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A friend had a similarish thing, save he sent the declaration (SP30) to the court and it never reached them.
He gets called to court and sat thru a couple of GBH cases, where the guilty parties were given a slap on the wrist and told not to do it again....
The judge leans across to my friend and tells him not to mess him around as he will face jail time....
Ended up with a seriously hefty fine....
Absolutely 100% lawyer up...
My experience of the courts (family court) is the Judges don’t know their @rses from their elbows and you need legal help in there to challenge the BS. Terrifying system where one person so out of touch has so much power.
Pay some money, see a solicitor, get them to advise and represent you.
There is some merit in that, you don't need a specialist loophole, save my license type lawyer - just a standard issue magistrates court defence solicitor, they will be used to dealing with this all the time. Alternatively you'll get a clearer answer on a specialist forum like pepipoo rather than people thinking they know what the law should be.
– Even stranger, when I go on gov.uk to see driving details, it shows the three offences (I also have two SP30s and 6 points, hence the ban) but under the info for the MS90 (they seem to use a different code) it states £660 fine and NO POINTS. WTAF.
If the s172 (MS90) was for failing to ID the driver in relation to the insurance matter you should not be convicted for the insurance - you either failed to ID the driver in which case they wouldn't usually have the evidence to convict (unless there's something more complex here), or you did provide the details so are not guilty of failing to ID the driver. The fact one has no points suggest they were linked - you can't get points for two different offences committed at the same time (there is in fact an error by the Mag Court here - in that the s172 request is committed not at the same time but 28 days after the request was made; but such an error, in your favour, is not that unusual).
Once properly considered you may find that the prosecutor is willing to accept a guilty plea to the s143 (no insurance), and a not guilty to the s172. Its hard for an individual to have that conversation with the prosecutor without incriminating themselves, prosecutors will happily have that discussion with a solicitor, but to protect you will not usually want to have the discussion directly. In magistrates courts the cases are dealt with on the day (in normal circumstances) and there isn't an easy way to get someone to look at cases ahead of the day it calls to agree to such a plea.
At the end of the day you will still seem to have 12 points, and fall due to be disqualified for 6 months. Some people will find it preferential to surrender their license today, get the matter over with and get back on the road in January, whilst others would find it useful to follow the stat. dec. process, reset the clock, and probably have the case call in Oct or Nov (given current backlogs) when they will have done some more prep for the impact of this. There is the possibility that if you can show you will suffer exceptional hardship they will let you drive with 12 pts. In theory you can present this argument yourself, but it is certainly worth discussing with a solicitor first as what some people think is exceptional is different to what the courts think.
If your aim is to get it resolved quickly a solicitor will probably help right now. If you prefer to appear in person and represent yourself, then the backlog plus social distancing could see you in limbo for a very long time (just in case you are hoping that might let the old points drop off and you not hit the magic 12 - it wont, its the points at the date of the offence that matter).
Having read "The secret barrister" I wouldn't step foot in a court room without the best brief I could afford stood next to me!
There is the possibility that if you can show you will suffer exceptional hardship they will let you drive with 12 pts.
I’m sure I read that around 50% of drivers with more than 12 points are still driving without a ban because they all had ‘exceptional’ circumstances. Which rather suggests that the circumstances were far from exceptional.
Thanks again for all the comments and advice. It's amazing the depth and breadth of expertise on here.
I should stress that I don't know that the Failure to Provide is related to the insurance matter. The insurance matter actually happened some months before I was charged with the Failure to Provide. I'm assuming the two are related (and the date of when the Failure to Provide was charged correlates with when the bailiffs tracked me down to collect the insurance fine) but i don't KNOW that they are related.
I have to confess that on being notified about the insurance matter I paid the fine and didn't look into it further. I intended to but I had a lot going on and then pandemic. Though I'd be naive not to realise there's a pattern of behaviour here..
There are an awful lot of known and unknown unknowns here. I'm going to throw it over to the guys on that other forum and see what they have to say. I'm also going to avail myself of a free initial consultation with a specialist lawyer. Contrary to one of tye first responses to this thread, the benefit of what I've learned from this will be huge in terms of ensuring that I ask the right questions and get maximum benefit. So thanks to all again.
