Report published – administration to cost extra £150,000

The Council Cabinet will decide on 20^th January how to implement the Councils decision to “automatically” refund those who were fined during the Lendal Bridge trial.

So far 12,512 refunds have been issued by the Council.

The most likely course of action is that all 35,000 motorists, who have not yet claimed a refund, will be written to and advised of their opportunity to claim.

After that the process will be much the same as the scheme currently in operation.

The cost of sending out and managing the notification process is put at £150,000. The money will come from grant income which otherwise would have been spent on public services in the City.

In total the Council took around £1.8 million in fines from the Lendal bridge and Coppergate schemes. The Council continues to pursue a claim that the Coppergate fines were levied lawfully but their appeal has been outstanding for over 9 months now.

Additionally, over £700,000 was spent on implementing and administering the original schemes.

The Council is shying away from simply putting a cheque in the post to the registered vehicle keeper details that its agents have on file. They fear that many of the payments would not reach the right people (hire cars, parental cars, foreign tourists, deceased etc)  and Legal Counsel have said that such an option could jeopardise the Councils  Coppergate appeal.

All in all it now looks like the Lendal Bridge experiment will cost over £1 million.

That is money which could, and should, have been spent addressing road safety issues across the whole City.