Traffic wardens eh!

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Malcolm Kane wrote:
<SNIP>
>
> If it is anything like our area the scheme is self financing. This
> means that as the locals get more careful about times the wardens get
> more picky about is it within the white lines etc.
>
> It has also recently come to light (thanks I am told to the freedom of
> information act) that the wardens have quotas of tickets which they are
> expected to issue. The implication is that if you regularly fail to
> fill your quota then your not doing your job.
>
> This of course means they have to ticket for the tiniest excuse.
>
> Incidentally since the Carlisle floods in Jan 2005 the police have been
> parking all day every day where they should have been ticketed.
>


The wardens down here can also ticket you if you have no Warrant of
Fitness ($250) or Registration ($250) displayed.

This used to be the police's job, so some of the money goes to the local
council, with the rest going into the govt. coffers.
 
On 2006-01-24, Malcolm Kane <[email protected]> wrote:

> Incidentally since the Carlisle floods in Jan 2005 the police have been
> parking all day every day where they should have been ticketed.

I saw some news report a few years back about some chap who got so
annoyed about his local police station parking their cars on
double-yellows outside the police station all day (personal cars as
well as jam sandwiches) that he used to walk in there and ask for them
to be moved. The coppers used to move them, then when he'd gone, move
them back again. I think he ended up driving around town in a mock-up
of a U.S. police car with some kind of mascot on the roof, protesting
about it! I can't remember if it got him anywhere, other than the
funny farm.

--
Blast off and strike the evil Bydo empire!
 
Austin Shackles <[email protected]> wrote:

> ...
> a TW last year managed to ticket the speed camera boys' van
> somewhere, which I found hilariously funny at the time.

Rough justice and sweet too - but it doesn't really right the injustices
of these petty despots.

--
William Tasso
 
On 24 Jan 2006 03:51:56 -0800, "Dave P" <[email protected]>
wrote:

>I recently parked in an NCP car park in lincoln, collected ticket from
>man, left car about midday, returned about 9pm, after the man had gone
>home. The gates to the car park were left open (I had checked they
>would be!) and we were free to drive out without paying. There was a
>little notice left undr the wiper - "This vehicle A123ABC has incurred
>a charge of £5 (or whatever) which has not been paid. Please post
>your payment to xxx or pay on your next visit." That was so effing
>*reasonable* that I paid up, just to reward their reasonableness. Mind
>you, that was NCP, a private company, not the loacl authority or the
>police.
>

Of course they were reasonable, being a private company the only
resource they have to actually *make* you pay is the county court.
Which they're hardly going to do for a fiver. The council/local
authourity/police on the other hand, can use the criminal courts to
make you pay, hence they don't have to be so nice in thier letters.

Alex
 

"Ian Rawlings" <[email protected]> wrote in message
news:[email protected]...
> On 2006-01-24, Dave Liquorice <[email protected]> wrote:
>
> > I think I'm missing something about how this congestion charge thingy
> > works. Being several hundred miles from London I assume it works just
> > like any other toll or car park charge.
>
> Nope, it's been specially designed to catch people out. You drive
> into London, you see the "C" signs everywhere, think "Hmm that must be
> that congenstion charge thing I've heard about", do your work, drive
> home tired and weary arriving home at perhaps 10PM and relax for a
> while. The next day you phone up to pay and are told that you're too
> late, you have to pay beforehand or by 10:00PM on the day you travel.
> You can pay up to midnight on the day you travel but that costs an
> extra £2. You can appeal but the options are extremely limited, I
> can't remember what they are as they're not on the CC London website,
> only on the backs of the tickets themselves.
>
> When you protest that it's grossly unfair you are told that the
> congestion charge rules were publicised on nationwide news, the retort
> that you didn't pay it any heed because you don't live in London or
> travel there normally isn't valid apparently, neither is the
> difference in time of a year or more between you being "informed" of
> the rules and you actually using it. You see, it's *LONDON* therefore
> every single soul in the British isles should have heeded the somewhat
> confused news reports of the time and written the instructions down
> for when they came to London.....
>
> I've bitched about this "pay before you go" lark before, it's amazing
> the number of people who just trot out the "ignorance is no excuse"
> line, it bloody well needs to be with those kind of rules.
>
> Mind you, there are exemptions for vehicles with more than 12 seats,
> so a 110 County could swing it. Also apparently they don't check if
> your vehicle has 12 seats or not, some people claim to have applied
> for an exemption on these ground and got one, despite driving a normal
> eurobox.
>
> Personally I just avoid the place like the plague, for many more
> reasons than just the congestion charge.
>


