TfL Behaving Illegally

Author
Discussion

cooperman

Original Poster:

4,428 posts

249 months

Tuesday 13th June 2006
quotequote all
It seems that when you advance pay the London congestion charge TfL ask for details of your vehicle.
They then confirm with DVLA that these details are correct.
Fair enough, you might think. However, under the Data Protection Act this is an illegal act as they cannot request such details until they believe an offence has been committed.
A friend phoned them to pre-pay and a recorded message told him his call was being recorded. He then spoke to a 'real person' who asked for his car details. He gave these and said that he assumed this was checked and the 'real person' confirmed that it was immediately checked with DVLA. My friend now awaits a reply to his letter asking then to explain this breach of the DPA. Very interesting!
Of course, it also seems that if you challenge a penalty from TfL as void under the Bill of Rights they just give up and go away, as such fines are also illegal. One chap has, apparently, had 7 'fines' deleted recently.

safespeed

2,983 posts

273 months

Tuesday 13th June 2006
quotequote all
cooperman said:
A friend phoned them to pre-pay and a recorded message told him his call was being recorded. He then spoke to a 'real person' who asked for his car details. He gave these and said that he assumed this was checked and the 'real person' confirmed that it was immediately checked with DVLA. My friend now awaits a reply to his letter asking then to explain this breach of the DPA. Very interesting!


Keep me posted. I know a journalist who would LOVE to get this story...

g_attrill

7,628 posts

245 months

Wednesday 14th June 2006
quotequote all
The DVLA can give out any information to any person or organisation with a "reasonable cause", there is no specific restriction saying an offence must have been caused.

Gareth

timsta

2,779 posts

245 months

Thursday 15th June 2006
quotequote all
Surely that's not "reasonable cause" though? What do they need "to confirm?" The vehicle hasn't entered their zones so there is no cause to release the details.

g_attrill

7,628 posts

245 months

Thursday 15th June 2006
quotequote all
It may well be considered a reasonable cause to use the data to confirm that the registration given is correct.

It is also possible that that TfL was using an anonymised database where only the make/model/colour is available to the operator, so the conversation would be:

TfL: Registration?
Caller: X123 ABC
TfL: Is that a pink Nissan Micra?
Caller: Yes

but not:

TfL: Registration?
Caller: X123 ABC
TfL: Is that a pink Nissan Micra registered to Joe Bloggs?
Caller: Yes

Gareth

Flat in Fifth

43,960 posts

250 months

Thursday 15th June 2006
quotequote all
g_attrill said:
It may well be considered a reasonable cause to use the data to confirm that the registration given is correct.

It is also possible that that TfL was using an anonymised database where only the make/model/colour is available to the operator, so the conversation would be:

TfL: Registration?
Caller: X123 ABC
TfL: Is that a pink Nissan Micra?
Caller: Yes

but not:

TfL: Registration?
Caller: X123 ABC
TfL: Is that a pink Nissan Micra registered to Joe Bloggs?
Caller: Yes

Gareth

Exactly! Not that I'm a friend of CC TfL but in the same way that you put in your VRN to get an on-line insurance quote, and it comes straight back with Make: Model: Colour, Engine type: No of Seats: and so on.

cooperman

Original Poster:

4,428 posts

249 months

Thursday 15th June 2006
quotequote all
Looks like my friend is 'barking up the wrong tree' here.
Sorry!

The Londoner

3,958 posts

237 months

Friday 16th June 2006
quotequote all
Possibly he is. You don't have to give any other details of the car than the registration number when you pay in advance online

bigandclever

13,750 posts

237 months

Friday 16th June 2006
quotequote all
I think that they do immediate DVLA checks if you ask for a discount or an exemption. For example, if you want to drive your bus in, they'll check the reg number with the DVLA to confirm that it is actually is registered to a bus.

simond001

4,514 posts

276 months

Friday 16th June 2006
quotequote all
TfL: Registration?
Caller: X123 ABC
TfL: Is that a pink Nissan Micra?
Caller: Yes
TfL: Man, you have issues

streaky

19,311 posts

248 months

Tuesday 20th June 2006
quotequote all
The DPA 1998, S29(3) states: "Personal data are exempt from the non-disclosure provisions in any case in which - (a) the disclosure is for any of the purposes mentioned in subsection (1), and (b) the application of these provisions in relation to the disclosure would be likely to prejudice any of the matters mentioned in that subsection."

S29(1) - the subsection referred to - includes: "Prevention or detection of crime".

It's that section that TfL and DVLC will use to justify the disclosure.

Streaky

NugentS

685 posts

246 months

Tuesday 20th June 2006
quotequote all
streaky said:
The DPA 1998, S29(3) states: "Personal data are exempt from the non-disclosure provisions in any case in which - (a) the disclosure is for any of the purposes mentioned in subsection (1), and (b) the application of these provisions in relation to the disclosure would be likely to prejudice any of the matters mentioned in that subsection."

S29(1) - the subsection referred to - includes: "Prevention or detection of crime".

It's that section that TfL and DVLC will use to justify the disclosure.

Streaky


But surely crime would mean criminal offense. Kengestion charge isn't criminal...

Sean

lucas

811 posts

215 months

Tuesday 20th June 2006
quotequote all
On a slightly side note on the mind thought of TFL then they do believe that if you are presented with documentation requesting money and you pay you are admitting guilt.

