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Drivers from all over the UK said they have received fines for unpaid journeys on across the Dartford Crossing, yet some have never even been to that part of the country.
Deputy headteacher Anne Marie Kenyon, who lives in Bury, Greater Manchester, told the BBC that she received two fines in the post this year, one in June and one in April, but said that she has never even used the crossing.
Kenyon said that both photos on the penalty charge notices were “quite blurred and hard to read” and that it had also mixed up the start of her number plate both times.
She said her plate starts with a DV, but the vehicles who had used the crossing had number plates starting with DY and OV.
Kenyon added that while the first fine was easy to deal with, the second time she rang to try to clear her name, she found it “so frustrating” and felt “the way [she] was treated was poor”.
While both of her fines were eventually cancelled, she told the outlet that she is worried it could happen again.
The Dartford Crossing, located over the River Thames carrying the A282 between Dartford in Kent and Thurrock in Essex, charges cars up to £2.50 every time they use the bridge and offers local residents who often use the crossing special offers.
It uses automatic number plate recognition (ANPR) technology to monitor crossings, but it appears that these cameras are causing drivers to be wrongly identified after mistaking similar number plates.
National Highways says the Dart Charge system automatically reads number plates and captures images of the vehicle on the crossing, but manual checks are also conducted when the image quality is not substantial.
Eleanor Vousden had a similar issue to Kenyon; however, she regularly visits her parents in Dartford, Kent.
Yet when she received a notification saying she used the crossing on Christmas Eve, she knew that was a mistake. The vehicle pictured was similar to hers, a Honda Jazz, but Vousden owns a Honda CRG. The number plates were also identical, except for the last letter, as her car ended with a G, and the vehicle fined ended with a C.
While she had a good experience contacting Dart Charge, who dropped the fee immediately, she told the BBC that she wondered "how often such mistakes occur and whether people do bother to check if they can’t remember where they were”.
National Highways told The Independent that “these are a small minority of cases,” while “more than 94.6 per cent of journeys made using the Dartford Crossing are paid correctly and on time”.
They added: “When penalty charges are issued in error, the charge will be cancelled as soon as a customer contacts us to let us know they are not the registered keeper of the vehicle.
“In some cases, manual checks are needed to make sure crossing details are accurate. This can delay those crossings being visible on the website. However, customers can still pay for these crossings at any time up to midnight the following day, whether the crossing is visible online or not.
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