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proceduralUK · England & WalesDifficulty: easy

Windscreen ticket route — Notice to Keeper sent outside the day-29-to-56 window

When a private parking ticket was first left on the windscreen (or handed to the driver), the operator can only make the registered keeper liable if the follow-up Notice to Keeper is DELIVERED in a precise statutory window: no earlier than day 29 and no later than day 56, counting from the day after the windscreen ticket was given. A Notice to Keeper delivered too early OR too late is outside the 'relevant period' in POFA 2012 Schedule 4 paragraph 8(4)-(5), and keeper liability fails completely — the operator can then only pursue whoever was actually driving, and must prove who that was. A posted notice is presumed delivered on the second working day after posting (para 8(6)), so the posting date on the letter usually settles the arithmetic. This is distinct from the camera/ANPR route (no windscreen ticket), where the deadline is 14 days — that scenario is covered by UK-PROC-001.

Legal basis

Protection of Freedoms Act 2012, Schedule 4, paragraph 8(4): the notice to keeper must be given so that it is delivered within the 'relevant period'; paragraph 8(5): the relevant period is 'the period of 28 days following the period of 28 days beginning with the day after that on which the notice to driver was given' (i.e. days 29-56); paragraph 8(6): a notice sent by post 'is to be presumed, unless the contrary is proved, to have been delivered ... on the second working day after the day on which it is posted'; paragraph 6(1)(a): compliance with paragraph 8 is a condition of keeper liability on the windscreen-ticket route. Schedule 4 extends to England and Wales only.

How to identify this in your case

Only applies where a ticket was physically left on the windscreen or handed over at the scene, and the customer is being pursued as the registered keeper (not as the admitted driver). Take the date the windscreen ticket was given (day 0), count from the day after: the Notice to Keeper must be DELIVERED between day 29 and day 56. Check the date on the Notice to Keeper and any postmark; add 2 working days to the posting date for deemed delivery. If deemed delivery lands on day 28 or earlier, or day 57 or later, the window is missed.

Sample appeal wording

Before you send this

Deadline. A late submission can be turned down without your argument being read. Check your notice for the deadline and how it is counted.
Paying may end it. Paying can count as accepting the notice and can close a challenge already under way. Part-paying or acknowledging an old debt can also revive a time limit that had expired.
The amount can change. Check what happens to the sum if you challenge — it may be held, re-offered lower, or keep rising, and fees or enforcement can continue meanwhile.
Use the official route. Use the method, recipient and form your notice specifies, with any reference, evidence and signature it asks for. Sent elsewhere, it may not count.
Only say what is true. Do not copy any statement of fact unless it is true for you, and check the legal point still applies. Delete what does not fit. It may be treated as your statement.
Careful what you volunteer. Avoid unnecessary admissions — naming the driver or accepting responsibility can remove arguments. But answer anything you are legally required to answer, and do include the evidence your ground needs.
Keep the record. Keep what you sent, the attachments, any receipt, and the reply. Note the next deadline.

Sample wording to adapt and send yourself — it may not fit your notice or the stage you are at. Replace the bracketed prompts with your own details; leave any case citation as it is.

I am the registered keeper and I was not the driver. A notice to driver was given on [DATE]. You may only recover this charge from me as keeper if the strict conditions of Schedule 4 to the Protection of Freedoms Act 2012 are met, including paragraph 8(4)-(5): the notice to keeper must be delivered within the period of 28 days following the initial 28-day period after the notice to driver — that is, between day 29 and day 56. Your notice to keeper is dated [DATE] and, applying the postal presumption in paragraph 8(6), is deemed delivered on [DATE], which falls outside that statutory window. I put you to strict proof that the notice to keeper was delivered within the relevant period. As it was not, no keeper liability arises under paragraph 4, and I am under no obligation to identify the driver. Please cancel the charge.

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Windscreen ticket route — Notice to Keeper sent outside the day-29-to-56 window

Legal basis

How to identify this in your case

Sample appeal wording

Beat It writes this argument automatically

Sources

Related appeal grounds

Next steps