DIR Return Create A Forum - Home
---------------------------------------------------------
FreeTrafficLegalAdvice
HTML https://ftla.createaforum.com
---------------------------------------------------------
*****************************************************
DIR Return to: The Flame Pit
*****************************************************
#Post#: 124415--------------------------------------------------
Re: Warburton toll bridge
DIR By: astralite
Date: July 12, 2026, 2:56 am
---------------------------------------------------------
HTML https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/c04y6dvpdx5o
#Post#: 125239--------------------------------------------------
Re: Warburton toll bridge
DIR By: sparx
Date: July 20, 2026, 9:34 pm
---------------------------------------------------------
Someone on there also managed to get an overweight vehicle
notice... in a yaris (or other small car).
Are parking companies using their KADOE contract to get driver
details? Or because under bylaws they can access directly?
#Post#: 125273--------------------------------------------------
Re: Warburton toll bridge
DIR By: fraser.mitchell
Date: July 21, 2026, 7:17 am
---------------------------------------------------------
I live near Crewe, and we use this bridge when we go to Bents
Garden Centre. I've set-up an auto-pay account, and so far have
had no trouble at all.
#Post#: 125287--------------------------------------------------
Re: Warburton toll bridge
DIR By: NewJudge
Date: July 21, 2026, 9:03 am
---------------------------------------------------------
The toll and penalty arrangements covering his weird toll bridge
seem to be a complete dog’s breakfast. There have been a couple
of threads elsewhere on the topic and in one in particular, a
contributor provided a very comprehensive, if somewhat lengthy,
opinion of it:
In my view, the real issue with the Warburton Toll Bridge UTCN
scheme is not whether a £1 toll can lawfully be charged. The
more serious question is whether the much larger Unpaid Toll
Charge Notice is being imposed and pursued through a lawful
statutory enforcement process.
The byelaws create a mechanism by which a toll is payable for
passage over the bridge, and they also set out escalating unpaid
toll charges of £30, £60 and £100 in addition to the original
toll. On its face, that gives the undertaker a route to claim
that a charge has arisen where a toll remains unpaid. However,
that is not the end of the matter. The lawfulness of any UTCN
depends on whether the enforcement process being used is
actually the process authorised by the statutory scheme.
The difficulty is Article 13 of the Rixton and Warburton Bridge
Order 2024. That provision appears to apply the Transport Act
2000 road user charging enforcement framework to the bridge, as
if the tolls and charges were charges payable under a road user
charging scheme. If that is right, then there is an obvious
question: why is this being operated through a homemade UTCN
process administered by Excel, rather than through the statutory
road user charging penalty charge regime?
That matters because the Transport Act road user charging
framework is not just about creating penalties. It also brings
with it procedural safeguards. Those safeguards include proper
prescribed notices, a formal representations process, statutory
appeal grounds, access to independent adjudication, and rules
dealing with situations such as hire vehicles. Those safeguards
exist for a reason. If an operator is going to use ANPR to
impose escalating penalties for non-payment of a road user
charge, motorists should not be left with only an internal
appeal to the same enforcement contractor that issued the
notice.
That is where this scheme starts to look legally dubious. The
UTCN appears to demand payment of a penalty-like sum, but
without the normal statutory enforcement structure that one
would expect if the charge is treated as a road user charging
penalty. There is no independent adjudication route. There is no
apparent statutory representations process. There is no clear
transfer mechanism for hire, lease, courtesy car or company
vehicle cases. There is no obvious procedural safeguard for
someone who was not the registered keeper but was the actual
user of the vehicle and the person with the evidence.
The hire and lease vehicle problem is particularly stark. The
notice says only the registered keeper can appeal unless written
authority is supplied. That may be administratively convenient
for Excel, but it is plainly unfair in practice. The registered
keeper may be a lease company or hire company with no knowledge
of the crossing and no incentive to investigate anything. It may
simply pay the charge and recharge the hirer, often with an
additional admin fee. Meanwhile, the person who actually used
the bridge, attempted payment, held an account, had an exemption
issue, or experienced a system failure may have no effective
right to challenge the UTCN directly.
