A pile of brown envelopes
The post brings three penalty charge notices, a congestion charge penalty and a letter about an unpaid clean air zone charge. Each has a registration, a time and a location. The office manager has to find out who was driving that van at that time, which job it was, and whether the driver had a reason to stop there. Meanwhile the discount period for paying early is running.
Some notices are paid without checking because it is quicker. Some reach the deadline for a challenge before anyone looks at them. The driver who got the ticket is often not told, so it keeps happening.
Why these charges are a mess
The notice goes to the keeper, not the driver. Drivers change vans, owner drivers use their own vehicles on your work, and matching a time and place to a job means looking at dispatch records and possibly telematics. Deadlines are short and differ by the type of charge and the authority.
| Type of charge | Why it is awkward |
|---|---|
| Council parking PCN | Short discount window, challenge needs evidence of loading |
| Private parking charge | Different rules and appeal process |
| Congestion charge | Must be paid by a deadline or it becomes a penalty |
| Clean air zone or ULEZ charge | Depends on vehicle and zone, easily missed |
| Bus lane or moving traffic | Driver behaviour, needs to reach the driver |
Whether to pay, challenge, deduct from a driver or recharge a customer is your decision under your agreements. The data just needs to be in front of you in time.
What it costs
Penalties paid at the higher rate because the discount window passed. Charges that could have been challenged, such as a driver loading at a customer's premises, paid anyway. Charges that should have gone to a driver or a customer absorbed by the business. And the same patterns repeating because nobody links them to driver or route.
Zone charges are the easiest to miss entirely. A van that enters a charging zone on a same-day job needs the charge paid, and if nobody is watching for zone entries, the first you hear is the penalty.
The charge log we build
- Notice intake: scan or photograph the letter, and the details are read automatically: registration, date, time, location, amount, deadline.
- Matching to the job and driver from your dispatch records and, where available, vehicle telematics, showing where the van was and what it was doing.
- Deadlines tracked for payment discounts and challenges, with reminders to the office.
- Evidence gathered for challenges: the job, POD time and location, any loading notes, ready for an appeal.
- Outcomes recorded: paid, challenged, deducted from driver pay, or recharged to a customer, feeding driver pay and invoicing.
- Zone charge prompts: jobs routed through charging zones flagged at booking or in the evening, so daily charges are paid in time.
What changes
Notices are dealt with within their discount windows. Challenges that have a basis are made with evidence. Drivers are told about their tickets, which changes behaviour. And zone charges are paid before they turn into penalties.
Signs you need this
- Penalty notices are matched to drivers by hand.
- Discount windows pass before notices are dealt with.
- Drivers do not always hear about their tickets.
- Zone charges are sometimes missed and become penalties.
- You cannot say how much you pay in these charges per year.