Sometimes one word can make all the difference.

In the case of motorist Anthony Hall it made the difference between having to pay a £60 penalty for driving in a designated bus lane and having to pay nothing at all.

Mr Hall has had his penalty notice quashed after the Traffic Penalty Tribunal ruled that Tunbridge Wells council had used the wrong wording on the fixed penalty notice that they issued to him - and had then worsened matters by not properly addressing his argument when he appealed the case.

The adjudicator in the case, Jill Yates, said: "The regulations set in simple terms what the council are required to say in their Penalty Charge Notices and there is no excuse for their failure to comply."

She was also critical of their failure to address Mr Hall's argument when he appealed the ticket. She said: "The council’s failure to properly consider Mr Hall’s representations and to explain why they were rejected, was a breach of their common law duty to act fairly."

The case arose after Mr Hall was caught driving in a bus lane in Grosvenor Road, Tunbridge Wells, on October 14 and he declined to pay the fee.

Mr Hall lives in Essex but had driven to Tunbridge Wells to pick up something purchased on eBay when he "got a little lost and ended up in the bus lane having followed the directions from my sat nav."

He said: "I never disputed that I was in the bus lane, but I didn't intentionally drive through it. At first I wasn't even aware that I had driven through a bus lane as this was the first time I'd been to Tunbridge Wells and wasn't familiar with the roads there."

The Bus Lane Contraventions (Penalty Charges, Adjudication and Enforcement) (England) Regulations 2005 state: "A penalty charge notice must state: that if at the end of the 28 day period no representations have been made and the penalty charge has not been paid, the authority may increase the penalty charge by a half and take steps to enforce payment of the charge as so increased."

But Mr Hall spotted that the wording on his actual ticket stated: "‘If full payment has not been received or you have not made representations to the council, then after the last day of the period of 28 days beginning with the date on which the Penalty Charge Notice was served the charge will be increased by 50% to £90 and a Charge Certificate may be sent to you."

Acting on advice from Ivan Murray-Smith, a specialist in penalty charge law from Norfolk, Mr Hall argued that the switch from "may" to "will" had fettered the council's ability to show discretion and was thus illegal. Since the notice was not correctly worded no charge could be levied.

He put this argument in his appeal notice, but the council then ignored the argument and sent him a standard response letter.

The adjudicator found that "the wording used by the council does not convey the correct meaning of the regulation."

And she also found that their response to Mr Hall's appeal "clearly demonstrated that the writer did not understand the issue raised by Mr Hall."

Mr Murray-Smith said: "The ruling makes it clear that the current wording used on Tunbridge Wells bus lane penalty charge notices is wrong, and as a result any PCNs issued are invalid."

A spokesperson for Tunbridge Wells Borough Council denied that was the case, saying: "The decision of the adjudicator does not set a precedent and we remain happy that our notices contain all the information required by law."

However, she added: "The council will be reviewing the wording of our Bus Lane Penalty Charge Notice to see if it can be made clearer."

Mr Murray-Smith said: "Anybody receiving a notice with similar wording could appeal it and expect to be successful, since the tribunals like to be consistent."

For those that have previously coughed up and paid a penalty, Mr Murray-Smith was less optimistic.

He said: "The only legal challenge available would be a judicial review and that would be prohibitively expensive to recover such as small fee."

Mr Hall said: "I feel pleased that I won obviously, but it was always a gamble when taking on councils in this way as they are only interested in the money they make from these things.

"They wouldn't listen to anything I said in my appeals and took this right to the most time-consuming end in their bid to get my money.

"I just feel now that there must of been a lot of motorists who have paid fines for going into this bus lane albeit on purpose or by accident but in actual fact this council had no right to demand anything from them, and more to the point I wonder if they are still using the same legislation and still carrying on conning motorists out of their cash?"

Mr Hall found Mr Murray-Smith to help him through an online website that assists to help people challenge their penalty charge notices.

Visit http://forums.pepipoo.com/index.php?