Late payment of motoring fine. Can court be avoided by paying now?

B

billythefish

Registered User
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159
Hello all

A friend of mine has a bit of a situation. She received a motoring fine, which came with 2 penalty points and a fine of (I think) €70. When she got the notice, she thought she had 90 days to pay, but it seems that was actually only 56.

She tried to make payment inside what she thought was the alloted period, but has now been told that she faces a court appearance. This seems a bit harsh, given that she simply misunderstood the instruction of the letter and is not down to an unwillingness to pay.

I'm wondering if it's possible to circumvent the issuing of the summons. She got a very "Computer Says No" response from the office that sends out the fine notice.

Is it possible for her to pay and avoid a court appearance? If so, can you tell me how to go about it?

Any help and constructive comments are appreciated.
 
Similar situation happened us - attempted to pay after the deadline (through inertia rather than beligerence!), they did not accept the payment. Told us we would be summonsed instead as we were past the deadline. They never did.

Maybe she should do the same ie try to pay. And if summonsed at least she'll have evidence that she did try and you would think that will only look better in front of the judge than not trying at all.
 
Hi flattea

Can you tell me how far back you're talking here? Is there no chance that this is still winging it's way to you?.. :)
 
flattea2 said:
Similar situation happened us - attempted to pay after the deadline (through inertia rather than beligerence!), they did not accept the payment. Told us we would be summonsed instead as we were past the deadline. They never did.

Maybe she should do the same ie try to pay. And if summonsed at least she'll have evidence that she did try and you would think that will only look better in front of the judge than not trying at all.
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Same happened to me, never paid it, never summonsed, never heard anything about it again..
 
A friend of mine was caught speeding recently. Never recieved the fine in the post, however did recieve a summons some 3 months later. Had no other choice but to appear in court. Can't figure out how the above never got summonsed, on her day in court there was a lot of motoring offenses, mostly down to non payments.
 
Smashbox said:
A friend of mine was caught speeding recently. Never recieved the fine in the post, however did recieve a summons some 3 months later. Had no other choice but to appear in court. Can't figure out how the above never got summonsed, on her day in court there was a lot of motoring offenses, mostly down to non payments.
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Not a 100% sure, but i read somewhere only 50% of nonpayments actually get summonsed for whatever reason.
 
1. She should be able to pay the fine but she won't be able to stop the summons

2. On the court day, just turn up and tell the judge the fine was paid late for whatever reason, apologies all round. Case dismissed.

My dad recently retired as a traffic warden, most cases that got to court ended up being paid on the morning (on the advice of the soliticors) and the judge just does some procedural thing (strikes out the summons? I think) and moves on to the next case. Huge workload on the judge on those days.

Your friend may have to pay a higher fine or whatever though.
 
It is impossible to pay at all after 56 days from date of issue of notice. After that time it goes to the Courts to process. Depends on the judge on the day what happens if a summons issues.
 
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