Sounds like an overly harsh system. in Melbourne Aus, we have a few major
sections of road which you must pay for in a similar way (ring up and give
credit card details etc.) but at least they give you a week after travelling
to pay for it. it used to be you had to pay on the day, but everyone kickied
up a fuss about it so they changed it to a week.

and in relation to ticket inspectors, you britons are not alone. every day i
feel more like i'm living in a nanny-state in Victoria. every where you look
theres some new ****ing rule about something stupid or irrelevant. and our
speed cameras and speed-limit set-up is ridiculous. i was booked at midnight
on a Sunday for parking in an area that becomes permit parking after 10pm or
something ridiculous. There were empty spots all around me, once again i was
parking were i shouldn't be, but be buggered if i can spend 15 minutes every
time i go somewhere trying to decipher the bloody parking signs.

just like all those before me, i've finished my rant and will now enjoy my
glass of wine.

Cheers.


 
>I recently parked in an NCP car park in lincoln, collected ticket from
>man, left car about midday, returned about 9pm, after the man had gone
>home. The gates to the car park were left open (I had checked they
>would be!) and we were free to drive out without paying. There was a
>little notice left undr the wiper - "This vehicle A123ABC has incurred
>a charge of £5 (or whatever) which has not been paid. Please post
>your payment to xxx or pay on your next visit." That was so effing
>*reasonable* that I paid up, just to reward their reasonableness. Mind
>you, that was NCP, a private company, not the loacl authority or the
>police.


Of course they were reasonable, being a private company the only
resource they have to actually *make* you pay is the county court.
Which they're hardly going to do for a fiver. The council/local
authourity/police on the other hand, can use the criminal courts to
make you pay, hence they don't have to be so nice in thier letters.

Ah of course. No private company would go to court over a fiver
because of court costs. The police or council can use the criminal
court system to persue you to the max, cos to them it;s effectively
free, paid for by you and me. Plus the fear factor - if you take them
on and lose, it can be very expensive, most people pay up to avoid the
hassle as they know you won't beat the system.

DaveP

 
>> I think I'm missing something about how this congestion charge thingy
>> works. Being several hundred miles from London I assume it works just
>> like any other toll or car park charge.


>Nope, it's been specially designed to catch people out.

Nail/head.

It's not that the rules (speeding, parking, etc) are being enforced
more strictly. If we agree with the rules, we can't complain if they
are applied and enforced.
What makes me feel very angry and powerless is the way that they are
being enforced seems designed to catch people out. Camera vans hiding
behind road signs, where they don't deter speeders but simply catch
them after the offence is committed. Road works cameras placed, not at
the road works where they might have some effect, but half a mile later
to catch those who speed up too soon. As happened to me, £40 fines
for overstaying a parking meter at 8am (no-one about, street empty)
rather than at 10am when the streets are full of cars cruising for a
place.

I agree with the drink/drive limits completely (and I don't drink and
drive at all), but even I would disagree if the coppers waited in
someone's drive to breathalyse him when he came back from the pub - in
other words, to catch him after he has committed an offence (and
endangered lives etc) rather than wait down the road from the pub and
catch him before the offence. It would smack of targets and revenue,
rather than a concern for road safety, as a lot of the current
enforcement strategies seem to be.

DaveP

 
On 2006-01-25, Dave P <[email protected]> wrote:

> Ah of course. No private company would go to court over a fiver
> because of court costs. The police or council can use the criminal
> court system to persue you to the max, cos to them it;s effectively
> free, paid for by you and me.

If that was the case, I'd probably have about 6 points on my license
following the two NIPs I binned in the last three years. It's true
that both cases were borderline so could have gone my way if I'd have
gone to court, but the Police didn't bother to chase in any way other
than one misleading warning letter promising hellfire and brimstone.
This is from two different counties, not one force.

> Plus the fear factor - if you take them on and lose, it can be very
> expensive, most people pay up to avoid the hassle as they know you
> won't beat the system.

It does seem that going to court is prohibitively expensive for us
taxpayers, although I have no experience of it. I get that impression
from the salacious edited highlights presented to us by the press, so
chances are it's the wrong impression!

--
Blast off and strike the evil Bydo empire!
 
On Tue, 24 Jan 2006 17:49:19 +0000, Ian Rawlings wrote:

> The next day you phone up to pay and are told that you're too
> late, you have to pay beforehand or by 10:00PM on the day you
> travel. You can pay up to midnight on the day you travel but that
> costs an extra £2.

So you need to know that you are going to enter the congestion zone
and prepay or pay before 2200 on the day you do enter it? Tricky, I
don't actually know were the congestion zone is, other than being
somewhere within the M25.

