Thousands of London taxi drivers have been wrongly fined for not paying the capital’s ULEZ fees – which they are exempt from.
But following what Transport for London called “a glitch”, thousands of cab drivers wrongly received penalty charge notices for entering the ULEZ zone at the end of September and the beginning of October. Drivers who enter the zone must pay £12.50 a day with those who fail to pay receiving fines of £180. London’s black cabs are on the TfL exemption list and do not need to pay.
Apology
But GB News reports that 7,563 penalty notices were incorrectly issued – even to an operator with a fleet of 300 EVs. It reported that TfL has “acknowledged the mistake and issued an apology stating: ‘We are aware that some taxi drivers have received PCNs incorrectly due to a system issue. We have written to vehicle owners to confirm they do not need to take any action, and that any PCNs that have been incorrectly issued will be cancelled’.”
Despite the apology and cancellation of fines, taxi bosses say the latest error left drivers so worried that some were considering paying the fines just to make the issue go away.
Licensed Taxi Drivers’ Association general secretary Steve McNamara is quoted by GB News as saying: “Our phone systems are in meltdown because our members cannot get in touch with TFL. Thousands of my members have been affected by this. We’ve had over 500 calls this morning alone.
“Members are struggling to get through to TFL so they’re all ringing us and consequently our phones are jumping off the hook … this should not have happened.”
Stressful
He said the situation had been stressful for drivers as unpaid fines can lead to bailiffs getting involved to recover the debt.
TfL has confirmed to GB News that it will write to all affected vehicle owners reassuring them they do not need to take any action regarding the incorrect penalty notices.
Among those affected was Lee Drinkwater, who runs a fleet of electric taxis. He told the BBC he knew of 300 penalty charge notices sent to his drivers and was asked by TfL to send in licence details for each driver to have the charges cancelled.
He said: “I can’t have staff spending this much time on the tickets … it’s not acceptable.”
Mr McNamara told the BBC that this follows other wrongly issued penalty charges sent out recently, which were believed to be due to a recent IT hack on TfL and which were later cancelled.
And in May, we heard how drivers were wrongly receiving fines after ULEZ cameras mis-read number plates. In one instance, a driver who had driven his car to the Ukraine and donated it to soldiers fighting against Russia received fines and the threat of legal action after his vehicle apparently entered the ULEZ months later – when it was more than 1,400 miles away. His own lawyers proved that the number plates didn’t match.
In other cases, innocent drivers have received fines after their number plates were apparently cloned by criminals trying to avoid paying the ULEZ fees.
Whether it is an IT “glitch”, hack, cameras misreading number plates or cloned number plates, the worry and hassle of dealing with each situation is understandably taking its toll on drivers who are wary that unpaid tickets are quickly followed by bailiffs and other legal headaches they could do without.