If it is unlikely that I would see the decision reversed then I'm of the view to take my medicine and plead guilty, get the ban out of the way, learn my lesson and move on.
With regard to the ban situation, the other points happened earlier this year (2 SP30s). I used to drive 30,000 miles a year for work and never an issue and then all this. Life eh?😏
I would agree with the advice above about asking a lawyer. My view is that the failing to identify the driver stuff is primarily to deal with people who are trying to wriggle out of things, not those who’s admin is shoddy. You appear to be the latter, and a lawyer may be able to help you get it resolved with a fairer outcome. And it is a bit of a muddle at the moment.
once upon a time I got a lift with a Taxi driver to Cardiff, who told me he had 28 points, because he had a family etc to support
My wife who is a current Magistrate says.......
It seems highly likely that the ‘Failure to Provide’ the details of the driver is linked to a SECOND offence of speeding.
This is because a failure to provide offence is not linked to a no insurance offence
It is possible that a letter regarding the speeding did indeed go to your old address and that you were tried in your absence and given the mandatory 6 points and a fine.
A statutory declaration is the correct procedure.
The aim of a statutory declaration is to ‘put aside‘ the original conviction, which I am assuming is a speeding offence of which you are unaware. Making the Stat Dec will mean that the 6 points for failure to provide the details of the driver will disappear and so will the fine. If you have paid the fine then it will be reimbursed to you.
HOWEVER, then you will have to plead guilty or not guilty to the original offence (of speeding)
It is easy for the courts to find out when and what time this offence took place so you can find out if you were driving or not. Of course if the car is only insured in your name then it has to have been you driving unless the car was stolen.
YOU SHOULD CALL THE COURTS BACK to get them to inform you of all the details of this offence TOMORROW.
If the driver of your car was indeed someone else then you plead NOT GUILTY and give their name to the court and its all over.
If you were in fact the driver then plead GUILTY. This is because you should only receive 3 points (if you were only slightly over the limit) and you should also get a smaller fine too.
If you haven't had a driver awareness course within the last 3 yrs you can pay for this, attend the course and get no points at all (usually only for the least serious speeding offences)
Of course if you were speeding more significantly then 4-6 penalty points are possible and you could still ‘tot up’ to 12 points and lose your licence....
6 points are given when you do
31-40. in a 20 limit
41-50 in a 30 limit
56-65 in a 40 limit
66-75 in a 50 limit
81-90 in a 60 limit
91-100 in a 70 limit
In any respect please do not plead guilty unless you are!!
If I can help you further please contact me tomorrow after you have sorted out what exactly the offence is!! Good luck
P.s. you really dont need to pay a lawyer for this once it becomes obvious what the failure to provide details of the driver actually relates to.
You will know if you are guilty or not of the speeding.
Exceptional hardship is actually much harder to get approved than you might imagine as we are told not to accept anything but the most significant. For example
* loss of your current job resulting in loss of jobs of other people who work for you
* current ill health which requires frequent hospital appointments etc
* sick child/dependent who needs frequent hospital appointments and where your partner or child's mother cannot drive
Exceptional Hardship arguments can also only be used once in any 3 year period, so if you are successful you will have to be extremely careful over the following three years. Any further offence for which you can receive penalty points will land you back in court again and make it much more difficult to obtain a good result.
I’m sure I read that around 50% of drivers with more than 12 points are still driving without a ban because they all had ‘exceptional’ circumstances. Which rather suggests that the circumstances were far from exceptional.
I think that number is more likely the number of people who ask that succeed in an exceptional hardship plea. I am sure the number in England is more like 25% of 12 pointers don't get banned - but you'll notice I didn't say which way round the discrepancy between courts and the public lay!
Mr and Mrs TiRed are awesome - that is all I have to contribute apart from good luck sorting it all out OP.
Once again I find myself in awe of this forum and the plethora of knowledgeable, informed, and above all decent people on here.
