The Ombudsman's final decision
Summary: We will not investigate this complaint about a penalty charge notice. This is because the actions complained about did not cause Mr X significant enough injustice to warrant investigation.
The complaint
Mr X complains a council civil enforcement officer (parking warden) confirmed it was ok to park in a specific location but the owner of the vehicle later received a penalty charge notice (PCN). He also complains about the Council’s handling of his challenge to the PCN and the way it dealt with his complaint.
The Ombudsman’s role and powers
We investigate complaints about ‘maladministration’ and ‘service failure’, which we call ‘fault’. We must also consider whether any fault has had an adverse effect on the person making the complaint, which we call ‘injustice’. We provide a free service, but must use public money carefully. We do not start an investigation if we decide the tests set out in our Assessment Code are not met. (Local Government Act 1974, section 24A(6), as amended)
How I considered this complaint
I considered information provided by Mr X and the Council.
I considered the Ombudsman’s Assessment Code.
My assessment
We do not investigate all the complaints we receive. In deciding whether to investigate we need to consider various tests. These include the alleged injustice to the person complaining. We only investigate the most serious complaints.
I appreciate Mr X is unhappy about the PCN but he is not the owner of the vehicle and is not directly, or significantly, affected by the Council issuing the PCN. The correspondence I have seen confirms the PCN was settled at the discounted rate of £35 and this amount is not significant enough to warrant investigation, whether it was paid by Mr X or the vehicle owner.
Furthermore, as the person liable for the PCN the owner of the vehicle had a right of appeal against the PCN which is set out in law. We would therefore expect them to have continued to challenge the PCN, and to ultimately appeal to the Traffic Penalty Tribunal, had they felt it was wrongly issued and should be cancelled. The complaints process does not provide an alternative to this.
Mr X is nevertheless unhappy with the way the Council dealt with his complaint. But it is not a good use of public resources to look at the Council’s complaints handling if we are not going to look at the substantive issue complained about. We will not therefore investigate this issue separately.
Final decision
We will not investigate this complaint. This is because the Council’s actions did not cause Mr X significant injustice.
Investigator's decision on behalf of the Ombudsman