How Can I Challenge A Southside PCN?
This blog serves to answer the question “How Can I Challenge A Southside PCN?” Your PCN challenge needs to convince the Durham County Council that the traffic violation never happened or that it occurred as a result of your authentic mitigating circumstances. The evidence that you attach with your appeal will be used to show your point of view of events and needs to be genuine and professionally filmed (video clips of the traffic violation scene).
How Can I Challenge A Southside PCN?
Southside Village is located within Durham County Council and you need to contact the Durham County Council for challenging a Southside PCN.
The evidence which you provide with your Southside PCN challenge needs to be genuine and it needs to show an alternative point of view of events as they happened at the traffic violation scene. This evidence is being attached with your text that has already stated that the traffic violation didn’t happen or happened as a result of your authentic mitigating circumstances.
It simply serves to further explain how what you are saying is true and prove your case to the Durham County Council. You can also further put forward this video clip again in front of the Traffic Penalty Tribunal, if the Durham County Council rejects your appeal.
Your grounds of the appeal stated in your PCN challenge will serve to explain your point of view of events to the council, these might set out that the traffic violation didn’t happen and that you have been wrongly charged for the contravention (by mentioning the stated evidence used by the council). In this case you can mention your own attached evidence as being authentic and showing the correct version of events as they took place at the scene.
In many cases, PCNs are not enforceable and you may be able to win your case and avoid having to pay your fine.
You could begin the process by speaking to an online solicitor for as little as £5.
What is the procedure for appealing against a Southside PCN?
You can submit a formal representation to your Southside PCN by writing a letter addressed to Park Smarter or by filling in the online formal representation form on the Durham County Council’s official website.
You need to brainstorm reasons for challenging a Southside PCN from the day of the incident and list them down in word processing software or on paper. It is essential to have some authentic evidence to attach with your PCN appeal in the form of video footage of the traffic violation, medical certificates explaining your mitigating circumstances, or pay and display tickets.
The evidence must be matched with the grounds for your appeal before describing the incident from your point of view. Your rough formal representation can be edited for clarity multiple times before it is ready to attach to your online appeal to Durham County Council. You need to visit Durham County Council’s official website to submit a formal representation to your PCN.
You have to open this webpage to enter your PCN Number and your Vehicle Registration Number as well as all your personal details including your mailing address, email address, the exact date of your contravention and the reasons why you are challenging the PCN. You need to click on “Submit Form” to submit the online appeals form.
It is essential to upload authentic evidence material with your PCN challenge to describe your mitigating circumstances to the Durham County Council and for explaining your point of view of the events which took place at the traffic violation scene. If you made a video clip of your traffic contravention, you should save snapshots from it by using a video player or video editing software.
Most video players such as VLC player allow you to slow down your video frame by frame and thus take ( a collection of) snapshots to attach with your Southside PCN challenge.The text of your appeal must state the relevant contravention code on your PCN and explain how you attempted to avoid the error (supported by photos or video footage).
Once you have proofread your appeal to eliminate any reasons for your challenge which might convey a disregard for traffic contravention codes enforced in the Durham County Council (by mixing up the contraventions) or reasons which involve forgetfulness to justify your actions, you can submit the formal representation.
Another way to send in your Southside PCN challenge is by mail. You can write a formal representation to the Durham County Council on the reverse of your “Notice to Owner” document. This handwritten appeal should be composed gradually by incorporating all the available evidence material to support the grounds for your challenge and should be able to convince the council of your mitigating circumstances (or other acceptable reasons).
You should view evidence relating to your Southside PCN online before writing down your appeal, so that you end up focusing on refuting the contents of the CCTV video or photographs or your traffic violation. Your PCN appeals form and all accompanying evidence documents (enclosed in an envelope) need to be sent to:
Room 4/117-122,
Durham County Co,
Durham,
County Hall,,
United Kingdom DH1 9JP
The Durham County Council will respond to your PCN appeal and your PCN will be cancelled or you will be sent a Notice of Rejection or Representations, which needs to be received promptly in order to contest the notice with the Traffic Penalty Tribunal.
What is a Penalty Charge Notice?
A Penalty Charge Notice is a monetary penalty issued to drivers or motorists for committing certain traffic contraventions including violating Parking, Bus Lane and Moving Traffic restrictions. A PCN is issued for failing to follow Parking zone, bus lane enforcement and moving traffic restrictions mentioned in the Road Traffic Act 1984 and the Traffic Management Act 2004.
A penalty charge notice can be handed to you by a Civil Enforcement Officer or dispatched to your (DVLA) residential address by post. CCTV cameras and Civil Enforcement Officers observe traffic contraventions before a violation is detected and the vehicle is charged with a PCN.
A PCN might also be issued for failing to pay road charges on time. You have 28 days to decide how and if you would like to challenge your Penalty Charge Notice. After 28 days if you have neither paid nor challenged your PCN, you will be sent a charge certificate from the Traffic Penalty Tribunal.
If you don’t challenge a PCN, you should pay the fine within 28 days, otherwise, its amount will increase by 50%. A £130 PCN will be worth £195 if you pay it in the 14 days after receiving your charge certificate.
How Can I Pay my Southside PCN fine?
You can pay your Southside PCN on the Durham County Council’s online payments page, or by calling Durham County Council’s automated payments hotline.
