A new one to me...

[jwalker]

Erm...today I received a speeding notice from Lancashire police for an offence in Blackpool last Saturday evening at about 6.30. Well, neither me nor my car have been to Blackpool, ever. We were both at home 150 miles away in Scotland. Presuming there is no mistake in the reading of the registration then there must be another car using my registration. I've looked at Google street maps and found the camera on a duel carriageway so it'll be rear firing.
I can see this might turn out to be my word against theirs cos I was billynomates for a few hours either side of that time and could have rushed away that afternoon and been on that road.

Anyone else had such a thing happen or know of someone who has? How did they go about dealing with it?

[Douglas]

I rang up and told them that it wasn't me. They asked for me to send in a photo of the rear of my car. I said that as it wasn't me I wouldn't, after some persuasion they agreed to look at the photo again. Some moron had keyed in the wrong registration. I got a computer generated letter saying "in this instance the Chief Constable would not be taking action". Bloody cheek!

Doug

[Downhilldai]

Same thing happened to me around 10 years ago. Fortunately, I had a receipt for a purchase at around the time of the alleged offence, which proved it could not have been me - I phoned the police authority & explained this and they agreed to drop the charge, particularly when I pressed them on what they were going to do about the fact that my registration had been cloned onto a stolen vehicle. They didn't propose to do anything about this.

[Polwart]

JW,

Bummer, I think I'd be promptly writing them an assertive but polite letter stating the facts. I wouldn't be highlighting that you can't prove your location (I wonder if IP addresses and mobile phone records could be used to back up your case if it ever got to court - bearing in mind that you only need to demonstrate reasonable doubt not total innocence. Credit card receipts would also obviously be good).

They have to provide copies of the photos on request - and I would want to see these (even if they immediately drop the case) as I would want to know if it was a cloned vehicle, a dodgy plate on a dissimilar vehicle (which should make it easier to prove similar claims in the future) or just an admin cock up at their end. If its the former then I think you need to follow up with DVLA and the police (possibly Lothian and Borders?) to get them to record the cloned vehicle issue - otherwise you'll be getting parking tickets and speeding fines a lot.

[TIMO]

A similar thing happened to a mate a few years back,, his car had been cloned too

[willk]

Two somewhat relevant stories:

I got a summons for illegal parking in Dublin. Hadn't been in Dublin (nor had my car). Called the police, they were very unhelpful. I had to write to the topcop and explain my case. I didn't get a reply and worried about the court case. That was the last I heard of the matter.

A person well known to me lives in Darkest Co. Down. One night some "gentlemen" came calling to his house as "his" van had been involved in several robberies south of the border. Pikeys (aka Knackers/Gippos/Tinkers) had cloned his reg. He only just managed to avoid a hiding/worse as he had some correspondence from the cops regarding the matter.

I fkkn 'ate Pikeys!

[YOUTUBE]CBmdYRyuN28[/YOUTUBE]

[jwalker]

I've written em a letter saying it wusnae me enclosing a photo of the back of my car. Fortunately it does have a couple of features which are unlikely to be on another car of the same type. My number plate has the wee SCO Euro blue bit on it too so hopefully the cloned one doesn't have that.
Interestingly, the documentation from the plod doesn't refer to the car at all just the registration, perhaps they don't bother checking car type, colour, etc. It could be that it's not a cloned car but a copy registration so that would be the easy outcome. I've asked to know if it's a cloned car cos I'll need to do something about my reg. number if it is.

Anyway, fingers crossed and we'll see what comes of it. I'll let you know. Ta, for the responses.

[GeoffChopper]

If the other number plate is on wrong type or colour car then your in the clear? Check photo ?

[Simon B]

One of my colleagues at work regularly gets this from a scote in London who has modified his plate, he also has no tax and no insurance but this seems to much more minor compared to raking in the cash from GATSO's and parking fines.

Each time he goes through the same routine and is often given a summons to appear in court. The thing he finds most annonoying is that the car was actually destroyed after being written-off. His insurance company did not forward the certificate of destruction to him so he keeps having to waste time explaining this to petty jobworths in london labour boroughs.

Do keep hold of certificates of destruction.

[jwalker]

Got this from Lancs Constabulary:

The Central Processing Unit deal with many types of motoring offences on a daily basis and occasionally mistakes can be made which we try to rectify as soon as possible. We would like to thank you for bringing the 'transcription error' to our attention. Please be advised the necessary amendments have been made and no further action will be taken against you.

Please accept our apologies for any inconvenience caused.

So, a transcription error....