PENALTY CHARGE NOTICE HELP - WRONG VRM READ BY ANPR SYSTEM.

trainram123

I do apologise in advance for the lengthy nature of this post, but please do bear with.

On 11/09/2025 my wife received a Penalty Charge Notice from Nationwide Parking Control for an address in Greenwich, London for an offence committed on 06/09/2025. This is somewhere both myself and my wife have never visited and is roughly 150 miles from our home address. 

It was initially suspected that we had been victims of VRM cloning given that the photos provided on the PCN appeared to show my wife's number plate on the offending vehicle. The offending vehicle is the same make and model (a Vauxhall Mokka) however it is BLACK in colour. Our vehicle is SILVER in colour. The vehicles both have a different style of alloy wheel.

I initially tried to make contact with Nationwide Parking Control via the phone. An answerphone message instructs you to leave your details and a representative will get back to you. This was done. No return phone call was ever made. 

Shortly afterwards I reported the matter to our local constabulary. They provided us with an incident reference number. I also followed the online appeals process detailed on the PCN, submitting both the Police incident reference number and also several photos of our vehicle. This clearly demonstrated the obvious difference between the two vehicles.Upon submission of the appeal we received an automated response confirming receipt and that they would be in contact in due course. This is the last time we heard from Nationwide Parking Control. 

On 07/11/2025, and to our absolute horror, we received a letter from DCBL (a debt recovering firm) stating that they were now acting on behalf of Nationwide Parking Control. My wife made a call to them stating that we had appealed the PCN and had not heard anything since other than the automated reply. The DCBL call-agent stated that NPC had rejected our appeal and had communicated this with us, as this was demonstrated by a document showing on our file. This document was then sent to my wife via email whilst on the call to the DCBL agent. This document has categorically never been received either via the post or email, inclusive of junk email folders. The document has no date on it and is not signed.

It details the reason for rejection being that motorist submitted photos could have been doctored in favour of their case, or something to that effect. This letter / document has never been received by ourselves, until receiving it via email from the DCBL agent on 07/11/2025.

However at the bottom of this document are x 3 digital images of the offending black Vauxhall Mokka, whereas previously we have only ever seen photos of said vehicle printed onto paper.        

When you zoom in on the images, you can clearly see that this is not an incident of VRM cloning, but in actual fact it is a case of an ANPR miss-read. The VRM of our vehicle is Dxxx WBP. The VRM of the offending vehicle is Dxxx WDP, however it has an attachment screw through the D making it appear like a B. If you type Dxxx WDP into the DVLA website, it does indeed come back as a back Vaxuhall Mokka. 

I re-contacted our local constabulary who allocated an officer to investigate. This officer has since provided written confirmation via email that it is an ANPR miss-read. They state that the offending black Vauxhall Mokka is registered to an address in London. They state that the offending vehicle in the photos definitively has a VRM of DxxxWDP, not DxxxWBP as is our vehicle. 

I presented this information to a DCBL agent this morning (10/112025) via a telephone call. They followed my request to open the document logged on our file, they then zoomed in on the digital images, and yet still had the brazen cheek to suggest that it was clearly a B, rather than a D. This, by the way, is also after having been told that we have police confirmation of the VRM containing a D rather than the B that our VRM contains. The phone call ended with the robotic "you no longer have a right to appeal, please seek independent legal advice"

I have composed a short email that I will send to Nationwide Parking Control and DCBL, which I will also send in letter form via recorded delivery. This email and letter will also have attached the confirmation statement from the police officer. It simply states a request to NPC to instruct DCBL to cease chasing the claim based on evidence provided.  

Someone has suggested submitting a Subject Access Request to both Nationwide Parking Control and DCBL, this is something that will also be done shortly. 

Trawling through their ATA Code of Practice we have also spotted that we suspect that Nationwide Parking Control are in breach of section 7.3d which states:

"Images generated by ANPR or CCTV have been subject to a manual quality control check, including the accuracy of the timestamp and the risk of keying errors,"

I have not yet made them aware of the above, nor have I included my intentions to report NPC to the International Parking Community and DCBL to the British Parking Association. I also intend on raising the matter with the DVLA and also making my local MP aware of the situation. 

Before I submit the email / letter to both organisations, does anyone have any further advice which may be of use?

