Do Adjudicators ever reprimand Councils?

starfish_chimp

Mr FA, I agree with your opinion, very much so. The Adjudicators' view that we are somehow "equal" is absurd, since £130 to "the Council" is nothing, whereas to a private individual it can be a huge amount. If they cannot be bothered to turn up, I think they should lose automatically. I wish I could do something about this, but obviously I can't really. As I said I did say something to the Adjudicator, but I don't think it was "received". Still, if everyone said something (after winning of course!) perhaps something might sink in.

I won't go after costs, I think it would be hard to get, especially as I don't work. However, because of my illness (ME) I had to actually go to bed for the rest of the day from sheer exhaustion of going to Court.

Still, I won. And they lost. Worth a small anyway... Thanks all for sharing your views.

Kite2010

There should be a rule bought in that any parking tickets which gets overturned at the Adjudicator level means at least £100 from the council to the claimant.

If they have to fork out every time they lose, they might sit up and take notice to avoid appeals going so far.

give_them_FA

I believe the amount of the PCN should be the "stake". IF the appellant loses, he pays the council the £70 or whatever it is. If the Council lose they pay the same sum to the appellant. That would certainly stop the present culture that councils have, of "why should we listen to any appeals, when we have nothing to lose by letting it go to the adjudicator"- which is the reason so few challenges are upheld.

Starfish, do not blame the adjudicator; privately they may even agree with you! It is the system that is wrong, a complaint to the top is needed.

patman99

Trust me, from what I found-out whilst researching this last year, your chances of getting a pay-out from the Council (especcially as it is Southwark) is extremely high.
The average claim for charges appears to be £500 and the best way to get them to pay up is to send them an invoice giving 28 days to pay. Of course the won't, but when you send a notice before action followed by a SCC date, they will pay-up, but only on the steps on the way in to the Court ( they want to make sure you actually turn-up as if you don't, they win).

starfish_chimp

I agree - the Council didn't even read my Appeal. I know this, because they did not respond to any of the points I made!:(

Thank you Patman,

I am going to do this. I will invoice them £380.

£100 for the day involved and afternoon recovery.
£80 for the paperwork leading up to.
£100 for my recovery the next day (due to my illness).
£100 for the worry and stress involved.

Does that seem reasonable? Should I go into some detail, or just summarise as above?



P.S. Would I need to pay anything re. Small Claims Court. e.g. costs if I lost?

Would I also have to go into detail e.g. about stress, illness, work involved at that point? Happy to do, but don't want to overload unnecessarily.

Kind regards,
Much appreciated , if anyone responds.

give_them_FA

All you would risk will be the Court fees which if you issue online would be about £60. Keep it reasonable and I doubt they will want to test the issue. Serves them and all the other cynical councils right.

I think the grounds for claim would be breach of duty of care- negligence. They have a duty to treat you fairly and to give due consideration to your representations and failed to do it. The fact that they rejected your appeals but failed to turn up to explain or justify their actions will not help them.

starfish_chimp

Thank you FA. I had a quick look after I posted and see that the court fees would be about that. More paperwork, but heyho. I still feel they should have comeback for putting me through all that. I see re. Small Claims in theory and in practice I could have to pay costs, but heyho again! I take your points on board about keeping it brief and pointing out that they did not bother to come to court to defend their case.