You need to visit the Durham County Council website to pay your Southside PCN. On this webpage, you can enter your PCN Number and your Vehicle Registration Number. Once you have entered these details you can click on “Next”.
On the next page, you have to enter your payment card details to complete your Ramsgate PCN payment. The Durham County Council accepts Mastercard, Visa Card, Maestro Card, UK Maestro Card, and Visa Electron card for PCN fine payments.
You might want to call on Durham County Council’s automated payments hotline for paying your Southside PCN. For this, you have to call on 0330 0884 785. On the call, you will need to enter your PCN number and payment card details. You can use the * key to enter the letters in your PCN number. This payment hotline is available 24 hours a day, 7 days a week. You should wait to receive a confirmation code for your PCN payment before ending the call.
How much is the PCN fine for each of the 3 kinds of PCNs served in the Durham County Council?
A Parking PCN in the Durham County Council is served for violating higher or lower level parking restrictions. You have to pay £70 for committing a higher level parking contravention and £50 for a lower level parking contravention. If you pay the parking fine within 14 days, you will just be paying £35 or £25 as a 50% discount is applicable to your payment.
For failing to comply with a bus lane contravention code or a moving traffic restriction in Durham County Council, you will be charged a £70 Penalty Charge Notice. The 50% early payment discount reduces both these types of PCN fines to £35 if a bus lane PCN is paid within 21 days and a moving traffic PCN is paid within 14 days
What will happen if I don’t pay my Southside PCN within the 28-day limit?
You should not ignore traffic contraventions or the Penalty Charge Notices resulting from them or cultivate a careless attitude towards driving in Durham County Council. As per your driving license rules, you are bound to abide by Parking, Bus Lane, and Moving Traffic contravention codes in Durham County Council.
If you neither pay your Southside PCN within 28 days nor decide to appeal against it, you will be sent a charge certificate from the Traffic Penalty Tribunal. The charge certificate increases your PCN fine by 50%, which means you will be paying £105 (or £75) now. You should pay the charge certificate within 14 days as it cannot be appealed and ignoring the charge certificate may result in the filing of a court order (for recovery of debts) against you by the Durham County Council.
You will be sent a “Notice of Debt Registration” and a witness certificate from the Traffic Penalty Tribunal, if you don’t pay the charge certificate amount within 14 days. The unpaid amount will be treated as a debt with the Traffic Enforcement Centre at the Northampton County Court.
The court order for debt recovery enforces that the charge certificate amount must be paid in full within 21 days or the county court will have to use additional powers to recover the money from your possession which means employing Enforcement Agents to (contact you or) visit your personal premises.
Can I Dispute A Southside PCN with the Traffic Penalty Tribunal if the Durham County Council dismisses my appeal?
Yes, you can dispute the decision of the Durham County Council in your “Notice of Rejection of Representations” with the Traffic Penalty Tribunal. The Traffic Penalty Tribunal website requires you to enter details given on your Notice of Rejection of Representations, after opening this webpage.
You can watch this instructional video here to learn about your challenge process. The video clearly explains how to use the online service offered by the Traffic Penalty Tribunal. On the Traffic Penalty Tribunal webpage, you will first have to select the type of PCN you were served by the Durham County Council (shown on the bottom part of the page).
After clicking on your specific type of Penalty Charge Notice, you should select “England” (Outside London). In the window which opens up, you should click on the orange box which reads “If you don’t agree with the PCN, you can make representations against it”.
After viewing the instructions on the following page, you need to click on “Start your appeal here” at the bottom of the webpage You will then be required to enter your Vehicle Registration Number, the reference number from the “Notice of Rejection” letter from the Durham County Council, and your PCN number for which the appeal was rejected on this page.
You can use the online service to challenge multiple “Notices of Rejection” simultaneously. You will require a valid email address to create an account on the Traffic Penalty Tribunal website. You have to upload a copy of your “Notice of Rejection of Representations” letter to your application by using the Traffic Penalty Tribunal’s online portal.
You can upload evidence such as video clips of your traffic violation scenes (taken from inside your vehicle), medical certificates from a certified General Practitioner, maps of the area showing the exact distance your vehicle travelled inside a no-entry zone, and scanned copies of “pay and display” tickets. You should construct a strong appeals case to communicate your mitigating circumstances or to deliver your assertion that the traffic violation never occurred.
The Traffic Penalty Tribunal should be able to ascertain the legitimacy of your situation by viewing evidence material uploaded to the PCN appeals system.
Your appeal of the “Notice of Rejection of Representations” should be submitted to the Traffic Penalty Tribunal within 28 days of receiving your Notification of Rejection from the Durham County Council. You must avail yourself of this chance of a free and independent hearing of your case.
You will be able to contact the Traffic Penalty Tribunal adjudicator during the formulation of your appeal. The result of your appeal will be communicated to you within 14-28 days of submitting your representation. If the adjudicator decides the case in your favour, the PCN will be cancelled by the Durham County Council.
Conclusion
This blog post addressed the question “How Can I Challenge A Southside PCN?” You can challenge a Southside PCN by focusing your appeal on the contravention code on it, all you need to do is to simply study the contravention code and realise how you can challenge your PCN. You have to add in authentic evidence material with your PCN challenge such as a video clip made from inside your vehicle that day to complete the application and submit it to the Durham County Council.