This is not an urban myth.

My last (hateful) job I was a section manager at a business outsourcing company. I am major client was TFL and my project was centered around TFL red route. Pure shambles in respect of certain parts. Sad to say but my then boss was/is not the nicest person around yet the NCP people were really nice and sound people and I was not dealing with the lower end of the food chain. It was quite refreshing to deal with nice people yet the policy which has come from TFL and not NCP dictated if you got a ticket and you did not research the circumstances correctly then you pay your are admitting guilt.

The TFL people were hard nosed and bullish in their approach yet were so incorrectly ill informed. Now things have changed in that the PA's use PDA's with cameras but when the tickets were hand written... imagine the fun and games my staff and I had!
Once again, I cannot speak high enough of the pleasent and correct way to deal with people that NCP had adopted unlike TFL.

BigGriff

2,312 posts

283 months

Wednesday 21st June 2006
quotequote all
I was so hacked off by the DVLA selling info to private companies that my MP is currently in correspondence with them about this very issue. I will keep you all informed.

I would suggest you all use your MP as it overloads the system and if they get enough complaints something will happen. I am sure I know what the DVLA's next response will be and I am ready to counter this. I can see this one being a real pain for them, but I will not let it go!

BO55 VXR

4,373 posts

250 months

Thursday 22nd June 2006
quotequote all
simond001 said:
TfL: Registration?
Caller: X123 ABC
TfL: Is that a pink Nissan Micra?
Caller: Yes


Actually, its a 2003 Blue Honda Civic SE Auto

shuvitupya

3,212 posts

216 months

Thursday 22nd June 2006
quotequote all
BO55 VXR said:
simond001 said:
TfL: Registration?
Caller: X123 ABC
TfL: Is that a pink Nissan Micra?
Caller: Yes


Actually, its a 2003 Blue Honda Civic SE Auto


I think the Nissan Micra has more credibility

BO55 VXR

4,373 posts

250 months

Thursday 22nd June 2006
quotequote all
.. but proves the point that anyone can retrieve vehicle details, but not owner details.

jasandjules

69,825 posts

228 months

Friday 23rd June 2006
quotequote all
Might be worth speaking to the information commission and asking for the DVLA to be checked out as selling information to 3rd parties without lawful excuse then.

streaky

19,311 posts

248 months

Saturday 24th June 2006
quotequote all
NugentS said:
streaky said:
The DPA 1998, S29(3) states: "Personal data are exempt from the non-disclosure provisions in any case in which - (a) the disclosure is for any of the purposes mentioned in subsection (1), and (b) the application of these provisions in relation to the disclosure would be likely to prejudice any of the matters mentioned in that subsection."

S29(1) - the subsection referred to - includes: "Prevention or detection of crime".

It's that section that TfL and DVLC will use to justify the disclosure.

Streaky


But surely crime would mean criminal offense. Kengestion charge isn't criminal...

Sean
The definition of "crime" is debatable. Generally it means any act that is contrary to law. It need not be "criminal" (opposite to the concept of "decriminalised" when used in reference to parking), just "contrary to law". This definition (which might or might not be used by the Information Commissioner or any Tribunal) covers the instance in this thread - Streaky

turbobloke

103,739 posts

259 months

Sunday 14th December 2014
quotequote all
A curious thread bump but why not...and data management possibly with TfL behaving stupidly could be a common theme. Marked O/T so as not to offend purists on a Sunday morning.


http://www.telegraph.co.uk/comment/11291390/Boriss...

Boris Johnson’s Transport for London (TfL) recently announced that it was planning to install more than 600 new digital speed cameras around the city. TfL claimed that its old film cameras, most of which it closed down three years ago, had reduced fatal or serious accidents by a staggering “58 per cent”, meaning that its new cameras will “help to prevent 500 deaths or serious injuries a year”.

No one was more startled by these claims than Idris Francis, an engineer and reader of this column. For 12 years he had been feeding into his computer huge quantities of data from police sources and TfL itself.

First he tracked back into the late Eighties the number of “KSIs” (killed and seriously injured) recorded at each camera site. This did indeed show a dramatic and steady decline. But he then compiled a graph showing the accident rate for the whole of London, subtracting the data for the sites with cameras. The result was unequivocal. The two graphs, though very slightly apart, showed exactly the same rate of decline. In other words, any evidence that cameras affected the accident rate was virtually nil.

Since July, Mr Francis has been trying to persuade TfL to look at his evidence, which has been checked out by an eminent academic statistician, but to no avail. In the end, TfL refused to answer his messages and seemingly ordered its switchboard not to put through his calls. Equally in vain have been Freedom of Information requests, which have been published on the Whatdotheyknow blog, trying to elicit the cost of this scheme, estimated at more than £20 million. TfL’s repeated reply was that such information cannot be disclosed because it is commercially sensitive.

So Mayor Johnson’s traffic officials have embarked on a scheme that will do little or nothing for road safety; made claims flatly contradicted by their own data; and are refusing to reveal what we will have to pay for it. It sounds like everything we have come to expect from modern government.


We don't mind the gap here as cameras aren't randomly sited, and the key result is that there is no trend gain in the speedcam locations. Good ol' TfL for listening to the voice of reason.