speeding ticket - did not receive paperwork - court 9/7/14 - HELP!!

[Sammy c]

Firstly I apologize for joining and posting asking for advice please do not let that stop you giving advice please

 

I am posting for my wife, we live in Norfolk UK

 

Around 6 weeks ago out of the blue we recieved a court summons to apear this friday coming at Norwich magistrates court

 

The offences are failing to give information of driver to her car which had commited offence of speeding

The second offence is driving at 46mph in a 40 mph zone

 

 

After our shock I myself rang the ticket office and stated this was first we had heard of this matter

The offence was commited on 17 December 2013

 

We was informed a letter had been sent over xmas period and again in January we recieved neither letter

 

We was assured on phone to write in to ticket office explaining this was first we knew of the matter and they would deal with it

 

We wrote a letter explaining this was our first knowledge of the incident and sent the court letters back to the court

stating there was a mistake and the ticket office was sorting it out

 

My wife has a clean driving history with no points,

she is disabled and on benefits she normaly travels at most 4K a year and has no knowledge of the incident

 

Friday afternoon I rung the ticket office to check up as we had heard nothing from the courts

or the ticket office and to my horror was told once the matter had a court date it had to go to court

 

My wife is traumatised over this, the thought of going to a legal court physically makes her ill

 

Its my fault, I assumed the mix up would be dealt with like the man on the phone told me

and luckily I checked up or we would of missed the court date

 

We was informed a simply £80 fine that could of got my wife a refresher class awareness will now possibly attract legal costs

and fines exceeding £1000 and 9 points on her licence

 

We have rung for legal advice been told we should be ok but fixed fees from around £1000 would be needed

 

We honestly did not recieve any letters asking for driver information

and to be fair our post office are very good,

ive not experianced mail not arriving before and twice from same people makes me wonder

 

I feel it unfair that and administration error so simple could potentialy cost us more than we could ever raise

and we are reading courts do not listen to Joe public contesting cases that are not legaly familiar

 

Please can someone write what we should say or do down so my wife can read it

 

Its not as simple as tell it as it is, my wife is almost dumbstruck with fear (and Im also as bad)

 

Most normal people never go through life going to court and the wrong word from us or forgetting to say something could destroy us

 

We dont have the money to pay the car would have to go and the lifeline the car gives would be impossible to replace

 

the court is this friday,

its my fault Ive left it so late,

simply I believed what the man in the ticket office saying write in informing us thisi s the first you have heard of the matter and they would deal with it

Thankyou in advance

[caro]

Hi and welcome to cag. The site is here for people who need help so no need to apologise. I'm really not sure what a solicitor could do or say for £1000 that you and your wife can't do for yourselves.

 

I'm sure someone will be able to advise.

[Sammy c]

Thanks Cargo

from the free initial advice I have received both solicitors seem to think once we alert the court

that a notice of prosecution letter was not recieved it should be ok and the original offer should be reinserted

 

Then after saying this they also mentioned both of them that Magistrates courts are busy and time aware,

often a magistrate is led by the clerk whos job it is to see cases do not over run and legal representation should be used to protect us

 

Obviously solicitors wouldnt want us to do it ourselves

 

Both solicitors offered a fixed fee and to be fair a court apearance a lot of letter writing do wack the costs up as we all know

 

Just we have one chance to speak to the judge and say what is important to say if not a huge fine cripples us,

should we get a judge who believes that 2 letters sent to our home is in law acceptable as proof of delivery we are dead in water

 

The ticket office assures us as long as 2 letters have been sent that satisfys the court

yet both solicitors claim this is wrong proof of delivery is recorded mail

 

Its my fault I shouldnt of accpeted what the ticket person said to me on the phone,

just i thought these guys wouldnt mislead you

[BankFodder]

Don't use a solicitor for this. You can do everything yourself.

 

First thing is to stop believing people on the phone. The system is extremely inefficient. Especially don't believe anyone who says that simply writing in will sort it out and you won't need to go to court.

 

Be prepared to go to court - and go there - whatever anyone says - unless you receive a written confirmation from the court that you don't need to go.

We have many cases where people suddenly find that they didn't attend court because they sent in a letter or because they were told on the phone that it wasn't necessary - and then the next thing they find is that a fine has been imposed - and that maybe even enforcement proceedings have started.

 

Certainly you should write a letter explaining everything but the best thing will be to deliver it to the court and get a receipt.

 

Find out the date of any proposed hearing and be there on the day. Sit inside the court - not outside. These court sessions deal with hundreds of cases in a very short period of time. They are mostly just files which are rubber stamped through because the defendants aren't there. Maybe some of those defendants have sent letters in expecting them to be read!!

 

In court, make sure that the clerk of the court knows who you are and your case reference number and that you want to say something to the court. Because you are present, the clerk might bring your case to the top of the list so that you don't have to wait too long.

