Penalty charge notices
Case reference FOI2024/01862
Received 30 December 2024
Published 10 February 2025
Request
For each of the calendar years 2024, 2023, 2022, 2021 and 2020
1. How many penalty charge notices were issued for non compliance of a chargeable journey at the crossing?
1a. How many are still outstanding and haven't been paid?
1b. What's the value of the amount that remains unpaid?
2. How many penalty charge notices were cancelled where it was suspected that a cloned vehicle was used for the chargeable journey?
3. How many penalty charge notices were cancelled where the ANPR cameras had initially mis-read the number plate for the chargeable journey?
Response
1. The number of penalty charge notices (PCNs) that have been issued are provided below. These figures include PCNs that have been reissued, for example if a customer advises they did not receive the original PCN:
2024 – 3,383,915
2023 – 1,858,852
2022 – 2,376,292
2021 – 1,910,465
2020 – 1,822,098
2. Upon receipt of sufficient evidence from the customer, the number of PCNs that were cancelled due to the vehicle registration allegedly being cloned are below:
2024 – 7,780
2023 – 4,519
2022 – 3,809
2021 – 4,348
2020 – 4,753
3. The number of PCNs that were cancelled due to a mis-read of the vehicle registration are below:
2024 – 25,556
2023 – 3,185
2022 – 2,150
2021 – 1,607
2020 – 906
Information withheld
1a and 1b. I can confirm that whilst we do hold the information for questions 1a and 1b, under section 36(2)(C) of the Freedom of Information Act 2000, we are not required to provide this information due to it being prejudicial to the effective conduct of public affairs.
We believe therefore that the exemption in section 36(2)(c) is engaged as we believe that releasing the information requested could otherwise prejudice the effective conduct of public affairs by adversely affecting the ability of National Highways to collect the Dartford Crossing road user charge and pass these charges due to the Department for Transport.
Before applying the exemption in section 36(2) (c) of the FOI Act, National Highways sought the opinion of Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for the Department for Transport Baroness Vere as a ‘qualified person’. Baroness Vere confirmed that, in her reasonable opinion, the disclosure of the total sterling amount owed by drivers of overseas registered vehicles could prejudice the effective conduct of public affairs; and that Section 36(2) (c) of the FOI Act was therefore engaged.
We are also of the view that the exemption in section 31(1) (d) is engaged as releasing this information could prejudice our ability to collect the road user charge and encourage drivers of non-UK vehicles to purposely avoid payment of the charge.
Advice and Assistance
Following the transition to the new service provider, we significantly extended the suspense periods of accounts to allow for account holders to re-validate payment cards, and for the service to overcome some initial technical difficulties. That extension period meant that PCNs were not flowing as normal during the latter part of 2023 and were held to allow users more time to pay. Eventually, removing the extension period allowed PCNs to flow, however, they were now issued some months after the initial crossing was made resulting in more PCNs than normal being issued in early 2024.
PCNs are now being issued within 2 weeks of the crossing.
Any concerns that are raised by a customer will be fully investigated and if it is established that the PCN was issued in error the PCN will be immediately cancelled, and the customer will not be charged.
As the issues we experienced immediately following the upgrade have been resolved the number of PCNs that have been cancelled due to a mis read of vehicle registration have continued to reduce month on month.
Documents
This is National Highways' response to a freedom of information (FOI) or environmental information regulations (EIR) request.
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