Fixation Theatre

This company were at the Grange Big Local and Mr Mustard offered to blog their flyer, so here you go. Fun for 3-18 year olds.

Blind to the facts

It is usually a good idea to stay off the pavement, especially a nice newly laid one, even if you know the council don't enforce at this location. The PCN in this case, was for partially dropping the driveway entrance, being 'adjacent to a footway lowered to meet the level of the carriageway' in parking legal speak. The thing is, the driver had permission to be there so should not have been given a PCN.

This is the informal challenge (the first challenge of a possible three, the one made in response to a PCN placed on the car) which was sent in to Barnet Council.

Amazing how the council, via their agents NSL, can send back a response which deals with points not made and omits the ones which were made.

What does Mr Mustard have to say about this response?

• They haven't carefully considered anything.
• Here is the relevant part of the 2003 Act which the council rely on:

• The council have ignored the request for proof that enforcement was requested by the householder - as they don't have it?
• The Act does not include any (as in all) dropped footways, only certain ones.
• Rule 243 does not say what the council says it does, it is specific to wheelchairs and mobility scooters. Rule 243 is also only guidance not the law.
• The motorist did not say they 'were unaware parking in this manner was not permitted' - someone is too fond of cut-and-paste.
• There is no tactile paving at the location - an error of fact renders unsafe the decision to reject the informal challenge.
• The dropped kerb is for vehicular access, not a safe crossing point, as this is what is opposite the driveway

It is the council (NSL?) who are blind to logic, reason and the facts. Anyone would think they rejected informal challenges in the hope that the innocent motorist will give in and pay up as many do but not if Mr Mustard is fighting your corner you won't.

Yours frugally

Mr Mustard

In their first contact with Mr Mustard the motorist said they were going to pay the PCN, they had a conspiracy theory that the council was after them, not so, they are after everyone equally as their budget hole is enormous.

Having done one of his periodical PCN checks Mr Mustard has found that this one has now been cancelled. A wise move Barnet Council.

Greenacre Walk - 3 Nov 19 - to Hadley & back

A week in the life of Mr Mustard

There is of course no comparison with Mr Mustard's somewhat comfortable life but most of his stories start with a picture and this is what he thought of. Mr Mustard will pick up the classic when he next sees it in a charity shop as he ought to read more but he doesn't have much free time and you are about to see why.

Do bear in mind that Mr Mustard has a full time job as a credit consultant / debt collector although he will often go work / PCN / work / PCN / work in order to have a bit of variety and keep up with both.

Here follows a list of the parking ticket related tasks he carried out last week:

Monday

Make formal representations against a Notice to Owner.
Provide advice on a private parking ticket - pointed towards the PePiPoo web forum.
Gave preliminary advice on 3 PCNs for a hire car whilst the resident's car was being repaired - the council were of no help in even mentioning a dispensation for such an event.
Rotherhithe tunnel - gave advice about a PCN for driving a VW Caddy through - yes it does breach the 2T commercial vehicle limit but the location is over signed.
Exiting a one way street in reverse due to a construction vehicle blocking it. Advised to phone the police next time who will either clear the obstruction or give authority to drive the wrong way. Had already lost at the tribunal - advised to pay up.
Gave advice on fighting a Notice to Keeper sent by ZZPS.
Provide advice on a private parking ticket received after a trip to LIDL - pointed towards the PePiPoo web forum.
Provide advice on a private parking ticket received after using a disabled bay - pointed towards the PePiPoo web forum.
Send authority to act letter out for signing.

Tuesday

Still in bed - receive and study a whatsapp message and two emails containing an informal rejection about a council PCN. Send advice to await the Notice to Owner.
Check all of yesterday's tribunal decisions and read any for Barnet.
Study a Notice of Rejection, find a flaw within the PCN, the location is not where the car was parked, send advice to start a tribunal Appeal and then do so once authorised.
Send whatsapp message to a motorist to phone the council to obtain a Notice of Appeal form so that the Appeal to the tribunal can be made in writing.
Receive an email from a delighted motorist that her PCN has been cancelled.
Wrote a blog post.
Exchange a few direct messages on twitter with a lady who now lives at the address of a man who is deceased and who is being bothered by a bailiff.
Answer a councillor's direct messages on twitter about a special permit blue badge bay outside the house of a centenarian so that she can help them the next morning (this was at 10:30pm).
Check a Notice to Owner is in the correct name as its issue was spotted and formal representations were made on line whilst it was still in the post.

Wednesday

Check all of yesterday's tribunal decisions and read any for Barnet.
Make the formal representations against the Rotherhithe Tunnel PCN now an authority letter is held.
Phone the tribunal as Mr Mustard only has one Appeal listed at 2pm and he has no evidence. Having checked the council website which has been set to zero he is pretty sure that the council have thrown in the towel but he does not want to disrespect the tribunal. They check and call back to say the Appeal will be allowed for lack of evidence.
Sent a letter to ZZPS that the Keeper will not be naming the Driver.
Consider a Notice of Rejection, recommend an Appeal to the Tribunal.
Complete form N180 for a court case that is being defended for a friend.
Consider a Notice of Rejection, recommend an Appeal to the Tribunal.