@TiRED thanks so much to both of you for your input and advice. I'll do some more digging and report back when I know more. I should state that I have had a look at my licence record online (got a code from the DVLA). I was hoping it would provide clarity, instead of which the plot seems to thicken. What is listed is the following:
SP30 - dated 26th December 2019 - 3 points
SP30 - dated 15th Feb 2020 - 3 points
MS90 (aka S172, Failure to Provide) - offence date listed as 8th Nov 2019 - 0 points (that's what it says on the computer!) and £660 fine. I'm assuming that this is the offence for which I have been convicted and lost my licence. But why say 0 points??? I'm currently also assuming that it relates to Failure to Provide for the insurance offence and that the date listed is the date when they got my new address from the bailiffs. But if that is the case why did they continue to send stuff to my old address? EDIT - I will of course try to clarify once and for all with the courts what the original offence actually is, when docs were sent etc
TT99 - 6 month disqualification under the totting up procedure - dated 9th July 2020. Which, given that the number of points listed is only 6, is in itself somewhat strange..
I should clarify that I was aware of the two SP30s and followed procedure assiduously with those, long before all this reared its ugly head.
I'll do more digging today and revert back when I know more.
Thanks again everyone for your input, advice and occasional fatherly admonishment!
For what it's worth I had a very similar incident whereby I'd sold a car, moved house then found that for some reason the DVLA hadn't processed the change in ownership and sent all correspondence to the old address. The new driver then decided to drive around in the car with no tax and was obviously caught. I was fingered for it and the paperwork was sent to my old house so I knew nothing about it. I ended up with the fine (£1500) being taken directly out of my pay from payroll (embarrassing to say the least) which was the first I heard about it. It was also in December and I'd just been made redundant. Funny that they found where I worked but couldn't be arsed to find out where I lived but I digress.
Anyway - I spoke to the courts and had to attend to state that I had no knowledge of the offence and I was refunded the monies. They then set another court date (days before lockdown) where I attended, stated my case and no further action was taken. I didn't pay for any advice (I was redundant and couldn't afford it) and it was all pretty stressful. That said, the law/fine/DVLA system is massive and slow moving. Everyone I spoke to was very reasonable and helpful and it's just a matter of going through the motions and stating your case clearly.
It does take ages to get anywhere and it's quite sobering to be sat in a magistrates on a weekday - I felt like a proper crim! At least it gave me something to do whilst I was job hunting.
As a side note and not trying to rub it in, but I do not understand why people move house & don’t use the Royal Mail re-direction service for a minimum of 12 months to catch any stray post.
Because its useless, Wife set one up few years ago and we dont think they redirected any mail, mail we received was for institutions she had manually updated, the easy to forget places kept going to the old house share and we would collect it, complained to RM to be told is basically like a best endeavours service! Same happened when we purchased our home a few years ago, we got the majority of the former owners mail, we were nice initially dropping it off at the agents for them to collect, but after 6 months it got annoying so we would return to sender all items which stopped the flow of them!
oikeith
As a side note and not trying to rub it in, but I do not understand why people move house & don’t use the Royal Mail re-direction service for a minimum of 12 months to catch any stray post.
Because its useless, Wife set one up few years ago and we dont think they redirected any mail, mail we received was for institutions she had manually updated, the easy to forget places kept going to the old house share and we would collect it, complained to RM to be told is basically like a best endeavours service!
Weird - I've used it several times while frequently moving house at university & while living in rented accommodation after first graduating.
While I can't categorically say that nothing was missed, I always got plenty of stuff that I had forgotten about needed updating and a relatively regular stream of post that would otherwise have been missed, or relied on the new tenants forwarding on for me.
I suppose like many of these things there is probably a wide variation based on the sorting office these things are done at.
Redirection has always worked for me. The lady at the Post Office was adamant that I needed to provided every combination of first/middle/surname/initials etc on the paperwork for it to redirect properly though.
Probably fair given its an absolute offence, but it still smarts a bit given I had no intention of of driving and only did so when explicitly instructed to by the police officer.
You can't just leave the story there... why did the police officer need you to drive your car?
You can’t just leave the story there… why did the police officer need you to drive your car?
So he could radio his mate up the road there’s a drunk driver on the way and get their stats up
Sounds like a real mess OP, hope you get it sorted. I received a speeding fine while moving flats and they sent the paperwork to pay the fine to the old place a day after I'd updated then to the new address going by the dates on the paperwork. Thought it was taking a long time until the court date for non-payment came through 3 months later. Thankfully a lawyer friend hooked me up with one of their colleagues who spotted they'd sent out the paperwork to the old address the day after they sent the acknowledgement letter confirming my change of address so a quick declaration in front of a judge and the charge was set aside. Get legal advice and follow it, that will get you the best outcome.
