The start of the story is here.

We contacted both the Guardian's 'consumer champion' who got a commitment from Southwark to waive the extra costs, and then published the story in February, as well as our MP, who got the same commitment and who enclosed the details they'd got from Southwark… of the wrong driver / car / fine etc!

We pointed out the commitments to Southwark in yet another appeal letter and repeatedly checking their website revealled that they eventually fixed the case sensitivity issue, but the amount demanded stayed at £120…

… until April, when Southwark sent us another letter announcing that the fine was now £200, with court action the next step!

So we sent two cheques: one for £40 and one for £160 with a letter saying we regarded the £40 as full and final payment and if they cashed the other cheque, we'd be after the money back, with interest.

Last week, nine months after the original ticket was issued, they sent an anonymous 'I have been authorised to refund..' letter with two cheques fror £80 each (presumably that's the limit they can pay per cheque without even more faff).

I did wonder if they had cashed the £160 cheque, because with the level of competence shown so far, it wasn't impossible that we'd end up £120 (or even £160) better off, but alas they had.