledgehammered into being rather than slowly & subtly drifted into place as times change. It is an example of how the populace are expected to bend to the will of the council whereas the council proclaim that they are Putting the Community First. You are allowed a hollow laugh at that phrase.

Given that the tendering procedure for the removal of the parking meters has not been properly carried out it should be run again and RM Countryside Ltd would be well advised not to kick up a fuss bearing in mind that they get the vast majority of their work from the council ( in contravention of the Constitution ).

So Mr Mustard will now share with you his short exchange of emails with the Leader Cllr Cornelius ( verbatim except that as usual Mr Mustard has been substituted for my real name )

The email subject was "How to be a Hero"


Friday, 2 December 2011

Dear Councillor Cornelius

Are you fed up with hearing about parking payment problems? Almost everyone is.

You are the Leader. You can fix this mess. Look at New York

Look at that lovely parking meter that takes cash and cards. Parkeon are one of the suppliers to Barnet Council.

Has anyone asked Parkeon if the current machines, which appear to be modular in design, can be adapted. I'll bet they can. Sure it will cost a few quid but £80,000 is being spent on removing and scrapping some perfectly good working machinery.

You will still need to employ some cash collection officers but, as more and more people use cards because it is convenient when the slot is there next to them ( like in Westminster as well as New York )the need to empty the meters so often will diminish.

Have you looked at Big Society ways of dealing with the machines? How about having a team of shop-keepers in each location to empty them each day? A small commission to the traders for providing that service or placed in a special fund to improve their town centre?

There must be a better way than the current one which has been poorly thought out and is being badly implemented.

So, what is it to be? Hero or Zero?

Yours sincerely

Mr Mustard

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Sunday, 4 December 2011

Dear Mr Mustard,

Thank you for your email.  I do not think that there is any future in the machines and now that we are developing the scratchcard option I feel that a lot of the objections to the pay by phone system will disappear.

Richard Cornelius

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The next email had a small change in title. It was "How not to be a hero"

Monday 5 December 2011

Dear Cllr Cornelius

Thank you for your short reply which is very disappointing.

I have seen the 4 page wraparound on the Barnet Times. I see that there will now be 2 voucher values available, £1 for 30 minutes and £2 for 1 hour which can be used in multiples to purchase more parking time. That may well be fine in the 1 hour zones ( if you have planned in advance and don't mind paying £8 for possibly your one and only visit to the borough of Barnet ) but here in High Barnet where the hours are from 8am to 6.30pm a visitor without a mobile telephone will need to purchase 10 one hour vouchers and a 30 minute voucher if they need to stay all day which at face value is £21. That will in effect mean that they will need to buy 12 ( 3 packs of four ) vouchers at £2 = £24 whereas in the Stapylton Rd car park the maximum daily charge is £5. ( Only 20m away in Strafford Rd the daily charge is, strangely, £7 )

If you went to the pub ( I don't know if you drink but please bear with me ) and ordered a round and the barman said "you have to pay by credit card for that round sir, this is a cashless bar, the charge is £7" and you said "oh sorry, I am afraid I haven't got my credit card on me" and the barman then said "that's all right sir, we take drinks vouchers which you buy on-line from the council in books of 4 at £2 each; however the cash price for your round is £21 so that will be £24 of vouchers you need to buy", I think you would leave and find a bar in another town. Please feel free to tell me that I am completely wrong.

Yours sincerely

Mr Mustard

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Mr Mustard isn't expecting to hear anything else as Cllr Cornelius has made his mind up, or had it made up for him? He says he listens but then he doesn't act. Not much point in listening then, is there?

Shopkeepers; you can act. If this man comes into your shop please double, treble or quadruple your prices.

Happy days; thinking of his free park anywhere in Barnet permit

What is sauce for the goose is sauce for the gander. 

Have fun.

Yours frugally

Mr Mustard