What options are there available to pay it? Easily available street
side machines that take cash? Drive by coin bins? Or do you have to
have a credit card and/or phone and/or internet access?

> When you protest that it's grossly unfair you are told that the
> congestion charge rules were publicised on nationwide news,

Were they? I remember a bit of noise about it when it came in but
certainly didn't pay much attention. It is not relevant to me living
several hundred miles away.

> Personally I just avoid the place like the plague, for many more
> reasons than just the congestion charge.

So do I. Horrible, smelly, noisy, place full of rude and ignorant
people.

--
Cheers [email protected]
Dave. pam is missing e-mail



 
On 2006-01-25, Dave Liquorice <[email protected]> wrote:

> So you need to know that you are going to enter the congestion zone
> and prepay or pay before 2200 on the day you do enter it? Tricky, I
> don't actually know were the congestion zone is, other than being
> somewhere within the M25.

You get warning signs up before it telling you how far ahead it
starts, so that's not so bad, however they are quite small and for
those of us not familiar with the somewhat chaotic and overwhelming
London roads it's not that easy. I find driving in London much easier
now I have a satnav system but it's still a PITA and if you're trying
to navigate then it would be easy to miss the warning signs. They do
have signs painted on the roads at the start of the zone, although
these are often covered by the car in front due to the congestion that
still infests the place.

> What options are there available to pay it? Easily available street
> side machines that take cash? Drive by coin bins? Or do you have to
> have a credit card and/or phone and/or internet access?

They do make a variety of options available, you can pay by internet,
pay by phone, pay by SMS (if you set up an account with them I think),
and pay in some shops. I've never used it more than once however, but
there have been complaints about the payment systems not working very
well, I'm not sure if that's still a problem.

> Were they? I remember a bit of noise about it when it came in but
> certainly didn't pay much attention. It is not relevant to me living
> several hundred miles away.

Ditto, which is one of my beefs with the system. I live 3 hour's
drive from London and have been there about 4 times in the last year
since I got caught by the charge, when I was caught I'd not been there
in several years so I too didn't read much more than the first
paragraph of news about yet another tax on travelling in London, in
the same way that I don't read about people being killed in Northern
Ireland.

--
Blast off and strike the evil Bydo empire!
 
Ian Rawlings <[email protected]> wrote:

> On 2006-01-25, Dave Liquorice <[email protected]> wrote:

>> ...
>> What options are there available to pay it? Easily available street
>> side machines that take cash? Drive by coin bins? Or do you have to
>> have a credit card and/or phone and/or internet access?
>
> They do make a variety of options available, you can pay by internet,
> pay by phone, pay by SMS (if you set up an account with them I think),
> and pay in some shops.

FYI: most carparks in the zone also have a congestion charge payment
machine. Not much help if you find a meter though.

For my part, I find it easier to 'phone home' with instruction/request to
pay the charge online - how that would work for others may be a mute point.

--
William Tasso
 
On Tue, 24 Jan 2006 19:30:24 +0000, Malcolm Kane
<[email protected]> wrote:

>This of course means they have to ticket for the tiniest excuse.

I retaxed my GS 'online' between Christmas and New Year - in due time
for the 'your disc will arrive within 5 days'. Old tax ran out on
31-12-2005 new disc arrived in the post on 21st Jan - dated 19th Jan.

Technically it is an offence to not display a valid disc on the
vehicle - regardless of whether the vehicle has been retaxed.


--
"We have gone from a world of concentrated knowledge and wisdom to one
of distributed ignorance. And we know and understand less while being
increasingly capable." Prof. Peter Cochrane, formerly of BT Labs
In memory of Brian {Hamilton Kelly} who logged off 15th September 2005
 
On Tue, 24 Jan 2006 18:04:59 GMT, [email protected] wrote:

>>Although there is no way of proving that bet except by trying it again the
>>next time a whale swims up the Thames past London.
>
>Fancy a dip Martyn?

Thank you, how kind. I now have to find a way to remove bacon and
melted brie toastie from my monitor...

 
On Tue, 24 Jan 2006 23:01:05 +0000, Alex <[email protected]>
wrote:

>Of course they were reasonable, being a private company the only
>resource they have to actually *make* you pay is the county court.

Course it isn't. They could clamp you.


--
"We have gone from a world of concentrated knowledge and wisdom to one
of distributed ignorance. And we know and understand less while being
increasingly capable." Prof. Peter Cochrane, formerly of BT Labs
In memory of Brian {Hamilton Kelly} who logged off 15th September 2005
 
On Wed, 25 Jan 2006 14:45:45 +0000, Mother <"@ {mother} @"@101fc.net>
wrote:

>On Tue, 24 Jan 2006 23:01:05 +0000, Alex <[email protected]>
>wrote:
>
>>Of course they were reasonable, being a private company the only
>>resource they have to actually *make* you pay is the county court.
>
>Course it isn't. They could clamp you.

