Question Re Fixed Penalty Notice

wyndham

Not looking for legal advice and none of the responses here will be construed as such.

Received a fixed penalty notice in the post in May for crossing a no-entry line in town. Got pulled by the guard at the time and he radioed through to check the address I gave as the registered owner was correct. Had no licence on me at the time. Fixed penalty notice arrived (60 bills)a few days later and it had the wrong address on it. As far as I know this address does not actually exist. Won't give the exact details of the error but say it's the difference between x lawn and x grove or something similar. In any case the notice got to me as someone in an post figured it out.

The window has now passed for payment of the fixed penalty so I can't pay it now anyway as it would just be sent back to me. There is no action i can take at the moment. So I expect a summons in the post . It it reasonable to assume that this type of error in a fixed penalty notice would automatically lead to it being struck out in court, as I could claim to never have received it? Does anyone have any experience of something similar?

ciarsd

No you wont get away with it, yes you will go to court, yes you will have to pay your fine and accept points.
There is a possibility that you will not get your penalty doubled due to the clerical error but you wont be let off free.

Seth Brundle

Can they actually prove that the letter was delivered to you, given that it was not sent to you but to somewhere else? I would fight it as you are not the person referred to on the sheet anyway as you don't live at the address.

wyndham

There is a possibility that you will not get your penalty doubled

I'd say that there's more than a possibility, given that the notice was sent to a non-existent address, wouldn't you?

gyppo

The guards used to deliver summon's in person at one time - Has this changed? Thankfully, its been a long time for me:)

I have known of a case where the person's address did not match the summons - the judge said that once the summons got presented to the right person, it did'nt matter about the address.

wyndham

Wasn't a summons though was a fixed penalty notice. Precursor to summons. They don't deliver either in person anymore or even send them by registered post.

gyppo

Ok, I didnt know that the delivery had changed.

Savman

wyndham wrote:

Received a fixed penalty notice

wyndham wrote:

I could claim to never have received it?

You wouldn't be the first person to lie in court but you'd wanna make sure your story is water tight or yer fooked :rolleyes:

Saruman

Was it adressed (your name) to you? Do an post keep records if mail they deliver? Did the letter have details of your car and the incident they can relate ONLY to you?

Are there points involved?If not why not just pay the €60?

wyndham

Too late to pay the fine now as more than 56 days have lapsed. On payment of the fine it's 1 penalty point and on conviction in court it's 3 penalty points and a higher fine. It's worth beating the rap.

smiley2

how did 56 days pass if it arrived only "a few days later" as you said?

Spitfire666

thats what i was thinking smiley2.
You would wanna be very careful as you could get caught out and then you'll get no sympathy whatsoever.
also, summons' are still delivered by guards. some are in the letterbox, and others (personnal summons) need to be actualy handed to either the person named,a person residing at the same address above the age of 16, a person in charge of the house at the time delivered (i.e. house keeper/childminder), an employer/employee of the named person at a place of work.

wyndham

It arrived a few days after the incident in May. 56 days have passed since then. Thus I now can no longer pay the fixed fine and am waiting to be summonsed.

The fixed penalty notice arrived with the regular post.

Villain

Several Previous cases have been dismissed because Gardai couldn't prove the notice was recieved, also I know before the system became computerised in April only 1 in 7 people who didn't pay within the 56 days were prosecuted.

MercMad

You had plenty of time to pay the fine, but you chose not to. You have chosen to take your chance in Court that the address error will be taken as a mistake on their part and you will be let off !

Firstly, as far as the Court is concerned you commited the offense, you will be asked that and you will be penalised accordingly !

Then they will ask you why you are in Court.............how did you realise you were due in Court if the address on record does not exist ?

The fact is.......... the mail gets to you, they will prove that and, and you will get what you deserve, and possibly more for waisting everyones time !

Villain

History would suggest your wrong MercMad.

Spitfire666

it wouldnt be as straight forward as that MercMad, if he gets a summons and its served by a guard, the guard will do like the postman does and work out where the house is, at that point he will get a chance to try his luck and claim he dint get the original fine in the post at all. he wont get away with it completely but he could get the non-increased fine.

wyndham

Have personally had cases struck out before on two occasions, both were parking tickets in the days before clamping. Guard never turned up to court. Swathes of cases are struck out every day because of guards not showing up, not being prepared if they do show up or because of errors in the summons,etc. This does not happen as much as it used to before penalty points and the guards seem to have more of an incentive now to see the case through to a conviction. Anyway i'll just have to wait and see at this stage. Will report back if I get summons but they have up to 6 months to do this from date of the offence.

ciarsd

wyndham wrote:

I'd say that there's more than a possibility, given that the notice was sent to a non-existent address, wouldn't you?

I'm just speaking from experience, as I had a similar situation the week of penalty points introduction - as a result there was a delay of almost 1 year before the points were added to my licence...thankfully they are nearing expiry.

gyppo

wyndham wrote:

Have personally had cases struck out before on two occasions, both were parking tickets in the days before clamping. Guard never turned up to court. Swathes of cases are struck out every day because of guards not showing up, not being prepared if they do show up or because of errors in the summons,etc. This does not happen as much as it used to before penalty points and the guards seem to have more of an incentive now to see the case through to a conviction. Anyway i'll just have to wait and see at this stage. Will report back if I get summons but they have up to 6 months to do this from date of the offence.

It looks like you make a habit out of not paying fines within the allocated time period. Wasnt there something about paying parking tickets within 28 days before the courts became involved?

Black Sky

ciarsd wrote:

I'm just speaking from experience, as I had a similar situation the week of penalty points introduction - as a result there was a delay of almost 1 year before the points were added to my licence...thankfully they are nearing expiry.

How did you know they were added to your licence. I got caught same week, (didn't know till i received the penalty in the post), went, down and paid the fine at the fines carriage office, and that was the end of it. yes I do wonder was I lost in the paperwork mountain, and will it ever catch up with me.

Seth Brundle

@wyndham - double check that your car is in fact registered to the correct address! I would have presumed that they are automatically printed and labelled directly using National Driver File records (never got one of these letters so I haven't seen one!)