of PCN appeals against Newcastle City Council are won

Name: Penalty charge appeal outcomes for Newcastle City Council, 2013/14 to 2024/25
Creator: Traffic Penalty Tribunal

The Traffic Penalty Tribunal recorded 2,145 outcomes for appeals against Newcastle City Council from 2013/14 to 2024/25, and 949 of them ended with the driver paying nothing. That is 10.2 points below the 54.4% tribunal average.

2,145appeals with an outcome

949won — nothing to pay

1,152refused

What the tickets are worth. In its return to the government for 2024-25, Newcastle City Council reported £3.1m of income from parking fines. That is 12% of everything it earned from parking, so most of its parking money comes from people paying to park rather than from penalties. Any surplus is not profit in the ordinary sense: on-street surpluses have to be spent on transport under section 55 of the Road Traffic Regulation Act 1984.

What the appeals were about

Newcastle City Council enforces more than one kind of penalty, and drivers do not fare the same on each.

Penalty type	Outcomes	Not contested	Won
Parking	1,267	188	40.9%
Bus lane	698	88	55.2%
Clean air zone	178	42	25.8%
Littering from a vehicle	2	0	0 of 2

318 of those 949 wins were uncontested. In 33.5% of the appeals Newcastle City Council lost, it put up no defence at the tribunal at all. That is a small share, so expect Newcastle City Council to defend most cases and put your argument in front of an adjudicator rather than fold early. Those tickets were not close calls. The authority had already given up on them, and the appeal was the only thing standing between the driver and a cancelled charge.

Is it getting easier or harder?

In 2013/14 to 2015/16, drivers won 45.9% of appeals against Newcastle City Council, from 665 outcomes. In 2022/23 to 2024/25 it was 28.8%, from 455. Drivers are doing worse now than they were, by 17.1 points, so do not lean on the older figures.

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Year by year

Year	Allowed	Not contested	Refused	Won
2013/14	57	46	146	41%
2014/15	59	24	95	47%
2015/16	82	37	117	50%
2016/17	270	77	244	58%
2017/18	32	13	77	37%
2018/19	27	15	65	36%
2019/20	33	7	56	42%
2020/21	11	7	19	49%
2021/22	12	9	28	43%
2022/23	17	6	29	44%
2023/24	19	52	121	36%
2024/25	12	25	155	18%
All years	631	318	1,152	44.2%

Busiest year: 2016/17, with 602 appeals decided. A further 44 appeals were closed by consent order across the period, which the tribunal counts separately because it can mean the driver agreeing to pay the original charge.

What this does and does not tell you

These are appeals that reached an independent adjudicator, which is the last stage. They leave out every ticket cancelled earlier, when you first challenge it or make formal representations, and that is where most successful challenges actually end. So your real chance of getting a ticket cancelled somewhere in the process is higher than 44.2%, not lower. Among the 203 authorities in England outside London and in Wales with enough appeals to compare, Newcastle City Council ranks 173rd for how often drivers win.

Two details worth knowing before you read too much into the number. The refused column includes appeals made after the deadline and appeals the driver withdrew, so it is not purely a record of arguments that lost on the evidence. And a small number of appeals each year finish with no outcome recorded against any of these categories, so the totals here are of appeals that reached a recorded outcome rather than of every appeal lodged.

Before you write

Find your contravention code. Every PCN carries a two digit code that says exactly what they claim you did, and what they have to prove. Look yours up.
Check the deadline. Discounts and rights both expire. Work out your dates.
Know how appeals work outside London. The Traffic Penalty Tribunal route, step by step.
Do not just ignore it. What actually happens if you do.

How similar authorities compare

Authority	Appeals won
Cambridgeshire County Council	44.6% of 662
Arun District Council	44.5% of 119
Carmarthenshire County Council	44.3% of 244
Newcastle City Council (this page)	44.2% of 2,145
Kirklees Metropolitan Council	43.7% of 1,093
Aylesbury Vale District Council	43.7% of 126
Bournemouth, Christchurch and Poole	43.4% of 645

Every authority we hold figures for, with sources →

Source: Traffic Penalty Tribunal, appeals data by authority, covering 2013/14 to 2024/25. The tribunal decides appeals for England outside London and for Wales, across parking, bus lane, moving traffic, clean air zone, river crossing and littering penalties. Every type Newcastle City Council enforces is counted above. A tribunal outcome depends on the evidence in that particular case, so nothing here predicts yours.