My husband and I have annually auto-renewed our two council parking permits, one for each vehicle, for three years.
This April, as usual, our payment of £110 for both was debited, but a month later we were informed that the permits had been cancelled.
Cardiff council told us that when we initially applied for the permits in 2022 we supplied incomplete documentation and that the mistake had only just come to light.
Apparently, applications are automatically approved without supporting documents being checked. The council relies on random spot checks to identify any problems, and gives residents 14 days to supply whatever was missing. Anyone who misses the deadline has their permit cancelled without a refund.
We’ve been told we will have to reapply for the permits and pay again. We later found the email informing us in our spam folder. I have hit a brick wall trying to speak to the council.
In the meantime, we have received three tickets, totalling £150, for parking on our road.
NT, Cardiff
Your experience is bizarre on so many levels: the apparent failure to check applications; the assumption that permit holders, who may be on holiday or in hospital, will be in a position to spot and act on a single email within a fortnight, or else lose their permit, and their money; and the fact that they must shell out for a second time to make good oversights that should have been detected at the application stage.
I put all these questions to the council but it only answered the one about the document-checking policy.
Incredible as it may seem, it does, indeed, rely on applicants to confirm they meet the eligibility criteria for a permit rather than scrutinising the evidence itself.
Its terms and conditions state that it reserves the right to request further documents at any time to verify validity.
“Any time” in your case meant three years.
The council tells me that when a “review” found that you had not submitted proof that your vehicles were linked to your address, and you did not provide it within 14 days of the email – which you did not see – it cancelled the permit to “ensure the integrity of the application process”.
This did not prevent the council sending PCNs to your address obtained via the registration plates from the DVLA database. It has now reinstated your permits, at no extra charge, and cancelled the three PCNs, but it appears to remain wedded to the system.
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