Westminster issued 650,100 parking tickets last year and about 11% reach a bailiff. From 1 November three firms replace Marston alone. The fees that get added.

Westminster has hired three enforcement firms to chase unpaid parking fines from 1 November, ending an arrangement that has run with a single company since 2008.

Cllr Tim Mitchell, cabinet member for city management, signed the contract award on 3 September. The work goes to CDER Group Limited, Marston (Holdings) Limited and Newlyn PLC. Marston is the current provider and keeps a share.

The reason given is volume. Westminster’s report records the number of penalty charge notices it issues rising every year:

Bar chart of penalty charge notices issued by Westminster City Council: about 474,000 in 2023/24, 584,000 in 2024/25 and 650,100 in 2025/26
Graphic by The Westminster Post

Around 11 per cent of those tickets reach warrant stage, the point at which a certificated enforcement agent can be sent to your door. On last year’s total that is roughly 71,000 cases.

What the contracts are

  • Three concession contracts, initial term 1 November 2026 to 31 October 2030, extendable by up to two years to 31 October 2032.
  • Estimated supplier turnover of £12.3m excluding VAT, £14.7m including VAT, over the maximum six years.
  • The council pays none of it. The firms take their income from the statutory fees added to the debtor’s bill after a warrant is issued.
  • The service covers more than doorstep visits: recovery before County Court registration, recovery after a warrant expires, address tracing, foreign debt recovery, Scottish debt recovery, DVLA “no trace” recovery, and alternative prosecution routes for persistent evaders.

Around 16,000 penalty charge notices a year are issued in Westminster to vehicles on foreign plates, which is why foreign debt recovery is written into the specification.

The council put the work out to open tender on 10 March 2026 under reference PRJ_30540. Five bids came in by the 13 April deadline. Bids were scored on quality alone, with 10 per cent for social value, and the three highest scorers won. The commercial gateway review board endorsed the award on 30 July.

The fees that get added

This is the part worth knowing before a ticket is ignored rather than challenged.

Westminster’s own guidance says that once a charge certificate has been issued and Marston writes to you before County Court registration, the outstanding sum is generally either £165 or £240, depending on the original charge. Registering the debt at the Traffic Enforcement Centre adds £11, a fee the Ministry of Justice raised from £10 on 13 July 2026.

After that comes the warrant, and with it the statutory enforcement agent fees set by the Taking Control of Goods (Fees) Regulations 2014:

Stage Fixed fee Plus
Compliance £75.00 none
Enforcement £235.00 7.5% of any sum over £1,500
Sale or disposal £110.00 7.5% of any sum over £1,500

A warrant lasts twelve months. The new contracts also cover recovery after that year has run out, which is a tier the council did not previously buy.

Your right to stop it

The Order for Recovery, sent after the debt is registered at Northampton County Court, is the last notice before enforcement. It carries four grounds on which the registered keeper can file a witness statement or statutory declaration:

  • you did not receive the notice to owner or the penalty charge notice
  • you made representations within 28 days and got no rejection notice
  • you appealed a rejection within 28 days and got no response
  • the penalty charge has already been paid in full

The court will not accept a witness statement before registration has happened, so the Order for Recovery has to arrive first. The Traffic Enforcement Centre can be reached on 0300 123 1059. Making a false statement can bring contempt proceedings.

Westminster also says it will consider reasonable adjustments where a protected characteristic under the Equality Act 2010, or another condition, makes it hard to pay or to challenge a ticket. The route is parkingservices@westminster.gov.uk or 0207 823 4567.

What the equality assessment says

The council’s own assessment found the service may fall harder on disabled people, older people, pregnant people, and people on low incomes or in deprived areas, who “may experience greater financial or emotional pressure in managing debt or engaging with enforcement processes”.

It concludes the risk is mitigated by existing law: the Tribunals, Courts and Enforcement Act 2007, the Taking Control of Goods Regulations 2013, the Ministry of Justice national standards for enforcement agents, and the Breathing Space debt respite scheme, which can pause enforcement for someone in financial difficulty.

How the firms treat vulnerable debtors is one of the measures the council says it will manage the contracts against, alongside recovery rates, complaint handling and the switch to electric vehicle fleets.

One thing to watch

The council classed this as a non-key decision. Its stated reason is that the contracts involve no council spending and are “not expected to have significant direct effects on communities across two or more wards”.

That is a defensible reading of the constitution, because the money flows from debtors to contractors rather than out of the council’s budget. It also means a £14.7m service touching roughly 71,000 warrant-stage cases a year went through without the scrutiny a key decision attracts. The council has not quantified how much extra it expects to recover, saying a three-operator model has not been used here before.

What it means for you

Challenge early, not late. The cheapest moment to contest a penalty charge notice is at the start. Every stage after the charge certificate adds a fixed sum you cannot appeal away.

Expect a different name on the envelope after 1 November. Letters may now come from CDER Group or Newlyn as well as Marston. Check the reference against your ticket before paying anyone, and use the council’s parking service if you are unsure.

Council pages will lag. Westminster’s “dealing with parking debt” page still names Marston only. Treat it as out of date from 1 November until the council updates it.

Related: parking charges by zone, resident permit prices and when the parking hours actually end.

Sources