Probably fair given its an absolute offence, but it still smarts a bit given I had no intention of of driving and only did so when explicitly instructed to by the police officer.
I've had similar but I wasn't being set up for a pull.
A good 20 years ago(!!!) I was out drinking with my mates in November, one of who is a police officer's daughter. Her dad walks in on patrol just before closing time to the pub to check up on her (regular occurrence, he's a sound bloke and we all get on with him great) as he'd seen my car in the car park, checks she's ok then asks how we're all getting home later. We all say we'll walk back along the canal as both of us with cars had drunk too much and we'd fetch them in the morning. He then turns to me and says "You're driving her home and you can all sleep in the lounge, no way are you walking back along the canal in this temperature." "But I'm definitely over the limit, not risking a ticket!" "I'll take care of that, you won't get pulled." Cue the slowest I've ever driven in my life!! The next morning I wake up as her dad walks in off shift, looks at me, smiles and just says "You looked properly shifty driving through the estate at 5mph, you could have gone a little faster." Wouldn't happen now!
I got caught driving without insurance once, points and fine (my mate was pissed and I didn't want him driving so drove his car). I set up a standing order to pay the fine as I was on a low income at the time.
Somehow this got cancelled and I, stupidly, didn't realise or do anything about it. I owed about £150..
Long story short, got a letter to go to court. Turned up, explained what had happened..
Got sentenced to 2 weeks prison! Luckily made my one phonecall home and my parents came in and paid the fine off.
2 ****ing weeks for £150!!
Meanwhile, my ex-brother-in-law, who had abused my sister, smashed her car up, threatened her with a knife was told to try and be a better person and do 50 hours community service..
Good luck with your case.
I’m surprised no-one has suggested you change your name to (STWs ever popular) Guy Martin? He seems to get away with all kinds of stuff 😉
Update time. Thanks again for all your input. Love the story about the copper getting reluctantjumper to drive home. Reminds me of a guy I knew at college (Also 30yrs ago) who had his own very old VW beetle. In it was a very nice and very dodgy stereo. Given his dad was a senior copper he had a cutout of the standard stereo that he wedged on top of it so that the old man would never see what he was really using!
Anyway, to the case, now spoken again to the courts and established that the S172 does indeed relate to a speeding offence. 35 in a 30, same camera that subsequently got me again on a stretch of road that had been (and I thought still was) a 40. My fault regardless. So seems like I'm going to follow the route of pleading guilty to the original offence (3 points and £100 fine) rather than the S172 (6 points and £660 fine).
One thing, would I be correct in my understanding that once I lodge the Statutory Declaration the previous conviction is null and void, meaning that the points, ban and fine disappear until the new court case?
@TiRED if you read this I'll be PMing you if that's okay. Looking forward to getting this mess sorted out and have learnt a very valuable lesson!
Blimey, this stuff is all very confusing. Starting to really appreciate how lawyers earn their corn!
A point of clarification I'm now after if anyone can help is that the Single Justice Procedure relates only to the S172 offence (failure to provide details). Nowhere does it mention the speeding ticket, hence the initial red herring around insurance. Nowhere else is there anything re this speeding ticket. It doesn't appear on the DVLA website, courts have no record (to my knowledge) of any conviction or somesuch regarding this, though they obviously know of the original offence as they told me! (perhaps I'm not asking the courts the right questions..)
So does that fact that they are trying me purely on the S172 mean that I can't ask for it to be put aside on the basis I plead guilty to the SP30, or does the SP30 thing still exist because without it the S172 can't exist?
Whatever happens I am going down the Statutory Declaration route, but obviously would like to be tried for the SP30 offence, just not sure I can do this if they are only pursuing me for the S172.
Thanks again for any input
I'm confused now. Is this Speeding Offence in addition to the other two, but one they've not yet prosecuted? That would take you then to 9 points.
This thread has been really interesting and I don’t know what a V5 is. It sounds proportionate that you’ll get things sorted out as you hope.
Looking forward to getting this mess sorted out and have learnt a very valuable lesson!
