APCOA Penalty Notice - Hackbridge Railway Station

Rhysrobin

Hi

FYI I have read most of the 'APCOA Railway Penalty Notice' threads, as well as the NEWBIES thread.

What I have, as the registered keeper, is a Penalty Notice for £100 quoting a breach of Railway Byelaws. I have yet to reply/appeal but I understand that APCOA has no legitimacy to issue this. In terms of response, I have seen comments saying it is not necessary to appeal/reply to the PN at all. On other threads, I have seen template appeals to POPLA.

So I just want to check: should I do the first/second stage appeals or just ignore entirely?

Thanks!

Gr1pr

My advice is to appeal as keeper based on a recent Apcoa railway template that mentions no keeper liability due to Pofa2012 schedule 4 not applying on railway land , especially ones Contesting a Penalty Notice 

Coupon-mad

Then appeal to POPLA including the first paragraph stating that APCOA do not have landowner authority to issue Penalty Notices, only Parking Charge Notices.

Rhysrobin

Thank you. So as first appeal, I propose sending this to APCOA (taken from a recent thread):

>>>

I am the registered keeper of the above vehicle and am in receipt of the Penalty Notice you issued. The land in question is subject to byelaws and as such it is not relevant land for the purpose of schedule 4 of the Protection of Freedoms Act 2012. Therefore there can be no hirer/keeper liability. You will need to contact the driver, who I will not be naming and there is no legal requirement for me to do so.

I do not expect to hear from you again, or your debt collectors, except to confirm that no further action will be taken on this matter and my personal details have been removed from your records.

If you prefer you can issue me the POPLA code which I can use to have this cancelled.

>>>

Look ok?

Gr1pr

Yes, all OK, do it ( as keeper,  no blabbing about who was driving   )

doubledotcom

Doesn't matter. It will be rejected because they will say that it is the "owner" who is liable (utter testicles). I would advise you just say the following:

Subject: Re: Unlawful Penalty Notice Issued Under Railway Byelaws

To whom it may concern,

I am the registered keeper of the vehicle in question. Your issuance of a “Penalty Notice” under railway byelaws is unlawful. As a private company, you have no statutory authority to issue or enforce penalties under these byelaws. Your notice is therefore a misrepresentation of legal power and, in my view, constitutes an instrument of fraud.

Specifically, your conduct appears to fall within the scope of Section 2 of the Fraud Act 2006—Fraud by false representation. You have:

• Falsely represented that you are authorised to issue a criminal penalty under railway byelaws;

• Done so dishonestly, with the intent to secure payment directly to your company;

• And thereby sought to cause financial loss to the recipient through deception.

This is a criminal matter. I will be reporting your actions to the Economic Crime Unit of my local police force.

Should you now attempt to pursue this alleged charge as a civil debt, I will treat that as further evidence of attempted extortion. You are fully aware that railway byelaw offences are criminal matters, triable only before a magistrates’ court, and that any penalty—if lawfully imposed—would be payable to the public purse, not to a private entity such as yours.

You may issue as many POPLA codes as you wish. POPLA has no jurisdiction over Penalty Notices issued (or purportedly issued) under railway byelaws. If you genuinely believe an offence has been committed, the correct course of action is to lay information before a magistrate. I will welcome the opportunity to challenge any such summons—should you manage to persuade a magistrate that you have standing to bring one. I am confident you will not.

Accordingly, I suggest you pursue the driver, whom I am under no legal obligation to identify. As for the “owner,” I wish you luck—there is no statutory register for that.

Cease and desist from any further attempts to misrepresent your authority or to unlawfully extract money under the guise of a statutory penalty.

Yours faithfully,

After that, you can just ignore everything that comes your way. It will wither and die on the vine. Debt collector letters can be safely ignored as they are powerless to do anything except to try and persuade the low-hanging fruit on the gullible tree to pay up out of ignorance and fear. If it is a real Penalty Notice, any alleged debt can only be collected after a fine has been imposed by the magistrates court.

I have yet to see a single Penalty Notice issued by APCOA that has EVER been prosecuted in the magistrates court.

coffee_boy44

@Rhysrobin currently in the same situation myself. Could you let me know which of the above responses you used and what the outcome was?

Unsure whether the best route for initial appeal is to use the standard Apcoa railway template for penalties that you noted (no keeper liability and POFA2012) from @Gr1pr, or the second email suggestion (ref. unlawful penalty notice and Fraud Act 06)

ChirpyChicken

Outcome is if they lose it will time out after 6 months anyway

doubledotcom

It doesn't actually time out after 6 months because it is not a real Penalty Notice. However, they can never pretend otherwise, as that will be them admitting that they are fraudulently attempting to gain money by deception.

Hung by their own petard.

You can appeal to POPLA if that makes you feel better and especially if they tell ACPCOA to cancel it. However, even if you didn't bother, nothing will come of this apart from a load of useless debt collector letters which you can safely ignore.

Eventually, they will give up and that will be the end of it.

ChirpyChicken

doubledotcom said:

It doesn't actually time out after 6 months because it is not a real Penalty Notice. However, they can never pretend otherwise, as that will be them admitting that they are fraudulently attempting to gain money by deception.

Hung by their own petard.

You can appeal to POPLA if that makes you feel better and especially if they tell ACPCOA to cancel it. However, even if you didn't bother, nothing will come of this apart from a load of useless debt collector letters which you can safely ignore.

Eventually, they will give up and that will be the end of it.

Sorry I have to disagree with you. Its issued under the relevant byela

doubledotcom

POPLA is not a method for appealing a real PN. A PN can only be disputed in court. 

The wording on the back of the APCOA notice actually gives away that it's not a real Penalty Notice. It says they might use a debt collection agency or take you to court if you don’t pay. That’s a civil process, not a criminal one. Real Penalty Notices are backed by law and enforced through the criminal system. They don’t involve private companies suing people or hiring debt collectors.

So by threatening civil action, APCOA is admitting this is just a private invoice dressed up to look official. If it were a genuine byelaw penalty, it would go through the magistrates’ court and any fine would go to the government, not APCOA. Their wording actually undermines their own claim.