Please help railway parking ticket debt collector letter received

Ashleyok

Hello I am new to this and really need some help!

I have received a debt recovery letter from PCN debt recovery and prosecution service, at the top it says notice to keeper and railway byelaw 14

It claims I received a parking ticket on 3rd jan and haven't paid it, the issue of this notice is dated 17th March!

It says that it's now too late to pay the discounted fee and the fine is now £90.00 if paid within 14 days which has actually passed now also! And then a magistrate court summons will be issued against me under railway byelaws?

I have received no other type of letter or notice apart from this what should I do can I appeal this in anyway? Please help thanks!

jkdd77

We've seen plenty of these on the forum.

The threat of prosecution is almost certainly a bluff, and an aggressive commercial practice. Northern and East Midlands Trains are the only two TOCs that actually prosecute under byelaw 14- with other TOCs, and all PPCs, the threat is simply intended to intimidate the victim into paying an unenforceable invoice.

Even if they did prosecute, which is very unlikely, it would, at least in theory, be for them to prove the identity of the driver beyond reasonable doubt- which is why you mustn't admit to being the driver (if indeed you were driving, and don't admit to this on the forum, or in any correspondence with the debt collectors).

Since POPLA isn't a option with these invoices, and since RK liability doesn't apply, I would continue to ignore everything except actual court papers.

peter_the_piper

Is it a private parking company? Which rail company is involved? Don't ignore, wait for further advice. Some rail companies do take further.

Coupon-mad

Was this CP Plus? If so then search this forum for their name and the word 'penalty'.

Or don't you know who issued the ticket?

Either way, urgently grab your camera/phone, go and read the sign and show us a picture of it (all the wording) in a broken link. Remove the http:// because newbies can't post working links.

Ashleyok

Thanks for the replies, the car park is run by meteor but the notice is from debt recovery and prosecution services no mention of meteor. At the bottom of the notice it says - London and South Eastern railway limited trading as debt recovery and prosecution services.

I would ignore the charge if that's what normally happens it's just the railway byelaw part that is worrying me? Also I have to continue to park at the station and I'm worried they could clamp my car or something?

There's also a paragraph about how my details have been obtained from the dvla which makes me think it is quite serious?

Do I continue to ignore or write to southeastern to try and appeal?
Thanks for all your help!

Ashleyok

Coupon-mad wrote: »

Was this CP Plus? If so then search this forum for their name and the word 'penalty'.

Or don't you know who issued the ticket?

Either way, urgently grab your camera/phone, go and read the sign and show us a picture of it (all the wording) in a broken link. Remove the http:// because newbies can't post working links.

Thank you I will take a picture of the wording and upload on Monday!

Coupon-mad

Ashleyok wrote: »

There's also a paragraph about how my details have been obtained from the dvla which makes me think it is quite serious?

Far from it - for years, pretty much any old crim has been able to buy DVLA data if they are in this despicable 'private parking' industry. And you cannot opt out either:

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2123390/7-000-drivers-names-sold-criminals-How-DVLA-21m-selling-details-4-85m-motorists.html

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/uknews/crime/9179438/DVLA-sells-details-to-convicted-criminal.html

http://www.thisismoney.co.uk/money/cars/article-2120071/DVLA-sold-43-000-drivers-names-UK-Parking-Enforcement-Agency.html

You should search the forum for other threads about that TOC (train operator) as this has been covered recently in several threads.

And as it was a Meteor ticket it was NOT a real penalty, it was a Parking Charge Notice and you should have been sent a Notice to Keeper which would have offered the appeals procedure and POPLA. A fake PCN can't morph into a real one.

I would complain to the TOC and to 'Passenger Focus' and to the BPA and the DVLA, that Meteor's/their TOC client's agent claim to have issued a ticket you've never seen but that you suspect was only a Parking Charge Notice which cannot change into a byelaws penalty by magic. A Parking Charge Notice leads to a Notice to keeper and POPLA appeal, not this. Insist that Meteor are breaching the Code of Practice as they are muddying the waters as to the legalities of their PCN. And you require a copy of all the wording of the PCN to understand the nature of the ticket.

The email addy for the BPA and DVLA is in post #6 of the 'NEWBIES' FAQs thread at the top of this forum. Write as registered keeper with NOTHING being said that gives away who was driving - so no ad lib 'I never found a windscreen ticket' nor 'I parked'!

If you look at the first main post in the NEWBIES thread you will see an example of the sort of wording we recommend, emails or letters that start: 'I am the registered keeper...' and only talk about the parking event as from a third person point of view: 'the driver did not see any PCN'. I am not suggesting you use the template first appeal in your case as such but you should also respond to that letter I would say - again worded as a complaint asnd to demand a copy of the so-called 'penalty charge' they reckon was issued because you contend no such legal document exists.

If this was Northern Rail or CP Plus I would be more concerned but Meteor don't issue penalties so this needs 'reporting' because a bog standard private PCN invoice has been dressed up to assume a level of authority that it simply doesn't carry. The more complaints the better but find other threads about this first as I know it's been discussed.

An expert on these fake byelaws tickets who has posted at length about this scam (specifically about railway 'parking tickets') is 'anon45' on pepipoo so you could Google his name and 'railway penalty' or the specific name of the the TOC, to read relevant pepipoo forum threads.

My final advice is not to ignore it because there is a small chance that if the TOC don't get challenged about the nature of the PCN, then they 'could' try to lay this before a Magistrates Court as if it was a real byelaws penalty - and once that happens it's a much more stressful and difficult issue to handle and particularly hard to beat. Strike now with complaints & a robust response as keeper (not driver).