To be a bit bewildered by this penalty charge?

[PicaK]

Back in February my house was broken into and my car was stolen. Reported to police, insurance company paid out. Upsetting at the time but got over it.
On a Friday 2 letters turned up in the post from a debt collectors. 1 dated 16 Nov telling me they were chasing for money and 1 dated 30 Nov adding on a penalty charge for not contacting them.
Turns out that the car thieves had driven it through a bus lane, incurred a penalty charge and Birmingham City Council had sold the debt on.
But I never received any notice of a charge.
Naively I thought I'd just explain that, send in the crime ref number and that would be job done. I haven't done anything wrong!
But the penalty notice people now say I have to fill in an out of time statutory declaration PE2 and PE3 which needs witnessing by the county court or paying a solicitor to witness.
Is this absolutely how this works?

Why you might not have got the original letter but got the ones from the bailiff…

The original letters may have gone to the new owners - the insurance company. This is because you did the right thing, sent off forms correctly etc. The notification was then possibly lost/filed/sent to the wrong office etc

When you didn’t reply to the original notification the debt was sold on. The bailiffs knew that you hadn’t replied ( but couldn’t have known why)

They then looked for you via other routes (not dvla) and found you that way.

This happened to us with a fraudulent application for a phone. The application was made from another address using either my son’s or my name (we share a name). First we knew of this was unpleasant letters from debt collectors - who had tracked me down.

Hope you can sort this out soon.

@Missdotty you’re talking shit now as you didn’t read the op. We all know you need to change your address on for driving licence and your log book. Nowhere in the op does it say they have moved.
It’s not theirs to pay as the car was stolen and the useless council bods want her money even though it wasn’t her.

@itsgettingwierd

These parking companies are money grabbing shits.

Years and years ago a warden gave a whole row of 14 cars a ticket for being in a space between 1-2 hours. It was a 2 hour parking limit and they made a mistake.

The company insisted everyone had to jump through hoops to get the falsely produced tickets cancelled.

I asked for a contact address and wrote a letter stating clearly that if they insist on trying to fine me civilly for what they would claim would be a loss to money to businesses for my parking for 62 minutes in a 120 minute space then I'd counter sue for the emotional distress and my time due to their mistake.

I never heard back and never filled out their umpteen forms either!

Since when do you get a parking charge for thieves driving your stolen car in a bus lane?

Do people even read the post they are replying to?