Merton Council - making it up

 

The restriction probably starts at the junction meeting point, where the give way markings are. Thus Mr Mustard would probably have argued that the signs were not adequate due to placement. The motorist had his own ideas and picked up a sign point which Mr Mustard might have missed, the authorised vehicles point, but not the school term times which he is well aware is improper.

The adjudicator gave careful consideration to the Appeals, far more than Merton Council would have done, as the adjudicator is completely impartial and Merton Council were trying to stiff a motorist for £780

These decisions, as are the hearings, are public which is how Mr Mustard can bring them to you. He often looks at multiple penalty cases.

 

If the same flaws are in your case at a different location or in a different council area you can claim the support of these decisions but they are not precedents. Other adjudicators make up their own minds but may be persuaded by the view of another adjudicator.

Don't just pay PCNs, see if you can find something wrong, you will be amazed if you look hard enough how often councils get it wrong.

The end.

Knowledge is Power and persistence pays off

Mr Mustard helps a loft conversion company if the boss or any of the staff get PCNs. Their contracts with customers require that they provide as many visitor vouchers as are required but still things go wrong sometimes.

This PCN was picked up in Merton:

During the to and fro emails with the office it turned out that the driver had spoken to the CEO (Civil Enforcement Officer = traffic warden) to tell him of the works which were taking place in the street and that he was waiting for his client to sort out a visitor voucher. On arrival the client was on the phone and once he was off it he had run out of printed vouchers in any event (virtual ones may be available in Merton but how tech savvy is the client and does he have to go off to work?).

 

Mr Mustard looked at the photographs and found the driver in one of them. It is timed at 08:51 so two whole minutes before the PCN was issued.

Mr Mustard enquired as to what was said. Apparently the CEO said that the information was in the machine and although the PCN had not yet been printed there was nothing he could do other than complete the PCN. Mr Mustard was not amused. He decided to get the notes made by the CEO by making a Subject Access Request (you too can do this for your own data). He did that on the same day (5 August) as he made the informal challenge. Mr Mustard wasn't worried about the discount for early payment as he intended that nothing would be paid.

During the evening of 15 August Mr Mustard checked the PCN on line, the balance was zero. Clearly when a motorist makes a Subject Access Request the parking department knows that a critical eye is going to be cast over their handiwork so if it is defective it is best to cancel as early as possible. It turned out that they had cancelled the PCN that very morning. He was sent copies of the PCN system after reminding Merton that a response was overdue.

The notes are very interesting. The CEO certifies that he has attached the PCN to the vehicle at 08:52 a PCN which wasn't issued until 08:53 !

 

The payment system was only checked up to 08:46 so any payments made on arrival wouldn't show up, that is a huge flaw in Merton's systems.

 

The CEO comment that no driver was seen would go against Merton at the tribunal as the driver, wearing a liveried shirt, is shown in one of their photographs. If the CEO got that simple fact wrong how much of their evidence could be relied upon?

As to the notes of the conversation, which are mandatory, they didn't exist.

Lots of people assume that local authorities must be right, the truth is far removed from that, incompetence abounds.

 

The loft company were as honourable as they always are, another £50 was paid to North London Hospice.

End.

Merton Council - pay to park for free!

Graham had business in Merton and one condition of his contract with the customer was the provision of visitor vouchers but on this day that deal failed.

A PCN was issued for code 12, being in a residents bay without a permit or voucher.

The informal rejection was written by someone who doesn't live in the real world.

Mr Mustard wasn't concerned, he told Graham to sit and wait for the Notice to Owner. The 50% discount didn't matter as he was after 100% off. Once the Notice arrived a more comprehensive representation was made.

The response was also longer.

Longer wasn't better in this case. The Grounds of Appeal set out the stall in detail.

Once an Appeal was made to an independent adjudicator, a lawyer, whose knowledge of parking law is vast, Merton Council could finally see the writing on the wall and they filed a Do Not Contest form and cancelled the PCN.

Take no nonsense is Mr Mustard's advice.

