A motorist was fined nearly £11,000 for driving his French rental car in London’s ultra-low emission zone on a three-day trip to the UK, despite the fact the vehicle met the environmental standards to enter the Ulez for nothing.
Christian Ducarre received four penalty charge notices (PCNs) after falling foul of a little-known requirement under which foreign vehicles must be registered with Transport for London (TfL) or else be deemed non-compliant by default.
He is one of many EU drivers who have been sent PCNs, some of them totalling thousands of pounds, even though their vehicles comply with EU emissions standards.
The Ulez requires drivers of older, more polluting vehicles to pay £12.50 a day to enter central London, or face a fine of £180, which is halved if paid within 14 days. Vehicles registered in the UK do not have to be separately enrolled in the scheme to prove they are compliant.
In Ducarre’s case, his fines were higher because his hire car was also mistakenly classed as a heavy diesel vehicle and penalised under the separate low emissions zone (Lez) that covers lorries, vans, buses, coaches and minibuses travelling in most of Greater London. Lez fines are between £500 and £2,000 a day, depending on the vehicle’s weight, and rise if not paid within 28 days.
The two TfL-administered emissions schemes are part of a drive to improve air quality in the capital, and Ulez is due to expand to all London boroughs in August, although on Wednesday a judge ruled five Tory-led councils could proceed with a challenge to the expansion in the high court later this year.
The requirement to register vehicles also applies to British motorists planning to drive into any of the 200 European cities that operate similar low emissions schemes.
The cost and process of registration varies between countries, some of which require all drivers to buy a coloured sticker showing their vehicle’s emissions standard. Fines for failure to follow the rules range from £38 in Madrid to £1,853 in Vienna.
Ducarre incurred his charges after renting a car in France to attend his son’s wedding in London last May. “I checked that the car’s emissions standard was Euro 06 and so was not liable for the Ulez charge,” he said.
“In February I received a fine for £3,598, followed by three further fines totalling £7,371.04. When I tried to challenge them online, I received an error message because I’d received the PCNs outside the 28-day appeals deadline. My trip to London will cost me around £11,000.”
Ducarre is far from alone in his predicament. A group of drivers in France are planning legal class action against TfL after receiving four-figure fines without being given the option of proving compliance. A total of 18,962 Ulez PCNs were issued to owners of foreign-registered cars between January and September last year.
The agency contracted by TfL to enforce the fines, Euro Parking Collection (EPC), has recently gained access to vehicle keeper records in France, Germany and the Netherlands, and has been issuing PCNs for alleged Ulez breaches committed months previously.
Since the PCNs sent via vehicle leasing and rental companies can take weeks to reach the driver, the 28-day appeals deadline may have passed and the fine escalated.
TfL told the Guardian those who could demonstrate that their vehicles were compliant would have their fines cancelled and that it expected EPC to “act reasonably” over payment and appeals deadlines if PCNs were delayed in the post.
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However, drivers who had approached the Guardian claimed they were ordered to pay escalated fines despite receiving them weeks after issue and submitting evidence that they were not liable.
Adrian Low received six PCNs after driving his leased German-registered car into London in May last year. The fines were dated November 2022, but did not reach him until two months later, by which time the demands had risen from £90 to £270 each and he was out of time to appeal to TfL. “I sent evidence that the car was Ulez compliant to EPC and received a response stating that I had to pay up,” he said.
His and Ducarre’s fines were cancelled after intervention from the Guardian. TfL said Ducarre’s car had been incorrectly classed as a heavy diesel vehicle by EPC and therefore incurred fines for entering the Lez as well as the Ulez.
It stated that it was working to increase awareness of the Ulez before the planned expansion to the Greater London boundary on 29 August. This will include asking ferry companies to pass information to their customers.
EPC was contacted for a comment.
UK motorists heading to the rest of Europe should check the requirements in the region they plan to visit. The emissions rules across the EU are listed on the website Urban Access Regulations.