School restriction zone entered 45 seconds too soon. PCN issued.

[askingformymum]

I appreciate that there needs to be an exact time for the restrictions to apply and this thread is not about the zones themselves.

My questions is, should the council be lenient and wave the fine as the car entered the zone less than 45 seconds too soon, ie at 15:44:15 rather than 15:45 as stated on the signage.

The car in question has a digital clock and the driver insists the clock showed 15:45 (the driver actually sat away from the zone and waited for the clock to change so that it was ok to drive through. It is part of the driver's regular route and the driver is familiar with the zone restrictions).

So, should the council wave the fine? They are refusing to so far.

Is there any legal angle here that we could try?

TIA

I think they’re being massively unreasonable. Challenge.

I agree. Unfortunately, the driver tried to appeal but did it via the wrong channels so the official appeal date has lapsed and we are now having to try by other means.
It's proving extremely difficult.

In the last decade they brought in a 10 minutes grace period for parking overstays, but that makes more sense as it's possible you are delayed unavoidably.
With restricted zones I'm not so sure, it doesn't sound like something that would have an automatic buffer zone but if you've missed your free appeal you might have to eat the fine as the least worst option in terms of stress.
You could try asking for the council's policy on enforcement in case that gives you any ammunition?

It does seem a bit mean but I suppose they have to draw the line somewhere and if people know they can get away with entering at say 15.44 everyone will start doing that.

It’s money making. My DH was fined for entering an illeagal yellow box. It fails to comply with regulations. Loads of people have been fined. No change has been made and DH knows the regulations! They still fine motorists and they are in the wrong. The LA wants the money!

It does sound mean but presumably it’s a “strict liability offence” which is hard to challenge because you either did or didn’t do it and if you did you are liable for the consequences.

I think it sounds a waste of everyone’s time .. I would just pay it and move on..

The time is 3.45 - so anything before that should be fined. It doesn't matter if it is ten seconds or ten minutes.

Thanks for the replies.

I appreciate that a 10 minute grace period for school traffic zones would be too much but I thought that perhaps 1 minute's grace would not be unreasonable 😏.

The trouble is that if there’s one minute’s grace then why not 90 seconds, or two minutes? Where do you draw the line? Which leads back to 3.45 hard deadline. In the days of non-digital time-keeping maybe it was easier to argue for a grace period.

There's a significant allowance allowed for inaccuracy on speedos, I'd have thought there would also be some sort of leeway on timing.
Even digital clocks aren't always precisely in sync - one in a car mightn't be 'slaved' to an atomic clock.

I suppose the challenge would be the discrepancy in clocks how do we know their clock wasn't slow how do we know your car clock isn't fast

so the official appeal date has lapsed and we are now having to try by other means.

I suspect that'll be the crux of the issue. If they'd gone the correct route, there's a good chance someone with common sense would have thrown this out.

It's probably not worth the fight now.

I don't watch the exact time I enter a time restricted area, if it's anywhere close I would assume it's active. If you run it that close you're likely to get done for it. Even a time signal controlled clock only re-checks itself maybe hourly so could easily be a few seconds out.

Edit: What was the rush to go more than 20, it's usually quite a short distance past a school or was it no entry until that time?

I don't really see how you can challenge it given they did indeed drive into the zone when it was still active.

Pay up and lesson learned for next time - leave it a good few minutes after the given time!

It wasn't a speed issue; it was entering a zone.

The annoying thing is that the driver waited until the car clock said it was past the restricted time. So it's definitely a case of clocks being misaligned rather than the driver deliberately committing an offence but that is impossible to prove.

It doesn't matter whether it was deliberate or not though.

Anyone could say "oh, my clock showed 3:45!" and there would be no way at all to prove it.

Is it worth the effort? How much is the fine? If you think about a nominal cost of the time and effort (maybe roughly your hourly rate at work?) will you actually be gaining anything? In my area a fine is £30 if you pay quickly.

Where I do think there should be a bit of leeway is when new schemes are introduced. Our local council has gone nuts on bus lanes. When one was introduced near work, pretty much everyone got a fine in the first few days.

If you've driven a route every day for years there is a degree of 'autopilot' going on when you are commuting. I do think that they could have given it a few days for everyone to get used to it before starting to fine. Nobody was doing it deliberately.

I've been looking this up recently in order to challenge a similar PCN for entering a zone 16 seconds early - try posting on ftla.uk (used to be Pepipoo). The people on there have a wealth of knowledge.

There is some precedent at tribunal for having similar appeals allowed, as it could be considered unreasonable for the average motorist to know whether their dash clock is calibrated to the exact time as the ANPR cameras. If the council have refused the initial representation (which they almost always do), then it depends on whether the driver wants to go to the next stage.

What do you you mean by the driver has gone via the wrong channels though? There's really only one way to make initial representations against a PCN, which is via the council, which should be clearly documented on the notice itself.

Hi, does anyone know if the camera records you as soon as you enter the road? I turned into a road and realised it was in a school restriction time and stopped the car before passing the camera.

Not sure which camera you are talking about.
You have contravened the rule as soon as you have either passed the sign or completed the manoeuvre that is not permitted. Usually the camera set up to enforce the rule would have a clear view of your car moving while it does whatever it is, then at that point they should have enough evidence to issue a penalty.

I would not attempt to appeal. The line has to be drawn somewhere and I think an appeal would fail.