Sunday 12 January 2014

PATAS w/c 6 Jan 14 - start as you mean to go on

Sorry, no picture today as Blogger won't let you update them since 1 January 2014. They are trying to fix the problem.

There were 88 hearings of which 1 was the subject of a recommendation to cancel, 29 PCN were upheld and 58 were cancelled. So 66.66% were allowed, or 2 out of 3. Given that appealing to PATAS is free to the motorist and that it costs the council £40 every time, you really should complete the PATAS form and post it off as it will gain you another 28 days at the very least in which to pay, put the council to a whole load of work which they might not bother to do and then you win and you could, if you want to do the minimum, simply not bother filling in the optional box 5, details of appeal, and let your existing representations to the council stand to be looked at again by an independent adjudicator as a postal appeal so you don't even need to go to Angel, Islington. To complete the PATAS form that way will take 2 minutes, I know because I have just done one. All it will cost you is 50p for a second class stamp.

Have you got a Notice of Rejection of Representations and a PATAS form which you have received in the last 28 days. It's the New Year, fill out that form! Go on, stop reading this, fill out that form and come back here afterwards.
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You've done it? Good. Now to the PCN which were cancelled last week and why.

The first one is a corker. The motorist saw the traffic warden run across the road to take a photo so they drove away. They received a PCN in the post. They were held not to have prevented the issue of a PCN. The position is quite simple. A traffic warden employed by NSL has no power to detain you, you can simply go about your normal business without waiting around to be penalised.

The Saracens Event Dday signage continued to cause a headache for the council. They probably don't care as they issue 400 PCN on most event days and as half of the recipients simply pay up that is at least £6,000 into the coffers every time. They lost 4 ED zone appeals in this week which is an appeal to PATAS rate of only 3%.

There is a missing sign in Castle Rd. That sounds like a good place to park or to appeal from.

The council only put part of the representations into the evidence pack. That isn't good enough so the PCN was cancelled. the motto of the story is to write long letters to the council so that they fall over their technical shoelaces.

Someone who tried 5 times to pay by phone and the system failed was held to have tried hard enough. There is more to life than trying to combat Barnet's unfriendly payment system.

A bay in Algernon Rd changes halfway along and catches people out. There should be a clear division if a bay changes. If there isn't your PCN should be cancelled if you appeal to PATAS. I note that the free from 10 till 4 loading bays have been repainted to be wider and separate them from the normal pay parking bays as people were getting caught out in droves. Nice to see the council doing something sensible for once.

The council are still pushing their luck on historic PCN with ones from 25 May 11, 6 June 11, 13 July 11, 21 July 11 & 12 September 11 being rapidly cancelled by the adjudicator.

The traffic warden put the PCN in his pocket but didn't tell the office that. It has now been cancelled.

The evidence for a car supposedly parked more than 50cm from the kerb (the whole car has to be this distance away or more) was vague and so the PCN was cancelled.

A suspension was not adequately signed. I suspect they often aren't nor in good time.

Someone accused of not having their blue badge on display produced photographs of it chained to the steering wheel. Anyone that careful with it is likely to have had it on display. Perhaps the traffic warden only photographed other sections of the windscreen?

Someone who paid £1 to park had their PCN cancelled as the council failed to show where the £1 was allocated.

I have often wondered how the abbreviations used by traffic wardens are meant to be understood by the public. The council lost a case because they didn't produce a key with their evidence pack.

The council often claim that if they haven't answered informal representations (ones sent in response to receiving a PCN on your car and before the Notice to Owner is issued after which they become formal representations)  that they didn't need to. The adjudicator in case 2130605773 said otherwise and referred to the famous Hackney Drivers Association Ltd case as establishing this in Court.

There was a time lag on the PayByPhone payment being registered. As it was clearly paid on time the PCN was cancelled.

Is this start to the year typical of what is going to happen in 2014? That is up to you. Remember once you have the Notice to Owner (which means that the offer to pay 50% no longer exists) you have nothing to lose, and everything to gain, by ploughing on to the end of the process.

Yours frugally

Miss Feezance

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