Thursday

Check all of yesterday's tribunal decisions and read any for Barnet. Find that the council have given up on two PCNs. Email the two motorists concerned.
Start an Appeal.
Receive a Notice of Rejection by email and send it on to the motorist with advice to go to Appeal.
Check the status of 8 PCNs.
Email a motorist to see why his balance is now zero.
Email another person to tell them their PCN is now cancelled.
Start a tribunal Appeal on line.
Check for evidence on four upcoming tribunal hearings. Email one of the people concerned to tell them a charge certificate has been issued, that it is an error and they should therefore win for that alone.
Post some advice on the PepIpPoo forum about a PCN issued 3 minutes into a changed restriction in Hampstead High St.
Email yet another person to tell them their PCN is now cancelled.

Friday

Check all of yesterday's tribunal decisions and read any for Barnet.
Receive 3 emails containing various documents for 3 PCNs, save the images, sort all of it into order, make an informal challenge, verify one PCN reference and advise to wait for the next document on two of the PCNs.
Check the status of 23 PCNs.
Email a motorist to tell them to look out for their Notice to Owner.
Email information about why an early charge certificate is so naughty.

Saturday

Check all of yesterday's tribunal decisions and read any for Barnet.
Write an extra ground of Appeal that the charge certificate was premature, upload to the tribunal and send a copy to the council.
Visit the vehicle hire company where Mr Mustard provides advice and deals with anything tough.
Check the status of the upcoming tribunal cases and find the council has given up on one of them. Tell the motorist.
Look at two PCNs he had missed when he was sent three at once. Make formal representations for one of them. Gave advice to await the Notice to Owner for the other one. 
Look at a Camden PCN and advise the motorist to make their own challenge on line as Mr Mustard's name won't help.
Look at a bus lane PCN, provide advice and write a blog about it.
Check 10 PCNs and find that one has been paid.

Sunday

Check all of yesterday's tribunal decisions and read any for Barnet.
Look at a Regulation 10 PCN received in the post. Find an error within it. Advise the motorist.
Write a Review request for an Appeal that he lost outside London, where he never seems to fare as well, and sent it to the motorist to check.
Write a blog post.
Checked seven PCNs and find a charge certificate has been sent.

Mr Mustard is only fighting half as many PCNs as he was doing 2 years ago when he nearly lost control due to sheer pressure of work and parking. He hopes you understand why he tries to limit his help to those who need it the most

- the elderly and not so up with things 
- the physically or mentally disabled
- the poverty stricken
- council blunders

He hopes you have enjoyed this little insight into his world and will understand that whilst he always tries to respond quickly it isn't always possible.

Yours frugally

Mr Mustard 

POFA or not POFA

POFA is the often used shorthand for Schedule 4 The Protection of Freedoms Act 2012. That law was introduced at the same time as clamping on private land was outlawed and gives a landowner (via their chosen parking management company) the right to demand payment from the registered keeper of the vehicle if certain conditions are met.

Mr Mustard doesn't routinely help people with private parking charges but does advise some friends who have a vehicle hire business and receive about 100 tickets (council and private) a week and does a few others just for the practice and the fun of it. Mr Mustard is happy appearing at the tribunal which runs very efficiently to a 30 minute timetable per ticket but can't spend his life sitting around at various county courts waiting to get in front of a district judge. He is though perfectly capable of dealing with a case on the papers and parking companies are usually happy to fight that way as it saves them paying a fee to the legal representative who would otherwise have to be in court.

Here is a Parking Charge Notice to Registered Keeper which a private individual sent on to Mr Mustard and asked for help with.

sorry the edges are cut off but they aren't needed

The rule set by POFA is that if the first document is a Notice to Keeper sent by post, it has to be in the hands of the Registered Keeper by the 14th day after the day of parking, so if the parking was on Friday 1st January, by Friday 15th January. In the above case Mr Mustard noted that the Notice was not posted until the day after the 14 day period has ended and thus would have arrived 2 or 3 days after the period had ended. That would give the Keeper a good defence to a POFA based claim. However, by the wording of the Notice, Mr Mustard came to the conclusion that All Parking Services were relying on a contract having been formed by the driver by the presence of signs, then applying to DVLA for keeper details under the basis of reasonable cause (which Mr Mustard doesn't think is reasonable as the parking company has no idea if the Keeper was the Driver on the day) and then sending what looks like a POFA compliant Notice to Keeper but isn't, it is simply a subtly worded letter inviting the Keeper to admit who the Driver was. This is a bad idea as often the Keeper will incriminate themselves as the Driver and they have the right not to (don't try this with a police speeding ticket, tell them the truth, as the law obliges the keeper to name the driver).