Is it not to speed 😉
Glad to be of service. V5 is the doc that identifies you as the person in possession of a given vehicle. Not necessarily the owner as I understand it (though it usually is), but the person who has responsibility for it. Hence with a speeding ticket the V5 owner is written to and has to declare who was driving.
Is it not to speed
That's the one. And also to get my sh1t together!
To the question above re points, the 6 points I have on my license are from two SP30s, within 4 days of each other, from the same speed camera, in February of this year. So AFTER the offence that led to this mess. Though I think the SP30 that led to this mess was the same speed camera. Bit of road that has been 40 for years and they changed it. No excuse, but like I said 100,000 miles in just over 3 years with nothing and now 3 times within a few months on the same camera..
I'll update once I know more about what my options are. Hoping that I'll be able tomplead guilty for the original speeding offence and they'll drop the S172
Pay a solicitor unless you don't value the chance to mitigate.
I'm going to be the party-pooper/downer on this thread, so sorry everyone:
I, unlike a lot on here, don't have any sympathy for someone done for driving without insurance. That's a serious crime with potentially very serious consequences.
You compond that with not fulfilling the other clear and obvious legal requirements of owning motor vehicles.
You're guilty as sin. So consider the fact that if you plead not guilty, wasting the courts time and taxpayers money, you might get a stern ticking off and an increased sentence/fine.
My advice would be to pay up and act like an adult in the future. Doing your paperwork properly is not complex - you even get repeat warnings and chasers from your insurers, for example, which you will have ignored.
Stop whining, take it on the chin and take proper responsibility for your life.
You'll have been convicted of an S172 instead of the SP30 as because you haven't provided details they don't have enough evidence for an SP30 so they convict you with S172 instead. What you want to be doing is a stat Dec to rewind the S172 and get charged / convicted with the SP30 instead of the S172. You need to negotiate so that you only get convicted of SP30 and don't end up being convicted of SP30 & S172.
Well it only took 70 replies or so for someone to really lay it on the line. Though using the moniker of chevychase is a weird one to be taking that high moral stance from behind, given what an execrable individual Mr Chase apparently is.
In fairness, I was going through redundancy, house move and issues pertaining to my divorce at the time, so head was all over the place. Not justification for sure, but context is always important, particularly in the law, no?
The insurance things as it pertains to this was a red herring anyway. Me making assumptions. I've looked into it and as I understand it it was actually to do with my road tax having lapsed, which thereby invalidated the insurance that I did have. The actual period of time when I wasn't insured due to paperwork was a week or so. I assumed the two were connected. They weren't. Furthermore, if Mr Chase had bothered to read the whole thread (which I'm not convinced that he has), I think it would be fairly clear that I'm not trying to duck responsibility here. I think I've been very clear that failure to update the DVLA correctly re the V5 was ultimately my fault. The original question was framed around whether or not a mistake at my end would lead inevitably to a guilty plea even if there wasn't any intent. At the end of the day, my main aim was to try and understand what the line between guilty and not guilty is, what the courts will and won't accept in terms of culpability and knowledge of the offence in question.
It's also worth thinking about proportionality. As things stand the impact of a six month ban could see me lose my job and livelihood, at a time when the jobs market ain't exactly great. Which of course impacts upon my wife and child, but also my ex-wife and two children whom I pay substantial maintenance to each month (more than the legal minimum, because I take my responsibilities to my families seriously). In addition, with my ex-wife shielding because of a serious underlying health condition and no family to support her, I have been the primary support for her in terms of shopping etc through the pandemic. She will continue to shield for some time I think. Being unable to drive would seriously impact upon my ability to do this. So, is the impact of a six month ban a proportional punishment for making an honest mistake in terms of filling out DVLA documentation? I don't think so, but obviously context is everything and that is why courts allow people to ask for mitigation and why I originally posted on here.
Whilst I do accept some of Mr Saturday Night Live's post, in particular I think the use of "whining" is both unfair and unnecessary. I'm not whining and I'm not looking for sympathy. I'm trying to work out what is going on and what my rights and responsibilities are. At the end of the day the law and the legal processes around anything like this are there for a reason and are as important as the offences that they regulate. It is as important that these processes are followed as it is that the guilty get caught. Otherwise we risk anarchy.
