Just imagine having to pay a fine for something that is not your fault. That’s what hundreds of Dutch lorry drivers suffered, and Transport for London might have to return millions of pounds because of it.

It’s an early part of the year that a company representing Dutch truck companies, called Transport in Nood BV or TNBV is suing TfL. Why? They believe the fines enforced by London’s Ulez and Low Emission Zone are unlawful. Well, now it turns out TfL admitted some of those fines were made wrongly, and that means they could be asked to return a lot of it.

What Are Ulez and Lez?
Now, let’s break what Ulez and Lez are to understand this whole situation completely.

Ulez is just a zone in London. If your car or truck emits more than the absolutely strict emission standards, you have to pay a fee to enter the Ulez zone. If your car or truck does emit more than the required amount, you have to pay £12.50 daily. If you do not pay, you will get a fine of up to £180.

Lez is comparable, but its scope is for heavier trucks, such as lorries. If your lorry emits too much pollution, a considerably larger fine must be paid-for not complying, up to £3,000.

Both areas are part of London’s efforts to make the air cleaner and reduce pollution. However, in the way the fines were meted out for the Dutch lorry drivers wasn’t fair.

The Dutch Truckers Fight Back
Earlier this year, Transport in Nood BV, an organization that acts for many Dutch trucking companies, applied for a judicial review of the London-based transport authority’s decision. They claimed that the settlement of their fines with the Dutch drivers was done unfairly by TfL. Their argument for standing by the stand was that these fines were not only too high but also unequal.

According to Antonio Oliveira, the owner of TNBV, fines were too expensive for some companies since they could put them out of business. One flowers transport company received nearly 400 fines amounting to €400,000 (£330,000). That’s a lot of cash any business firm should be paying!

The big problem here for TNBV was that the fines were issued in euros instead of pounds. There, fines have to be paid in pounds. Also, the exchange rate used for calculating fines made the fines even more expensive. An example case suggests how much of a miscalculation that meant: a company was charged €3,600 (£3,200) for a Lez fine, while its maximum should have been £3,000. In addition, 5% surcharge was added to each charge by the collecting agency on behalf of TfL, Euro Parking Collection (EPC).

TfL Should Apologize
In court case, TNBV pointed out that these were not mere minor errors, but were illegal. After going through the documentary evidence submitted by the court, TfL agreed that the fines should have been issued in pounds and the 5% extra charge was illegal. TfL has now settled with the Dutch companies, which means they admit that something went wrong.

However, there is also a huge disagreement over the amount of money to be refunded. TFL wants to return just the 5% surcharge on every fine, while TNBV insists on complete refunds on the full amount of every fine. The court will have to decide on this.

The whole situation has really made TfL and EPC very nervous. It is not necessarily about Dutch lorry drivers, but how these fines are being handled for people and companies throughout Europe.

Earlier this year, according to The Guardian, several European countries accused London’s transport organization, TfL, of collecting illegal information about their citizens only to fine them. Since the vote on Brexit, The UK automatically has no information related to data about residents in the EU. However, EPC apparently let access to it and this led to an imposition of fines of over 320,000.

Some people in Europe have faced huge bills, up to £11,000, because they drove inside London’s clean air zones and were fined, but are the fines even lawful?

TfL claims, however that despite the fact that the UK has withdrawn its data sharing agreements with the said EU countries, “local laws” in Europe authorize the sharing of vehicle information with the UK in enforcing traffic rules. Yet, several governments in Europe do not buy the explanation.

The Future of Fines in London
As TfL faces all these, the biggest question is what changes will this bring. Will TfL have to hand back millions of pounds? Will it cease issuing fines to European motorists?

According to Antonio Oliveira of TNBV, this is only the tip of the iceberg: “We have long suspected that something was not right… EPC has been adding an illegal surcharge of at least 5% to every fine they have ever issued.”.

To him, it’s not just money; it is the stand against what he feels is being dished out unfairly to him. He added: “This discovery makes it clear that challenging such practices would indeed be a more beautiful thing as a group. Of course, this kind of unlawful action cannot go unrebutted.”.