Were you one of the 28,253 people in the last year that challenged the council on a parking ticket you were given?
More than 7,700 parking tickets handed out by Havering Council in the last year that were challenged have been cancelled.
Out of the 28,253 challenges and representations that were received in 2017/18, 7,731 penalty charge notices (PCN) were cancelled - which is a cancellation rate of 27 per cent.
The information was revealed at the Havering full council meeting last week, when Councillor Clarence Barrett asked the council for figures.
The council responded to his question and said that reasons for cancellation vary but include instances where the driver submits evidence as part of their appeal demonstrating that they had a valid pay and display ticket or visitor voucher at the time of the offence but it may have slipped from their dashboard and therefore not on display.
It also said that officers do take a common sense approach and will also cancel PCNs and issue warnings where genuine mistakes are shown to be made such as a driver mistyping licence plate details at the machine.
There are also instances where mitigating circumstances - such as medical reasons or a vehicle breaking down - has led to a PCN being cancelled.
Cllr Barrett said: “Receiving a PCN is stressful enough for anyone. For those who believe they have grounds for mitigation and whose appeals have been refused by the Council, a final appeal to the Traffic Adjudicator is the next step.
“To then see that, of the past 100 appeals in favour of the motorist, half were not even contested by the council raises the question of what degree of examination is put into the original appeal by the Council and what degree of accuracy is applied to the PCNs anyway.
“There is, of course, a need for enforcement but we need to be confident that PCNs are issued accurately and fairly in the first place.”
The criteria by which officers assess appeals is available on the council’s website.
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