Parking Fine Appeals Successful 4 out of 10 times

Over the past 5 years 4 out of 10 of all parking & bus lane fines have been successfully appealed leading to well-known motoring organizations like the RAC calling the data “frightening” and showing drivers that they were “right to appeal” their parking fines. In total there have been almost 4.3million parking fines issued over the past 5 years of which 1.8million were successfully repealed, the potential for repealing is much higher however as not every person who gets a parking fine attempts to appeal it. In fact there were 84 councils across England that accepted more than 50% of all parking fine challenges with some areas of the country seeing parking fine appeal success rates being as high as 90%! The biggest offenders include Basingstoke & Deane council who overturned fines in 90% of all appeals, Christchurch who overturned 83%, Nuneaton & Bedworth who overturned 81% of fines & Lincoln who also overturned 81%. In Wales the highest rates were found in Rhondda Cynon Taf who cancelled 67% of challenged fines whereas in Scotland the highest rate of successful appeals was in Aberdeenshire with 70%. News is however not as good for Northern Ireland where the reported rate is only a 29% appeal rate across the whole of the country. Councils have responded to the latest reports and have stated that fines are not about money and the income from parking fines goes straight back into running the parking systems with any surplus made being spent on improving the transport infrastructure in the local areas. The issues with the current system are usually down to error so it is very important that you attempt an appeal on any parking tickets that you feel have been incorrectly issued and follow the full appeal procedure. Some cases in which you can successfully appeal a parking ticket include: Working for a business that has been exempt from parking tickets such as if you are a builder and therefore need to be able to park close to the property you are working on and do not need to pay the meter, or if your vehicle registration has been incorrectly entered into or incorrectly handled by a parking meter you will also receive your money back. Similarly if the area has inadequate signage of the machine is not working you will not have to pay the fine. In all cases it is best to contact your local council in regards to all tickets and if you are not happy with the resolution you should follow their complaints procedure. However if your parking ticket was instead issued by a private company and you believe the company is operating illegally you should contact the DVLA Swansea who will look into it and potentially revoke their license to issue parking tickets.