Bungling parking chiefs in Brent have paid compensation to a resident and have ordered its contractors to retrain their traffic wardens after she was wrongly ticketed outside her home.

Cordelia Uys, of Kempe Road, Queen’s Park, was unfairly penalised after she parked her car in a suspended bay which was not clearly marked in August last year.

After the Times exposed the mistake the ticket was cancelled but The National Motorists Action Group (NMAG) lodged a formal complaint to town hall bosses for their handling of the situation.

Peter Ashford, NMAG director said: “I am satisfied that the appalling treatment of Mrs Uys has now been corrected after a proper investigation and correction of the enforcement misconduct she had to endure.

“It is deplorable that she was repeatedly ignored and that it needed the involvement of NMAG to bring the operation of Serco enforcement staff into proper order”.

Mrs Uys had argued that the sign, which had been erected because of road works, was 50 yards out of sight of where she had parked,

She had even given the council photographs of exactly where she had legitimately parked to proving the penalty charge notice was wrongly given.

She said at the time: “I don’t think it was poor signage, I strongly believe it was on purpose,” she said.

“They provided the wrong photo. That makes me boil with rage.”

“I still think my husband and I are owed an apology.”

She has been given £50 as a gesture of goodwill from the council who have ordered Secro, the contractors in charge of parking enforcement in the borough, to provide extra training sessions for their workers.

David Thrale, Brent Council’s head of regulatory services, said: “We are very sorry for the inconvenience caused to Mrs Uys by this mistake and have offered compensation.

“To ensure this doesn’t happen again, Serco have tightened up their arrangements for putting up warning signs about temporary parking suspensions and the officer who issued the penalty charge notice in error has been retrained.”

Related link: Queen’s Park resident wins parking dispute thanks to the Times