What can I do? Council have changed charge to one that might be right!

DrGonzo815

Hello - any help appreciated, thanks for reading.

I was issued with a ticket a while ago but someone had taken it off by the time I got to my vehicle. Luckily my mum had driven past earlier and thought she had seen something yellow on the windscreen so I took pictures of how it was parked/parking permit etc.

Sure enough a month later I received a letter saying I hadn't paid my ticket. The charge was that my parking disc was not clearly displayed in a disc zone. It was a visitor parking permit and was clearly displayed however the warden had taken his picture from an angle which obscured it at the bottom of the window. My photo shows it was fully visible from the angle any normal human would look at it.

I emailed the image as part of my appeal and they have now come back to say that the notice was issued because the date had been changed on the permit, not because of what was said on the letter they sent out. I can see where they are coming from - on the date in question I had parked the night before and started writing in that date instinctively then changed it to the number of the next date as I was setting it for the morning. I know I can't prove that it was actually something I corrected at the time of writing so they may think I used it twice but there was still a space for another use underneath it and I have plenty of spares so I wouldn't try and re-use the ticket.

What can I do to help my appeal? With regards to the fact there was no ticket on my vehicle when I arrived at it, can I at least ask for the reduced penalty charge which I didn't have the chance to pay? Thanks

Redx

as its council, best to post over on pepipoo

bod1467

And this should be an easy beat ... I don't think they can change the charge reason mid-flow, as this would be an abuse of process.

pogofish

Yup - this is unquestionably one for Pepipoo - and the changing tack in process stinks to me. Hopefully they can set you right.