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Ivan Sobell
(P69) last appeared in Call Sign
one year ago when he told us about the pain he was suffering due
to sciatica. He told us he would beat it and as the picture
shows, he can bend and twist with the best of them now. So Ivan
isn’t a man to be messed with, especially when he knows he’s in
the right! However, the camera operator at Camden Council obviously didn’t know that as he spied on Ivan setting down a passenger in Shaftesbury Avenue and courtesy of that council, sent Ivan a £120 PCN! Ivan explained to Call Sign; "I had set down the passenger in Shaftesbury Avenue, taking a few extra moments to write out a receipt. I was then immediately approached by a Japanese hairdresser who wanted me to take his female client from his salon in Endell Street to the Barbican Theatre. "Trouble was, Endell Street was closed due to roadworks and I was seen on Camden’s video getting out of the cab to explain that I could not wait where I was - on a double yellow line - and that I would meet the passenger on the taxi rank outside the Shaftesbury Theatre." |
PCN Mistaken Identity – Camden apologise! |
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 If sciatica couldn’t beat Ivan, Camden must have been easy! "As there was a bit of language difficulty, this explanation went slowly, but I was clearly then seen to get back into the cab and pull away," he continued, "taking about three minutes in all." "So when I received the PCN in the post, which claimed I was there for twenty five minutes, I was less than impressed! I tried going online to see it for myself, but the system was unavailable and even telephoning their help line got nowhere. So I demanded they send me the full video and made it clear I would not be paying any money until I had viewed it all. "In the meantime, I sent back the Grounds for Representation form, claiming that as my vehicle is a licensed London taxi, I could stop long enough to execute my duties as a London cab driver as stated in the Transport for |
London regulations.
When the DVD arrived, it actually took me several viewings
before I realised that the cab seen pulling away from the scene,
twenty five minutes after me, was not me!" For the first time,
Ivan began smiling. "It was a Fairway taxi with no Dial-a-Cab logos on the doors, as the profile views from the camera clearly showed and there were other vehicles in the vicinity that were not on ‘my’ video." Ivan’s smile became a grin of satisfaction, steadily spreading across his face as he waved the letter of ‘humble apologies’ from Camden towards Call Sign’s reporter. "Needless to say," said Ivan, "Camden went home with their tail between their legs, and I saved a whole wad of money!" Sadly, Ivan isn’t the first and most certainly won’t be the last to be taken in by Camden’s cctv crackdown against anyone that council can get money out of. The difference was that in this case, they came up against someone who wasn’t prepared to roll over and just pay up... © Call Sign Magazine MMX |
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