A member of our family had a private number plate on a Ford van. Someone in the Manchester area committed a vehicle offence (not sure what this is) in a BMW with the same number plate as the van. The legal owner (family member) of said numberplate was never summoned to court but was eventually advised that he had been fined for the offence and is now being chased by bailiffs for £400+ (local police have said it is not a police matter). The family member advised bailiffs that it was not his car committing the offence but they are not listening and are demanding payment and are arguing that as the legal owner of the registration plate he his liable. Family member still has the same van that the number plate was on but the number plate has subsequently been sold legitimately. Who should he contact and what legal argument should he use to resolve this miscarriage of justice? Whilst I have put this in an open thread I only want advice from people with a legal background in such cases. Please help if you can.
Your family member will have been sent an penalty charge notice advising him to pay or make an appeal to the issuing authority. This was your family member's chance to appeal and say it wasn't their vehicle. If they didn't do so then ultimately they are liable for the penalty charge. Don't bother arguing it with the bailiffs, they have a warrant and legal authority to collect on the debt, they don't decide if it is his vehicle or not. If your family member received the penalty and didn't do anything, then it's likely tough titty I'm afraid. If he didn't receive anything, and found out by having bailiffs turn up then it's possible he may have grounds to file for an out of time statutory declaration. Having dealt with TfL their debts are registered with the Traffic Enforcement Centre at Northampton County Court, and I believe it is the same for other issuing authorities. Contact TEC in regard to filing for the out of time statutory declaration, fill in the PE3 form, and get it signed and witnessed by a solicitor or magistrate. This will likely get the penalty sent out at the first stage and then they can appeal and say it's not their vehicle. The form is submitted under penalty of contempt of court though, so don't just fib if they did receive it.
Bailiffs... Hide cars even if they do not belong to your family member if they are kept at the same address unless there is signifcant eg less than half paid as they will look at seizing them and get you to prove 3rd party ownership. Keep doors and windows locked. They can try a door and walk in if its unlocked or gain entry via a ground floor window. A bailiff CANNOT force entry unless its exceptional circumstances .. this being an order from the magistrate allowing them to do so. Its normally a last resort. Any out building such as a garage or shed they can access so remove anything worth taking. DO NOT EVER allow a bailiff into your property. Talk to them through an open window. They can only make peaceful entry unless theyve got a wareant of entry from the court however if you invte them in youve given them permission to gain entry next time. If they threaten to call the plod let them. Deal with them exactly the same way. Worst case with the plod youll have to let one of them in however remind him that you will be locking the door behind him. Video everything. Call local court and find out wjat the fine refers to and you should be able to get a stat demand arranged which will cancel first action and essentially a retrial.
Not sure whether it's entirely relevant - but I had something similar on a penalty notice where my car was lets say VE57RVO and the offending car has VE57RVD but the ANPR camera had read the D on the offending plate as an O. I argued that it wouldn't take Sherlock Holmes to check that whilst on the picture a red saloon didn't entirely match the description of a car registered as a grey estate and that perhaps they should check such simple things with a human being rather than simply send out distressing fines, etc. etc. especially as the fine was £60 so should pay for about 4 hours of a persons time. It took about 10 phone calls and letters to sort out though as it seems "computer says no" far too many times on these things.
I had one last year were a land rover towing a trailer had my reg on went thru a speed camera i ended up getting a pcn took 3 months of phone calls to lancs police gor them to finally get someone to look at the photo my car is a silver kia so it dint take em long after looking at the photo its the inconvience of it all
Back in 2007 or 2008 I was woken up by Police at 1.00am following an alleged drive off from a local petrol station, I think it was the Jet garage in Hoyland. Living in Carlton it's not a garage I'd normally use. Anyway, car involved as it turned out, was a white VW Golf carrying the plates Y506EFA. Mine is a red Octavia, reg YS06EFA. Unfortunately, when the footage was reviewed nobody bothered to check the shade of the car on CCTV (black and white I believe) or the plate recognition system failed, I never got a conclusive answer which caused the error. But when they checked the national database using the "wrong" details it obviously pointed to me.
