POPLA Decisions

1505grandad

" A keeper of a vehicle is a person who is registered with the DVLA as owning the vehicle. I note in this instance, the PCN was axed to the vehicle on the day it was issued. The parking operator advises that the appellant made contact prior to details being

obtained from the DVLA conrming that they were the registered keeper of the vehicle. I am satised that the PCN was axed to the vehicle and as no driver details were supplied,......"

Assuming this is a copy and paste these errors show what poor quality this entity is. Ok for criminal damage apparently.

CBA to read any more of it.

FollyT

In the interests of honesty, I am ashamed to admit that the omission of certain syllables, as highlighted above, occurred when I copied and pasted the above from the original Popla assessment. I don't understand how they were lost in transfer, but I should have double-checked.
The first sentence, however, is exactly as written by the Assessor.

DE_612183

@Coupon-mad there are messages on the FTLA site about that assessor as well...

doubledotcom

I now have a standard template response to any POPLA appeal where the operator conduces and they send the illiterate message. I make sure it is sent to both POPLA and their parent entity, Trust Alliance Group:

Subject: Formal Complaint – Incoherent and Unprofessional “Appeal Withdrawn” Correspondence

Dear POPLA Team,

I am writing to raise a formal complaint about the extraordinarily poor standard of the template email issued when an operator cancels a Parking Charge Notice before an appeal is assessed. The communication I received is so lacking in clarity, logic, and basic literacy that it calls into question the intellectual capability and procedural understanding of the person or team responsible for drafting it.

The phrase “the operator has withdrawn your appeal” is, on its face, nonsensical. An operator cannot withdraw an appellant’s submission, and no competent writer would use wording that implies otherwise. The fact that this has been adopted as standard text suggests that whoever authored it did not understand the process they were meant to be describing, or lacked the linguistic ability to articulate it accurately. Either possibility is deeply concerning.

The rest of the letter is equally inelegant. It is clumsily structured, contradictory in places, and written in such a muddled fashion that it reads like a hastily assembled paragraph from someone intellectually out of their depth. Basic sequencing, grammatical consistency, and coherence are all missing. The message lurches between confused hypotheticals and ill-fitting explanations, none of which reflect how the process actually works.

It is not merely embarrassing; it is an indictment of the level of internal oversight within POPLA. Any halfway competent professional would have sent this back for correction. Instead, it has been allowed to stand as an official communication from an organisation that claims to assess evidence, interpret procedures, and apply reasoning in a quasi-judicial setting.

If the standard of written communication is this poor, it raises a legitimate question: how can the public have confidence that POPLA is capable of the analytical, evidential, and reasoning-based work expected of an appeals service? A body that cannot draft a coherent template letter cannot reasonably be assumed to possess the competence required to evaluate appeals with fairness and intellectual rigour.

I request confirmation that this complaint will be logged and reviewed, and I expect a response addressing:

1. How this wording was approved;

2. Whether POPLA acknowledges that the current text is inaccurate, misleading, and grammatically deficient; and

3. What steps will be taken to correct the template and improve internal quality control.[/indent]

I look forward to your prompt and considered response.

Yours sincerely,

Everyone should be bombarding them with these if they get an operator concession to their appeal.

Coupon-mad

Yes - but not for @FollyT

lexiLD

Southampton Red Jet/Triangle car park Parking Eye

Status: appeal withdrawn by operator

Grounds for appeal given to poplar by RK: Non relevant land, poor waiting area signage and fine disproportionate to the alleged overstay of two minutes

Used a slightly updated version of https://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/discussion/6415460/southampton-town-quay-pcn/p1