 

Take a copy of your letter to the court on the day and also copies if income and bills. They won't want to see them - but you can offer them to the court as a sign that you are prepared to back up what you say. If you get a chance to speak to the court, the apologise but say that you really had no idea. Tell them that you don't remember the incident but if they way that it happened then you will be pleading guilty rather than cause anymore trouble. Basically - grovel.

If you are lucky, it will go not too badly - but once you are in the machine like this, it is very difficult to get out.

[Sammy c]

Thankyou for the responce Bankfodder

And there was I thinking I was a man of the world been around etc reduce to a jibbering wreck and clearly as green as a cabbage.

I thought or assumed UK justice wasnt like this, the situation is blatant theres a clerical error

Were happy to accept the speeding ticket even though we cant remember a year ago as my wife should be eligible for a speed awareness course as this is her first time yet were looking at 9 points and a huge fine

Could anyone suggest a template that would get our point across this situation is not our fault and the extra costs involved are not our fault maybe

Often we can say lots of words that mean nothing when a few well chosen ones might sound to us dumb people nothing but strike a cord into the educated

[kjun]

Have you requested/received copies of the original letters to check the address is correct on them?

 

Not sure what documents you get in relation to speeding penalties however in relation to civil claims the court will accept 1st class post as a method of service so I would question the solicitors advice you have been given regarding recorded delivery.

[kjun]

Not sure how useful this will be but legislation states:

 

S.172, sub-section 7.b, states that you shall not be convicted of failing to provide driver information if you can show that it was not 'reasonably practicable' to supply the information within the 28 days allowed. This section goes on to state that if you provide the information outside of the 28 days, you will still have a defence if you can show that you gave that information 'as soon as reasonably practicable thereafter'.

 

I would suggest that not receiving the the section 172 notice would be it was not practical to provide the required information within the specified time period but provided it at a later date.

[caro]

The offences are failing to give information of driver to her car which had commited offence of speeding

The second offence is driving at 46mph in a 40 mph zone

 

I see that the first offence mentioned is failing to give information of the driver. Could the driver have been anyone else or would it definitely have been your wife?

[Sammy c]

In theroy the driver of the car could of been other people

the offence was 17 December 2014 so no one can be sure to be honest I use the car so do the kids

 

But our arguement is not over the speeding offence as I said its the wifes first ticket so she could of paid for the speed awareness course but because any notification failed to reach us we have to go to court now to take the hit both for speeding and failing to identify the driver

There are significant extra costs including court and it isnt our fault no service was made

Realy we need a nice worded letter or something we can read out in court to ensure ther judge knows the correct procedure in this case has not been followed

[caro]

Please bear with me with the questions as I'm trying to get clear in my head what needs to go in a letter.

 

 

You mention that you've already written to the court when you got the summons. Who was that addressed to? Have you got a copy that you could post here minus anything that identifies you?

[Sammy c]

I have nothing now that I sent to the court

I dint think of keeping copies

The paperwork with the summons was asking for banking details etc and wether i was to plead guilty or not guilty

In responce i wrote on the court form that today was the first we had heard of the offence and I had rung the ticket office to sort things out and was advised by ticket office to write to them stating this was the first we had heard so issuing a court date etc was a mix up and as far as I was concerned the matter would be dealt with by the ticket office

In hindsight it turns my tummy when i think a judge may of read that and thought cheeky sod but the ticket office when i rung them seemed at the time understanding and didnt seem to think there would be a problem

I later found out from the solicitors once a court date is set there is little a ticket office can do

There seems a procedural error the ticket office is meant to write to owners and pass the ticket to the police if they have no luck in tracing the owner, in my wifes case it seems its gone straight to court for a 46 in a 40 and shes lost the chance of a guilty plee and a speed awareness course

6mph over the limit could inflict a fine up to £1000 and 9 points for first offence

crazy eh

[caro]

I suspect it's highly unlikely that a fine of that size will be imposed, or that many points.

 

 

If you can wait until morning I'll try and draft something for you, or if you want to try, using the information you've put here then we can take a look and make any amendments that might be needed.

 

 

Also, I'm attaching a budget sheet for you to complete and attach to your letter.

[Sammy c]

Cara again I thank you

were not in court until friday so happy (and extremely grateful and humbled) by anything you could put together before then

[caro]

Cara again I thank you

were not in court until friday so happy (and extremely grateful and humbled) by anything you could put together before then

 

 

The title of this thread says 9th July which is Wednesday. Check your paperwork.

[caro]

Draft letter:

 

 

Dear Sir or Madam

Re case number xxxxxxx

List offences as shown on the summons.

(Failing to give information of driver to her car which had committed offence of speeding

Driving at 46mph in a 40 mph zone)

I wish to make it known to the court that until I received a summons to attend court on 9th July 2014, I was not aware that my car had been speeding on 17th December 2013. On receipt of the summons my husband rang the ticketing office and was advised that two letters had been sent, one in December and another in January. He explained that we hadn’t received either letter.