That is not a minor inconvenience. It is a structural defect in
the appeal process. A lawful enforcement scheme should not
impose escalating financial liability while denying the person
with the relevant evidence any direct and effective appeal
route. If the statutory road user charging framework applies,
that problem becomes even more serious, because that framework
contains safeguards precisely to prevent this kind of one-sided
enforcement.
The internal-only appeal process is another major weakness.
Excel appears to be issuing the notices, controlling the appeal
process, deciding the appeal, and then threatening debt recovery
if the appeal is rejected or ignored. That is not independent
scrutiny. It is the enforcement contractor marking its own
homework. For a statutory charging regime involving ANPR, keeper
data, delayed notices and escalating charges, that is an
unsatisfactory and arguably unlawful substitute for the proper
statutory process.
The court point would be straightforward. Excel and the
undertaker cannot have it both ways. If the £30, £60 or £100
UTCN is in substance a penalty charge for failure to pay a road
user charge, then the court should ask why the statutory
Transport Act enforcement regime has not been followed. If, on
the other hand, they say the UTCN is not a penalty charge under
that framework, then they must explain exactly what legal
creature it is, why it is recoverable as a civil debt, and how
their own UTCN process lawfully bypasses the safeguards that
appear to be incorporated by the Order.
That does not mean every motorist can simply ignore the £1 toll.
The toll itself may well be lawfully payable. But the
enforceability of the much larger UTCN is a different issue. The
lawfulness of that charge depends on proper statutory authority,
proper procedure, proper notice, a fair opportunity to
challenge, and proof that the person pursued is liable.
My opinion is that the scheme is vulnerable because it appears
to graft a private debt recovery model onto a statutory toll
regime, while avoiding the statutory safeguards that should
accompany road user charging enforcement. That is the point I
would expect to be tested if Excel or the undertaker ever tries
to pursue these UTCNs through the civil courts.
--- Quote ---
> Are parking companies using their KADOE contract to get driver
details? Or because under bylaws they can access directly?
--- End Quote ---
That point is also addressed by the same contributor:
DVLA “reasonable cause” is not a free-for-all. A company cannot
simply obtain registered keeper data because it says money is
owed. It must use the correct route, for the correct purpose,
and only where it has proper authority to do so.
Excel’s normal electronic DVLA access is through its KADOE
contract, which is tied to private parking enforcement, ATA
membership and parking-related data requests. This is not a
parking charge. It is a statutory toll/Unpaid Toll Charge
scheme. So if Excel is obtaining keeper data through its
ordinary parking KADOE route, that raises a very serious
question about whether the data has been requested and processed
outside the scope of that access.
If Excel is not using KADOE, then the likely alternative would
be a V888/2A “reasonable cause” request. But that is effectively
a manual route. It requires a company to submit a request
identifying the reason for needing keeper data, supported by the
relevant basis for the request. That is very different from the
fast electronic KADOE system and would be far more cumbersome if
Excel is issuing Warburton UTCNs in bulk.
That leaves three possibilities. Either Excel is using KADOE,
which would be highly questionable because this is not a parking
event; or Excel is using V888/2A, in which case there should be
a manual reasonable-cause audit trail for each request; or there
is some bespoke DVLA arrangement for this toll scheme, in which
case Excel or Peel/MSCC should be able to identify it.
That is why this has the potential to open a can of worms. The
question is not simply whether keeper data could ever be
obtained for an unpaid toll. It probably could. The real
question is how Excel obtained it, what reason was given to
DVLA, what route was used, and what authority Excel had to
request it for this particular statutory toll scheme.
A DVLA SAR should expose who requested the data, when, through
what channel, and for what stated reason. If it shows that Excel
used a parking-related KADOE request for a non-parking toll
enforcement scheme, that would be a serious DVLA, data
protection and authority issue.
The thread is still ongoing and has become more complex.
Recently a registered keeper has received a NIP, alleging that
an overweight vehicle was driven over the bridge in
contravention of the Bylaws. It informs him that it is a
criminal offence but that if he was not he driver, he can
"transfer liability" to another person by providing their
details.
The thread is here (17 pages):
HTML https://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/discussion/6669616/warning-about-a-new-anpr-toll-on-warburton-bridge-over-manchester-ship-canal-managed-by-excel/p1
*****************************************************
Page 2 of 2
DIR Previous Page