As a final rejoinder, I agree with Mr National Lampoon that the laws are there for a reason. If I rack up 12 points for speeding and potentially get banned then it's my fault. I might try and mitigate re the above, but that's about the punishment, not the acceptance of guilt (which I think Mr European Vacation may be conflating).
The benefit of all of this is that when I take legal advice - which I will on Monday - I now have a very clear idea of what has happened and what questions need to be asked.
You’ll have been convicted of an S172 instead of the SP30 as because you haven’t provided details they don’t have enough evidence for an SP30 so they convict you with S172 instead. What you want to be doing is a stat Dec to rewind the S172 and get charged / convicted with the SP30 instead of the S172. You need to negotiate so that you only get convicted of SP30 and don’t end up being convicted of SP30 & S172.
Thanks for this, I understand what you're saying in principle. The problem as I see it is that alongside the SD form I have been resent the Single Justice Procedure which I have to fill out as well (essentially how I plead). This gives me three options:
Guilty
Guilty and I would like to approach the court with mitigation
Not Guilty
The SJP refers solely to the S172 offence. At no point does in mention the original offence, other than in passing "Failure to Provide when requested". So I don't see how I can go down the procedure of rewinding to the original SP30 if that option isn't present on the documents that I've been sent. Unless of course I lawyer up.
I was asking about the 3rd SP30 trying to work out the points thing. Assuming you can rewind to that and take the points, that'll be 9. The only other crime would then be failing to update the V5 and I don't think that has a points penalty, just a fine of up to £1,000. If that's correct then that might be the best outcome you can hope for.
I'm glad to see you're a fan of my work @funkrodent.
You're right though - I hadn't read the whole thread - and absolutely think it's correct that you go to the effort of ensuring you get treated fairly and to the letter of the law.
However - I stand by my point that you need to take adult responsibility for getting your paperwork done correctly because in your, admittedly amusing, reply you admitted to letting your car tax lapse too.
So speeding (a lot), driving without insurance, failing to notify changes of address to the authorities and failing to tax your vehicle.
*Everyone* is having a hard time at the moment, cry me a river etc. etc.
But do your bloody life-maintenance tasks. If you'd shown same dedication to completing a few trivial but legally-required paperwork and bill-paymenent tasks as you are to ensure you don't get a driving ban/large fine then you wouldn't be in this mess in the first place.
Fair enough, I can't argue with what you've outlined in your response. In mitigation (m'lud) this all happened (other than the speeding) a couple of years ago when my life was in a state of flux. Since then I've remedied the incorrect info etc. The speeding is a dumb one. As previously stated, over the four years between 2014 and end 2018 I drove well in excess of 100,000 miles with never a problem. However, whatever the reasons behind it i'll take it on the chin, I'm at fault and I deserve what I get.
The S172 is slightly different though. My initial question was round one of intent. Am I guilty if as result of a separate mistake a chin of events unfolded that led to this? If the answer is an unequivocal YES then I'll take the fine and the ban (though I'll attempt to mediate with the court) and move on.
As it happens - and this seems to be usually the case with the law - the actual answer seems to be a grey area, and there does seem to be precedent whereby under certain circumstances (which may or may not apply in my case) I can have the case discontinued by getting things wound back to the initial speeding charge (of which I was uncontestably guilty).
Anyway, its been a massively educational experience up to this point and I will be speaking to a lawyer on Monday as there is still an element of uncertainty that makes me feel it would be beneficial to get on the record legal advice.
Always found Mr Chase very funny btw. Particularly the bit in European vacation where they have a meal with the long-lost aged Austrian/German relatives, and upon leaving the old man turns to the woman and says "Who he f&ck were they?" and she shrugs and says "No idea". Shame he's allegedly an 4r5eh0le in real life.
I was asking about the 3rd SP30 trying to work out the points thing. Assuming you can rewind to that and take the points, that’ll be 9. The only other crime would then be failing to update the V5 and I don’t think that has a points penalty, just a fine of up to £1,000. If that’s correct then that might be the best outcome you can hope for.
Understood. On the SJPN it only references the S172 offence. There is no specific mention of the original driving offence.
I'm given to understand that this means that it would be very difficult to get the case "rewound" to the me pleading guilty to the original offence, but I don't know if this is indeed the case and I guess I will find out more tomorrow, unless anyone cares to enlighten me in the meantime..