End.

Malfeasance in Merton (London Borough of)

 

Mr Mustard likes to start his morning with a cup of tea and a perusal of the register of the Environment and Traffic Adjudicators. His main focus is on Barnet cases but Mr Mustard's eye can be caught by other boroughs and this was one such example, or rather, 14 such examples. Here is the text of the adjudicator's reasoning and decision.

Yet another enforcement authority pushing the long discredited theory that they can issue a PCN once every 24 hours where there is a continuous prohibition on parking and in this case there were two of them (not the best parking but that doesn't mean you should be scalped for 14 times £110 = £1,540). This authority tried, reading between the lines, to argue that each new day heralded a new prohibition thanks to the wording of 0.00 to 24:00 hours in the Traffic Management Order ('TMO'). Whilst the adjudicator calmly contradicted that proposition by pointing out the black letter law of the TMO said 'at any time' it shows you what slippery snakes are employed in the parking department of Merton Council, just as in other boroughs about whom Mr Mustard has written on the subject of continuous contraventions.

It is curious that enforcement authorities don't take the opportunity to increase their knowledge by doing as Mr Mustard and other self taught PCN experts so, which is to read the decisions of adjudicators who are experiences lawyers and the final arbiter (unless you fancy an expensive judicial review) of the law in this arena viper's nest.

Take what an enforcement authority says to their own benefit with a pinch of salt and do your own research on the internet or put your case on PePiPoo (silly name but an excellent site) and get good free advice from a selection of lay people who live and breathe PCNs.

Yours frugally

Mr Mustard

Merton - Pandemic parking enforcement

Here we go then with the same FOI questions as you saw Ealing answer. First of all, full marks to Merton Council for such a prompt answer.

Merton only issue about half as many PCNs as Barnet so presumably have about half as many traffic wardens (CEOs). A pleasingly low sick absence level. Not pleasing that they have not transferred any traffic wardens onto other duties in these exceptional times.

Just the same as Ealing, with the notable exception of enforcement around schools, so almost business as usual.

A worrying lack, just as in Barnet, of personal protective equipment (PPE) for traffic wardens. Traffic wardens could have the virus, not know and transmit it via a PCN.

'School safety zones' are becoming more common although they don't exist in the Traffic signs manual, 2019 edition. They are marketing speak for sections of road which you can't drive down at certain times of day.

The website is misleading, as the Traffic Order says nothing about the restriction only operating in term time and Mr Mustard wouldn't know the term times for Merton if he was passing through. The sign below also doesn't say anything about operational dates. The council may not enforce outside term times but if so they should cover the signs over.

This is a sign from Frinton Road.

Rather oddly, if you enter between 9.30am and 2.45 pm you also mustn't stop on the yellow zig zag markings outside of the school as they restrict stopping from 8am to 5pm. A completely illogical arrangement (unless it has been changed since April 19 when the google car went down the road).

This sign, the 'flying motorbike' sign (and which means 'no motor vehicles' of any type including vans, buses, lorries etc) will have a delayed action in creating a safe space as in Mr Mustard's experience, borne out of talking to motorists who were just about to wrongly pass the same sign in Connell Crescent, Ealing, it is one of the least known signs in the Highway Code. Thus it takes many months for compliance and better safety to be established by the blunt instrument of receiving a PCN in the post during which time the council wrings its hands in sorrow, wonders why their scheme isn't working effectively and coincidentally pockets tens or hundreds of thousands of pounds from PCNs. A council which implements a scheme which they know from other boroughs' statistics won't work instantly and fully is morally repugnant.

Anyway, regardless of how effective the sign is, Merton are, perfectly properly, not enforcing these signs during lockdown, and there shouldn't be many vehicles about anyway. They will probably catch the same motorists later so what would be better, from a public education point of view, would be to send zero value PCNs and an explanation of the sign and their locations in order to help achieve the road safety objective.

So that is 2 points to Merton who have hardly backed off parking enforcement.

Yours frugally

Mr Mustard