The Ombudsman's final decision
Summary: The Council was not at fault for sending Mrs X penalty charge notices and enforcement notices. It was at fault for not acting swiftly when it found out the notices were not for Mrs X and the intended recipient did not live there. The Council has provided an explanation. It has agreed to apologise which is a sufficient remedy for any injustice to Mrs X.
The complaint
The complainant, whom I refer to as Mrs X, complains the Council sent penalty charge notices (PCNs) and enforcement notices to her address for a person who did not live there. Mrs X says when she got in touch with the Council it failed to prevent further contact on this matter, which included action from enforcement agents the Council had directed to recover the outstanding charge.
Mrs X says this caused her unnecessary stress and time because she had to contact other agencies and share her personal information to try to resolve the matter.
The Ombudsman’s role and powers
We investigate complaints about ‘maladministration’ and ‘service failure’. In this statement, I have used the word fault to refer to these. We must also consider whether any fault has had an adverse impact on the person making the complaint. I refer to this as ‘injustice’. If there has been fault which has caused an injustice, we may suggest a remedy. (Local Government Act 1974, sections 26(1) and 26A(1), as amended) We investigate complaints about councils and certain other bodies. Where an individual, organisation or private company is providing services on behalf of a council, we can investigate complaints about the actions of these providers. (Local Government Act 1974, section 25(7), as amended) If we are satisfied with an organisation’s actions or proposed actions, we can complete our investigation and issue a decision statement. (Local Government Act 1974, section 30(1B) and 34H(i), as amended)
How I considered this complaint
I wrote to Mrs X and considered the information she provided.
I considered the Council’s comments and the documents it provided.
I considered the statutory guidance for local authorities on civil enforcement.
Mrs X and the Council had an opportunity to comment on my draft decision. I considered any comments received before making a final decision.
What I found
What should have happened The guidance says a council has the discretion to cancel a PCN at any point. It also says councils should follow general principles of public law in acting fairly and exercising discretion reasonably.
The guidance also says councils should not fetter their discretion.
Councils can ask enforcement agents to act on their behalf, and, when they do so, they are accountable for the actions of the agents.
What happened In August 2021, the Council sent PCNs for two driving offences to Mrs X’s address. The DVLA has a record that a third party (whom I refer to as Y) had registered their vehicle at Mrs X’s address.
The Council got no response to the PCNs and reminders it sent to Mrs X’s address. In February 2022, it registered the non-payment of the fines at the Traffic Enforcement Centre (which is part of Northampton County Court).
In April, the Council directed bailiffs to recover the outstanding debt for the earlier PCN. It told them the person who owed the debt was Y and gave them Mrs X’s address. The following day the bailiffs issued a notice of enforcement (NOE) to Mrs X’s address.
In May, Mrs X wrote to and contacted the Council to resolve the NOE. The Council initially told her that, to prevent further contact by the bailiffs, she would need to deal directly with the bailiffs and show them her council tax bill. It told her she would need to write to the DVLA to explain to ask them to remove the vehicle record.
There is no evidence the Council took any steps at that point to withdraw or pause the enforcement action.
Following this, the Council sent Mrs X another NOE, for the later PCN, but this arrived before the Council wrote back to Mrs X to ask her to send a copy of her council tax bill to try and resolve the matter.
Mrs X escalated her complaint and the Council repeated its request for her to write to the DVLA. During this time, Mrs X sent the Council a copy of the council tax bill. It explained to her they had no option but to carry on and follow the statutory procedure.
After Mrs X sent it a copy of her council tax bill, the Council initially told Mrs X she would still need to write to the DVLA and have her address removed from the record.
After a short period of time, the Council wrote to Mrs X explaining it had updated her case notes to prevent any further contact.
My findings
The Council relies on information held by the DVLA to recover outstanding PCNs. The car was registered to Mrs X’s address in both street name and post code. There was no fault in the Council sending PCNs to this address, or in the Council providing this address for the bailiffs to issue NOEs.
There is a record of Mrs X contacting the Council in May at the point of enforcement action. Mrs X told me she contacted the Council before May, directly by telephone and spoke to council officers. She said she also returned PCN letters with notes enclosed explaining that Y did not live there.
In its response to my enquiries, the Council said it had no record of this contact and without any evidence either way, I am unable to make a finding on actions the Council did or did not take before May.
When Mrs X told the Council it had the wrong address in May, it did not do anything straight away to pause enforcement action. The Council says it does not pause action until it receives documentary evidence, and I accept this. However, it told Mrs X that she needed to go to the DVLA herself, and continued to tell her this even when she provided documentary evidence in the form of a council tax bill. This was fault by the Council, and enforcement action was live throughout this period.
The Council did subsequently accept the council tax bill as evidence and stopped enforcement action, and the delay before it did so was relatively short. It has already provided an explanation to Mrs X. It should now apologise.
Agreed action
The Council has agreed to send a written apology to Mrs X within six weeks of my final decision.
Final decision
There was some fault in how the Council responded when it found out it was incorrectly sending enforcement notices to Mrs X’s address.
Investigator's decision on behalf of the Ombudsman