We were assured on the phone that if we wrote in to the ticketing office explaining this was first we knew of the matter that they would deal with it. We also responded to the court stating that this was our first knowledge of the incident and there was a mistake which the ticketing office was sorting out. Unfortunately I didn’t keep copies of the letters we wrote as I didn’t expect the matter to go further. As we had heard nothing else my husband rang the ticketing office again on my behalf on Friday 4th July, and we were shocked to learn that despite the fact that I had not had any previous correspondence, so was not aware of the issue, the case would proceed on 9th July.

Regarding the issue of failing to give information of the driver who committed the offence of speeding, I obviously did not do this as I had not received the letters and was unaware that I needed to. Unfortunately after all this time I really don’t know who would have been driving that day, so understand that I will be held responsible for the speeding offence.

I would like to make the court aware that had I known about the need to provide information of the driver that day earlier I would have done so, and still would if I knew. I have a clean driving history with no points and no previous offences. I am disabled, on benefits and have no knowledge of the incident. I understand that had I known about this earlier I could have attended a speed awareness course and avoided court altogether. Obviously I would have preferred this instead of attending court, but I hope that you will accept my explanation of events and look favourably on my case.

Yours sincerely

 

Mrs Sammyc

If there are mistakes in what I have written please feel free to correct it, and if anyone else has any comments, please feel free too.

Edited July 7, 2014 by caro

[Sammy c]

Thanks Caro

others please feel free to comment but this is exactly what we needed, it might seem easy for you guys but the letter we wrote (or tried to) was 3 A4 pages and didnt actualy say anything lol

[caro]

No problem sammy. Sometimes it's easier to see as an outsider when you aren't emotionally involved.

 

Can you please confirm if the court date is Wednesday 9th or Friday 11th.

[Sammy c]

Update

the court is friday 11th in norwich magistrates court

 

At wifes request I rung the ticket office again to see why the letter we wrote had gone un answered

The lady checked files and accepted we had informed them we had not recieved the intended notice of prosecution or the request to inform them of the driver

After reading her paperwork she did say that the case was wiered as we had responded to them we accept the car in the picture was wifes and did not contest the speeding offence

But the strict rules of the ticket office state when a court hearing is made then it is always followed through

She stated if we admit the speeding they would drop the other charge but also accepted we would be liable for court costs and the option of a speed awareness course is not available

I feel now if wife has to go court and has to suffer the court costs then we should get our monies worth

The ticket office failed why should wife have to pay court fees when we have repeatedly tried to sort matter out

[Raykay]

If they do agree to drop the failing to nominate for a guilty plea to the speeding, (your wife needs to find the prosecutor before the case and ask), the costs would be part of the speeding matter - there will be the penalty (usually a fine) + costs + victim surcharge.

[Surfer01]

Did you confirm the address to which the letters in December and January had been sent and did you ask for copies of these letters?

[Sammy c]

They sent us copies of the intention to prosecute when they served us our court summons

amazingly the witness statement that relates to notice served is unsigned by them though

 

My argument is we need to try and make the court not award us court costs and victim surcharge for something that was not the wifes fault and a failure for the ticket office to comply with regulations

 

The lady in prosecutions did mention today a arguement in court could be expensive for us, it seems like the court time is rubber stamping the prosecutors requests and any arguement from our side needs to be argued by someone familiar with the law

We was told the real reason they prosecute is the ticket office must notify you within 14 days of a speeding offence and this has not been done so if they review the case there is no case they can follow

[Sammy c]

Update

Wife had a phone call today from prosecutors office who read the file and confused

They have stated under unit policy it has to go to court but they will drop the charge of not informing them of the driver as I had stated in my defence statement wife accepts its her car and probably was driving leaving us just the speeding fine to answer to

I complained that she should of been entitled to pay the speeding fine and attend a speed awareness course with no points but because of the ticket office failure to notify my wife now has to pay prosecution fees and court costs and im told and this is the kick in pants a victim surcharge fee

ANy advice on wether to take this option or carry on and ask for a trial date?

[caro]

I'm not clear what the options are. I thought the court date was Friday.

[Sammy c]

The court date is this friday, we are to attend the court whatever we decide

At present she is charged with 2 seperate offences, speeding and failing to supply the name of the driver

If she accepts a guilty plea for speeding the failure to notify them of the driver will be dropped

The prosecutor makes it sound like they are doing us a big favour but what they dont see is from driving aparantly 46 in a 40 with a clean licence instead of a speed awareness course now through no fault of ours will carry a court fine court costs prosecution costs and a victim surcharge

It just seems bullying, charge you with offences then horse trade down to cover up there incompetence

The prosecution are adamant in a court of law they do not have to prove they served papers, its for us to prove we did not recieve them

How can we prove we didnt recieve the notification?

[Surfer01]

I think the option is to go to court, explain to magistrate circumstances and state willing to pay original fine. Insurance companies do not seem to take into account 3 points for speeding any more.