Mr Mustard sent a letter in this case to ZZPS who do all the chasing on behalf of All Parking Services (their details got cut off the bottom of the letter when scanned) which said the following

Your Notice is out of time for good service under the Protection of Freedoms Act and there is no other legislation which requires the Keeper to pay your 'PCN' (a term which a private parking operator should not use as it is liable to be confused with a council document) nor is there any legislative reason why the Keeper 'should' give you the details of the driver on the day in question.

The Keeper is not going to name the Driver and you have no evidence as to who it was.

That letter was only sent this week so Mr Mustard can't tell you the response as yet. He will later.

At the weekend, Mr Mustard popped down to see his friends at the vehicle hire company and asked them if they had any demands from the PCN Admin Centre as they shouldn't release details of the hirer unless obliged to by POFA. He was given this one:

You can see straightaway that there is more content in this Notice to Keeper/Hirer and this is for a site where a ticket was put on the vehicle on the day. The Notice isn't perfect but that isn't the reason for this blog, the reason is to make you stop and think and decide at the beginning if you should be naming the driver or not.

You can easily find a copy of POFA on the internet. Schedule 4 is fairly short.

Paragraph 8 sets out the rules for a Notice to Keeper after a Notice to Driver was issued. That cannot be served until 29 days after the parking event.

Paragraph 9 sets out the rules for a Notice to Keeper when nothing was served on the day. That has to arrive within the 14 days starting the day after the parking event.

Get your analysis correct at the beginning and you will avoid a whole heap of trouble.

Yours frugally

Mr Mustard

Bus lane breakdown

Just when Mr Mustard thinks he must have seen the full spectrum of council effrontery along comes another outrageously wrong PCN to try and fill the budgetary needs of Barnet Council.

In the above shot the blue Honda at the bottom of the picture is stationary and there isn't a driver within the car.

The black car heading down the screen towards it now has two choices. 

The first is to move to the 'wrong' side of the road and overtake the Honda when it is safe to do so. This may be some time given that we are on the A5.

The second is to cut into the bus lane for a short distance, very short given that a check on google street view shows that the bus lane ends where the solid white line ends so any incursion could be said to be de minimis (too trivial for the law to concern itself with) and undertake the Honda.

Clearly the Audi chose the safer undertaking route. One would think that the council or NSL person who reviewed the cctv footage in this case would have used their common sense when watching a Honda that didn't move at all and not authorised the issue of a PCN. The person who looked at the cctv did not use their common sense, they duly sent a PCN.

The motorist concerned made a challenge fully expecting the existence of a stationary car to excuse their short incursion into the bus lane. They were wrong. Their challenge was turned down and the letter rejecting the challenge doesn't mention the broken down car at all, it simply says you can't be present in the bus lane for any distance at all.

Barnet Council wonder why they are unpopular. Mr Mustard knows why as does every right thinking and fair minded person.

Mr Mustard will be seeing you at the tribunal Barnet Council. This PCN won't put a dent in his 86% success rate.

Yours frugally

Mr Mustard

Update 1 October 19: The PCN has been cancelled and a full apology sent for 'any inconvenience this matter may have caused' - Mr Mustard thinks that quite a lot of inconvenience was caused. Flowers, a bottle of wine, a box of chocolates, all three, or £65 (50% of the PCN value) would not have gone amiss.

Heading towards a computer monopoly

If you have a Formal Notice of Rejection of Representations (you having challenged a postal PCN or a Notice to Owner or an Enforcement Notice for an alleged bus lane contravention) from Barnet Council it will now contain the above section. Not all that long ago you were sent the Appeal Form with the Notice of Rejection but not any longer. Although it is the case that many people use the on line service to start their tribunal appeal not everyone is au fait with computers and the elderly or disabled are less likely to use them. You now have to phone up for a manual form, and your 28 days start to expire. Mr Mustard thinks that the move towards forcing everyone to do everything on line is a retrograde step. There should be choice which includes using the Royal Mail.

What Mr Mustard would like you to do is to start phoning for an Appeal Form (even if you plan to use the on line system) as he wants to test how efficient it is. When you phone up you might get voicemail so just leave a message. If you get a person, give them your PCN reference and car registration and they should send a form to you the same day. Please let Mr Mustard know afterwards how long it took for the form to reach you.

Whilst we are discussing Notices of Rejection if yours does not offer the discount for paying you would be giving money away for possibly nothing if you meekly pay up at this stage. Far better to send a copy to mrmustard@zoho.com and Mr Mustard will start your Appeal on line and be your representative at the tribunal hearing (he goes there often!) as you have nothing to lose. The proviso is that if Mr Mustard saves the day for you, you will send at least £25 to the North London Hospice (if you are poor you don't have to do the donating part, you could give time as a volunteer if you have it or goods to sell if you are having a clear-out).

Yours frugally

Mr Mustard