It's called illegal restraint of property unless its done by, or on
behalf of the local authority or police.

Alex
 
On Wed, 25 Jan 2006 14:25:56 +0000, Mother <"@ {mother} @"@101fc.net>
scribbled the following nonsense:

>On Mon, 23 Jan 2006 20:49:43 -0000, "Richard Brookman"
><[email protected]> wrote:
>
>><rant over, thanks for listening>
>
>You think that's bad...
>
>http://www.101fc.net/_bits/scc.jpg

now that is a jobsworth!
--

Simon Isaacs

Peterborough 4x4 Club Newsletter Editor and Webmaster
Green Lane Association (GLASS) Financial Director
101 Ambi, undergoing camper conversion www.simoni.co.uk
1976 S3 LWT, Fully restored, ready for sale! Make me an offer!
Suzuki SJ410 (Wife's) 3" lift kit fitted, body shell now restored and mounted on chassis, waiting on a windscreen and MOT
Series 3 88" Rolling chassis...what to do next
1993 200 TDi Discovery
1994 200 TDi Discovery body sheel, being bobbed and modded.....
 
....and Ian Rawlings spake unto the tribes of Usenet, saying...

> It does seem that going to court is prohibitively expensive for us
> taxpayers, although I have no experience of it.

System: we allege you were speeding. £60 if you come quietly and don't make
a fuss.
Rich: refuses to sign document admitting offence when genuinely believes he
wasn't speeding.*
System: <fingers in ears> you were speeding, you were, you were, you were,
gotcha, gotcha, la la la
Rich: signs cheque for £240.

* If I sign a court document that contains a statement that I believe to be
false, I am liable to a fine or even imprisonment. So should I have signed
it or not?


--
Rich
==============================

Time flies like an arrow. Fruit flies like a banana.


 
....and Alex spake unto the tribes of Usenet, saying...


> On Wed, 25 Jan 2006 14:45:45 +0000, Mother <"@ {mother} @"@101fc.net>
> wrote:
>
>> On Tue, 24 Jan 2006 23:01:05 +0000, Alex <[email protected]>
>> wrote:
>>
>>> Of course they were reasonable, being a private company the only
>>> resource they have to actually *make* you pay is the county court.
>>
>> Course it isn't. They could clamp you.
>
> It's called illegal restraint of property unless its done by, or on
> behalf of the local authority or police.
>
> Alex

Try telling that to Di, who was clamped in a paved area behind a shop. The
large burly (and phenomenally unpleasant) clamper insisted that she walk a
mile to the cashpoint and back, and hand him £100 as he would not take a
cheque. I arrived on the scene and phoned the police (mentioned demanding
money with menaces), and they sent a traffic warden to the scene. She said
that as the ground was private property and there was a warning sign (tiny,
high and very recent), we had no option but to pay up. Didn't want to know.
I imagine an NCP car park would have the same legal status.

Like a lot of other comments in this thread, they get away with it because
no-one wants to know.

--
Rich
==============================

Time flies like an arrow. Fruit flies like a banana.


 
On Wed, 25 Jan 2006 19:19:15 -0000, "Richard Brookman"
<[email protected]> wrote:

>If I sign a court document that contains a statement that I believe to be
>false, I am liable to a fine or even imprisonment. So should I have signed
>it or not?

Did we talk about this? If not, it's pretty scary (very scary
actually).

At a training day for Magistrates last September one of the scenarios
was based around a speed camera that was found to have been illegally
placed - and indeed, in a part of a road where it would have been
impossible to break the speed limit.

There were two groups; those who stood their ground and went to Court,
and those who just signed the form and sent the cheque. After the
finding that the camera had been illegally placed, those who had gone
to Court (and obviously found guilty) will have had their points
removed and fine refunded (although no compensation would be paid for
increased insurance, loss of job etc - but that's another point).

One of the Court Clerks (viscious cow, bloody nice legs though) who
was leading the training, well, involved in it anyway as they're not
actually allowed to 'lead' as it were, suggested that although those
who'd just sent in the cheque were due a refund, they must knowingly
have made a false declaration of guilt - so should they face far more
serious charges as a consequence...


--
"We have gone from a world of concentrated knowledge and wisdom to one
of distributed ignorance. And we know and understand less while being
increasingly capable." Prof. Peter Cochrane, formerly of BT Labs
In memory of Brian {Hamilton Kelly} who logged off 15th September 2005
 
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