‘I received 18 driving fines from the council - I was exempt!’

A mother has received a court order after being issued 18 fines for driving in a restricted zone despite being exempt. Marlene Nwaokolo, from Lordswood, has a disability exemption for the Bleakwood Road school street scheme in Walderslade where her daughter attends. The 42-year-old was using a courtesy car after being involved in a crash and had contacted Medway Council to ask them to apply her exemption to the new car between November 30 and December 6.

She waited until this had been confirmed by the council before using the car to take her daughter to school as normal. However, she soon began receiving fines from car rental company Enterprise for breaking the school street rules. The school streets scheme aims to reduce traffic through streets near schools by issuing fines to motorists who drive through them during set hours around the beginning and end of the school day.



They use automatic number plate recognition (ANPR) cameras, which identify vehicles which don’t have an exemption. Emergency services vehicles, blue badge holders, and residents who live in the school street itself all receive exemptions. Marlene was fined £70 by Medway Council on 18 occasions, totalling £1,260.

Enterprise also added a £35 admin fee for each of the fines but this has since been waivered. Marlene contacted Medway Council and was told they would be cancelled. However, after she returned the car, Marlene received further letters which said all 18 fines were still registered as unpaid and asked her to cough up.

She contacted the authority and the error was again acknowledged with another promise that the fines would be cancelled. Four months later, on April 15, she was sent a court order for recovery of unpaid penalty charge for one of the citations, costing £115, and Marlene says she expects the others will come in turn as well. If her suspicions are correct she would be facing costs totalling £2,070 for fines Medway Council has acknowledged several times should not have been issued.

She says the whole ordeal has been incredibly frustrating and stressful. She said: “Every time we email Medway Council says the fines have been cancelled, that I don't need to pay it. Then I receive another one and then another one.

“Now it's been escalated to the point that it's actually going to court because I haven't paid those fines, even though I have proof that I am not liable to pay for them. “They have assured me I am exempt, that I don't need to pay for this, and yet they're now taking it to court because I haven't paid. “It’s made me extremely stressed.

I have actually got to the point that I'm scared to open the mail because every time I do there's a new citation or a penalty charge or a court notice. “It's always something, and I'm just really, really stressed, and really anxious as to what's going to come next.” She added it was particularly frustrating because she had informed Medway Council ahead of time that her exemption would need to be applied to her temporary car and was told it would be done.

She continued: “I've done what I was supposed to do. I told them well in advance and I waited for their permission before I started parking there. “The first fine I received, I got in touch with them straight away to tell them what's going on, and they told me it was issued in error and would be cancelled, but I received one every single day after that.

” Marlene also said she’s not demanding an apology from the authority, just that she wants them to take a look at their processes in case this has been affecting other people as well. She said: “I would really want to encourage Medway Council to look into their procedures because I think there is an error there. “Even if it's a computer mistake, something happened down the line and I think they really ought to look into it so that it doesn't happen to other people really because I can't be the only person this has happened to.

” A Medway Council spokesman said: “We would like to apologise for the fines issued in this case, which were due to a delay in processing a change of vehicle exemption. “We are now working to ensure that all remaining correspondence related to these PCNs is withdrawn, and that no further action is taken. “We apologise for any distress caused and can reassure the resident that this matter is now resolved.

“We are also reviewing internal processes to prevent similar occurrences in the future when residents report a change of vehicle for exemptions.”.