Fine for driving off without paying for fuel

[Sparklesea]

I filled my car up with fuel (£50) in July, went into the shop and used my phone to pay. It didn't go through but neither I nor the attendant noticed and I drove away.

I have received a letter from a company called VARS technology asking for £90, then a few weeks later another letter asking for £120. Now I've received a letter from a different company called Direct Collection Bailiffs Ltd asking for £200. I was away from home and so didn't receive these letters until recently.

While I fully accept it is my responsibility to ensure payment is made properly, I did attempt to pay and assumed that I had. Obviously I didn't intend to drive away on purpose. I have been into the garage, spoken with the manager and offered to make the payment. He said he wasn't able to take any money because the fuel had gone from their log and the matter had been passed on to VARS.

It seems such a huge amount for one tank of fuel. Can I challenge the amount that DCBL is asking for, and should I do this with them directly, or with VARS? I can't afford to pay £200 but I don't want the heavies coming round and ending up with a CCJ against me. What can I do?

Use ChatGTP or Gemini, they're pretty good at letting you know your legal options at a basic level.

This is why I ALWAYS get a receipt, (after paying by debit card.)

Sorry you're going through this @Sparklesea Hope you get it sorted.

Why would you have nothing to prove you were away? This part is strange, surely you have some kind of travel documents or a letter from your job if it was a work thing. I can’t think of a circumstance in which you’d be away for months at a time with no evidence or paper trail at all of you having done that. Unless you work for MI5 but I I suspect you’d be able to get the fine cancelled another way if you did…..

THIS is why everyone's response to that question "Do you want a receipt?" should be "YES I DO." If they fail to ask, say "I'll need a receipt, please."

A bit weird that you can’t afford £200 for a payment now but didn’t miss any money leaving your account for the fuel. You should be able to prove your long absence from home or explain why it’s taken you such a long time to respond. You may be able to get a reduction but you rightfully have to pay for hat you owe plus admin costs.

O I don’t check my accounts in a way that would flag I haven’t paid for petrol. I
think a lot of people are like me. They look at how much Theres left on the account, the total of tge CC, not the individual items.
Or like I ave done befire, tgey use an app to check how much theyre spending by area (food, petrol utilities etc…). Again, not looking line by line at their payments and then checking with receipt (that the OP probably haven’t taken anyway)

I can understand them saying it's out of their hands for now, but it'd be pretty weird for them to choose to commence legal action when passed back to them knowing it was a genuine mistake.

This is how I got caught out. It was a pay at the pump (one that is notorious for running out of receipt paper) and the payment must have failed. I now never use PATP or leave a petrol station without a receipt...

I'm not checking stuff like this beyond verifying the amount I'm paying for is correct.

With the postal service being as bad as it is,I don't think it's remotely suspicious not to receive letters on time. And you might not look at things you weren't expecting to receive and bin them with all the junk mail you get.

OP I'd write to them and say they don't have proof you didn't pay so you'll see them in court.

And follow the advice on here to contact your bank and find out if there's evidence of your card being declined.

Seems mighty convenient that they have footage of you getting fuel but not going in to pay.

Same.

Same here, I was once chased to the door of a small ASDA because my self-serve payment hadn't gone through properly.

Why admin costs? The cashier should have realised the payment hadn't gone through.

I often drive in Southern Italy where am absolutely meticulous in getting a receipt so they know I won’t be as easily fleeced as they might think.

Nobody except a court of law can fine anyone for a theft.

It is not theft if there was no intention to deprive and your attempt to pay shows there was no intent to deprive.

The current admin costs of repeat letters to recoup the money and the account management. Do you think those letters write themselves? Read the OP.

Added: OP acknowledged the responsibility lies with them to ensure payment had gone through.

You don’t look at your current account? Or you look but you have so much money sitting you don’t notice £50 that shouldn’t be there? I wish I could be either of those tbh but my budget dictates knowing how much money I have/should have:

Fair enough. If I check my account and there is £50 more then I expect I would definitely look further to see why.

Think there’s a facebook page/group that helps folk sort out car parking fines, maybe there’s 1 for sorting this sort of mess?

I’d reply and tell them to take me to court then I’d show the judge my evidence of having attempted to pay at the time and that IF the payment wasn’t automatically taken, there’s clearly something wrong with their systems, not my bank.

Whereas I never get a receipt, such a waste of paper to just throw in the bin. But I do hover to check my payment has gone through before I leave.

What is that evidence?

That’s actually a good point. Could you try and send a screenshot of „payment failed or transaction reversed“? Surely they have CCTV in the shop to check you came in to pay which would prove your point of having attempted to pay and the failure of the cashier to check at the time. May be worth a try.

DH filled up and forgot to pay one day, the police phoned him and asked him to pay the next day which he did. Honest mistake, no further action. Yours seems a bit suspicious tbh.

But not everyone is in a position of needing to budget down to the penny. You understand that.

I check my payments have gone through before leaving a shop. I keep an eye on total spend across a month. I do not ever cross reference my bank account with receipts.