Van Hire company extortionate PCN admin charges

Aflemi

1st post, so trust its in the right place.
I hired a van for a day and incurred 2 PCNs within 1.5 hours for taking it through the Rotherhithe Tunnel there and back. I'm not disputing  the fines. The van hire company have charged me a total of £120 inc VAT.  I have read about taking this to the BVRLA but wanted to get the forum's expert opinion on it first.
The offences took place 25th Nov. I received a notice on 9th Dec of an admin fee of £36 for 2 PCNs which I reckoned was fair. I then received another notice on 5th Jan of a further £84 debit to my credit card  with copies of the PCNs which I paid immediately. 
When I queried the 2 admin payments I was given this answer:

The payment of £36 relates to 2 admin charges at £18 from United Rental whom own the vehicle. They originally received the PCN's and charge £18 per PCN to forward them to us. The charge of £84 then relates to our 2 charges at £42 each for forwarding your details on to the issuing Authority. As your signed contract states, you allow us to charge your card any monies owing to us relating to any PCN's, including the charge forwarded to us by United Rentals.  As you incurred 2 separate PCN's, whether they were incurred minutes or hours apart, they have to be dealt with as separate PCN's, this is why you are charged more than one administration charge.  Unfortunately, it is not for you to decide what you think is a fair administration charge. You have signed the contract agreeing to all the above charges. You are well within in your rights to dispute this payment with your bank, however, as we have acted within our legal rights, and have a signed contract by you agreeing to such, I must advise you, as per your contract, you will then be liable for further administration charges incurred by us for providing contract and PCN's in dispute to the bank.

My argument is that :
1. It is not my concern who owns the vehicle, I have rented it from a company and agreed to pay reasonable admin fees to them, how they structure their vehicle supply is not my concern.
2. They have treated the 2 charges as one.  One communication, one payment, one letter. They would have incurred no more work to administer two communications on the same day as they would have one. They are doubling their already extortionate charge for no more actual work.
3. Their threat to charge me even more admin fees if I dare to dispute the level of their charges.  I have actually done this and on the advice of my bank, I have cancelled my card and replaced it with a new one with different numbers. 

I have told the van hire company i am totally willing to pay a reasonable  fee for their extra work but not £120.

Many thanks for your help in anticipation 

Umkomaas

As we major on private parking tickets here, PePiPoo might be your best bet for council tickets. Register there but please note that a hotmail address won't work - try using a throwaway gmail account instead if you do have trouble registering and post a new thread; here's your link:

http://forums.pepipoo.com/index.php?act=SF&s=&f=30

Have a read through some of the other threads there before you post your own to get the hang of what information they need from you in your opening post - but as a minimum you will need to post redacted photos/scans of all correspondence you've received from the council (both sides, if appropriate) as they need to see all the small print.

But I suspect this is more to do with the contractual terms of the hire agreement, beyond the scope of a parking forum (private or council related). There may be a better MSE sub forum to help you - check the various sections. 

Also your idea of approaching the BVRLA is sound, provided the hire company is a member. 

Aflemi

Thank you. As I said,  I have no problem with paying the PCNs. It's the van hire co's 'admin fees' I have the issue with. If this is not the correct forum section and someone could be kind enough to point me in the right direction, I'd be grateful.

Le_Kirk

You have been pointed in the right direction by the post above yours by @Umkomaas .

Aflemi

Ok, I've said that I have no problems with the PCNs so the pepipoo link is not needed. I have looked for subforums without success. Pardon my ignorance, but if you could be more specific regarding which direction I appear to have been pointed,  I'd be grateful. 
Thank you.

D_P_Dance

Perhaps there is  cause to complain to Trading Standards, read this

https://www.bvrla.co.uk/uploads/assets/uploaded/61b3298b-a918-499b-9ac8b8bea2b726a0.pdf

Aflemi

Thank you. Having read through the BVRLA guide it doesnt mention anywhere about the admin fees and what is deemed reasonable. Thanks for the link though and I'll consider trading standards. Would still be uaeful to hear people's opinions on my three points of argument. 

Thrugelmir

Difficult to dispute contractual terms after the event.  The cost of employing people is extremely expensive. Not just their hourly pay rate. It's all the other other costs on top that add up. Normally I find peoples view of reasonable as not understanding business costs. 

Coupon-mad

I think what you are not understanding, @Thrugelmir, is that consumers are not liable for all the business costs and wages of a trader, when it comes to an admin fee for handling a letter.

This has been tested in court and a template letter is no more than a fiver to a tenner, plus VAT.  Unlike with parking charges, GPEOL remains a thing when there is no deterrent/legitimate interest argument to justify charging a higher sum.

An admin fee must relate to the cost of the actual work involved (not business running costs and wages that would be paid anyway) and must be proportionate to the matter in hand.

What does your parking firm make of what the Select Committee said about proportionality when it comes to 'debt recovery' letters?

I'm guessing that some PPCs have thrown something together to pretend that a 29 pence Experian 'soft trace' and a template LBC, batch-printed on cheap paper by an automated process, costs £70.  But you can't use wages and overheads to justify £70, not even to try to look convincing.

Admin fees don't work like that. The same applies to admin fees charged by BVRLA members for replying to a private PCN.  It is free for a consumer to take such a dispute to the BVRLA to decide.  Nothing to lose.

Umkomaas

I'm guessing that some PPCs have thrown something together to pretend that a 29 pence Experian 'soft trace' and a template LBC, batch-printed on cheap paper by an automated process, costs £70.  But you can't use wages and overheads to justify £70, not even to try to look convincing.

A bit like the pathetic attempts in trying to cost out £100 as a GPEOL! 🤥 It used to make me laugh. Them was the days! (said Angela Rayner!) 😝

Aflemi

Thanks for your contributions people. Specifically, does anyone have a view on the extra charges applied by " United Rentals", who apparently are the owners of the vehicle? Why should I pay for a chain of  'subletters'? Also am I being naive in thinking that because they have combined every communication and charge into one then why double the admin charge when it's obvious they have treated it as a single event? Thanks for your opinions again.