Parked in a meter bay when penalty time is indicatedThe official national descriptor for code 04, as published in the Department for Transport statutory guidance list.
The letter after the number on your ticket
Codes are often written with a suffix: 04c rather than just 04. The letter narrows the allegation, and it tells you what the council actually says went wrong. These are the suffixes code 04 can carry:
| c | buses only |
| s | shared use bay |
What the council has to be able to show
An appeal is not an apology, it is a challenge to the council’s case. For code 04 that case rests on:
- A traffic order designating that length of kerb as a meter bay.
- A meter that was working and correctly showing penalty time.
- The time the officer observed the display, recorded on the notice.
Where code 04 tickets go wrong
A meter that jams, rejects coins or runs fast is the council’s problem. If it was out of order the right code is 08, not 04, and the two allegations cannot both be true.
This is a parking place, so the statutory ten minutes after expiry applies here. Compare the time on the notice with the time your payment ran out.
Meters that take cards or app payments fail silently. A bank line or app history with the time on it answers the allegation directly.
If the bay was not lawfully in use as a meter bay at that moment, the contravention does not stand.
The ten-minute grace period does apply here, because a meter bay is a parking place rather than a waiting restriction. That single point disposes of a lot of code 04 notices written up minutes after expiry.
What to gather before you write
- A photograph of the meter display, showing what it actually read.
- Your payment record with a timestamp. Coins are hard to prove, card and app payments are not.
- Photographs of the bay markings and the plate covering it.
Code 04 questions, answered
The meter was broken, so why is this a 04 rather than an 08?
Because the two codes allege different things, and councils do pick the wrong one. Code 04 says the meter was working and had gone into penalty time. Code 08 says the meter was out of order. If yours was genuinely broken, say so plainly, photograph the display, and ask them to confirm which they are alleging, because it cannot be both.
What does contravention code 04 mean?
Parked in a meter bay when penalty time is indicated. In plain terms: An old-style parking meter has run past the time you paid for and is showing penalty time. Physical meters are steadily being replaced by machines and apps, so this code is far less common than it once was.
How much is a code 04 penalty?
Code 04 sits in the lower band, so it carries the cheaper of the two rates that council uses. Outside London that is commonly around £50; in London £110 in Band A or £90 in Band B. Half is normally taken off if you pay within 14 days, and your notice states the actual figures.
Your notice is definitive. This page explains the national code. Councils use extra codes and local suffixes, and the wording printed on your own notice always takes precedence. Check the deadline on the notice before you do anything else, because the discount usually runs out after 14 days.
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