I am appreciative in advance for your responses & any forthcoming help. Please be kind, this situation has caused a great deal of stress to myself and my family.  

Thank you. 

Half_way

there is no fine, no penalty,and no offence has been committed.

do you know where this car park is?
do not send anything just yet

Gr1pr

A few points of note,  so alter your wordings accordingly please

Definitely not a Penalty   ( or a fine either  ).  No Penalty Charge Notice was issued 

No offence was committed 

This is a civil matter regarding the alleged breach of the parking contract on that private property 

DCBL are powerless debt collectors and should be ignored,  never phone them, your dispute is with NPC

1505grandad

"The offending vehicle is the same make and model (a Vauxhall Mokka) however it is BLACK in colour. Our vehicle is SILVER in colour."

They are also in breach of the KADOE contract with the DVLA (the Customer of course in the following being the ppc):-

"B8.2. The Customer shall ensure before relying on any item of Data that the Data provided matches the information in the request (for example, so that the model, type and colour of the vehicle match) and shall not seek to recover payment where the Data provided does not match the vehicle information in the request." 

James_Poisson

You need to realise that you are not dealing with an authority or reasonable people, you are dealing with greedy scammers that will never accept an appeal (that's a sham also) as they consider themselves to always be right even when they are wrong because that's how they make money.

The debt collectors are just as bad, they don't accept appeals and work on a no win no fee basis to frighten people on behalf of the parking company.

Umkomaas

I rather suspect this is a numberplate misread by whatever shoddy bit of junk the parking firm use to take their photographs. NPC tend to use CCTV more than most - rather than ANPR - but neither is that accurate. 

Double check whether certain letters might have been misread like C/G, E/F, I/J, M/N.  The two same-make vehicles might have come off the production at similar times and shipped out dealers at the same time, with very similar VRMs. Unlikely that cloning of a numberplate for the same model would be too sophisticated a step for a wannabe car park bilker.

If plates have been cloned, the legitimate owner of the VRM would normally be receiving all kinds of other penalties piling in on them. Not just a single PCN. 

trainram123

Thank you for your comments so far. 

Here is an image of the car in which they are claiming the D is a B. 

Coupon-mad

Hahahahaha!  

I'm laughing about wot DCB said on the phone. Hilarious scammery!

Right.

STOP PHONING. Send a complaint to NPC:

https://nationwideparkingcontrol.co.uk/complaint-policy/

Attach your evidence and tell their DPO to call the dogs off or you'll sue them for data misuse and will also report them to the IPC, the DVLA and the ICO. Give them 7 days to apologise and erase your data from the case entirely.

Half_way

You have not answered the question:

 Where was this car park, and do you know who's car park it was?

Reason for asking is that if the above is known, then that is where your ire should be directed.

Someone somewhere will have allowed/given permission for the shower of !!!!!! that is the parking company to operate on their land in their car park - on their behalf.

 The Antics of these so called parking companies is well known, particularly with ANPR errors, from Double-dips, to read errors.

 Those who allow these parking companies to operate should be held responsible 

On 11/09/2025 my wife received a Penalty Charge Notice from Nationwide Parking Control for an address in Greenwich, London for an offence committed on 06/09/2025

As has been said, this is not a penalty, there is no offence

Please can you share this address, and if you know it the landowner ( ie car park of a pub/supermarket/schoool/community centre etc) 

trainram123

Half_way said:

You have not answered the question:

 Where was this car park, and do you know who's car park it was?

Reason for asking is that if the above is known, then that is where your ire should be directed.

Someone somewhere will have allowed/given permission for the shower of !!!!!! that is the parking company to operate on their land in their car park - on their behalf.

 The Antics of these so called parking companies is well known, particularly with ANPR errors, from Double-dips, to read errors.

 Those who allow these parking companies to operate should be held responsible 

On 11/09/2025 my wife received a Penalty Charge Notice from Nationwide Parking Control for an address in Greenwich, London for an offence committed on 06/09/2025

As has been said, this is not a penalty, there is no offence

Please can you share this address, and if you know it the landowner ( ie car park of a pub/supermarket/schoool/community centre etc) 

Sorry, I missed your comment. 

It doesn’t look like a car-park as such, I think it’s more a case of someone stopping on double red lines, similar to the system found within airport grounds. 

It’s Telcon Way, Greenwich. Google Earth doesn’t reveal much.