[Closed] Flashed doing 75 in a 50 dual carriageway, court or points?

90% sure you wont get the option of the speed awareness course, as I got caught doing 75 in a 60, if I had been doing 1mph more, I wouldnt have had a choice.

You'll be sentenced to a ritual flaming on STW...

is that the sound of pitchforks being sharpened?

NEVER choose the court option. They'll think you're taking the piss and wasting the Court's time...you'll come off [i]much[/i] worse than £100 & 3 points!

there wasn't any childrens faces on the dual carriageway at the time so I should be safe.

[img] [/img]

there wasn't any childrens faces on the dual carriageway at the time so I should be safe.

well you didn't see the camera, so how do you know you didn't miss hundreds of children's faces in front on you? 😉

but did have to do an awareness course about 18 months ago,

my money you mean. It was 70 odd quid ish.

Why waste time with court, 3 points and £100 seems pretty reasonable to me.

Just MTFU and take the points...

You were clocked at 25 Mph above the speed limit, it's pretty unequivocal, if you do ask for a court appearance, they'll just increase the pointage and up the fine... fixed penalty notices are nice and efficient see, try and buck the system and you'll catch a double bollocking...

I don't have any points at the mo, but did have to do an awareness course about 18 months ago, but the speed means I won't get that choice even if it wasn't within 3 yrs.

That won't go in your favour either if you choose court, it simply demonstrates that the course didn't change your habits and that you have a [I]"History of driving with excessive speed"[/I], a lack of points doesn't mean the offense isn't recorded (can anyone confirm that?) just thet you wriggled out of the points last time by attending a [I]scare 'em straight[/I] course... which apparently didn't work.

jekkyl - Member
my money you mean. It was 70 odd quid ish.

3 points and £100 seems pretty reasonable to me.

I won't choose court, I want the points. The letter seems to say I could still be given a court appearance. My question was will I defo get offered the points and fine?

Unfortunately you won’t lose your driving licence for life - Muppet

Unfortunately you won’t lose your driving licence for life - Muppet

Hello up there!

Although a copper, I work in another area of policing and haven't dealt with a traffic matter for over 15 years. However this is what I think - you would be wise to research it yourself though 😀

It seems you've been lucky (if that's an appropriate term). Had you been clocked at 76mph - the guidelines (under 'Speed Enforcement' in the below link) suggest you ought to receive a summons to court for a stiffer sanction than can be imposed by the Fixed Penalty Scheme.

http://www.cps.gov.uk/legal/p_to_r/road_traffic_offences_guidance_on_fixed_penalty_notices/

From the circumstances you describe, you are eligible to be dealt with by way of the FPS. If you wish to plead not guilty your case will be heard in court.

The Speed Awareness Courses are aimed at those caught speeding just above the limit and will only be open to people caught breaking the speed limit by 10% + 9mph or less - so, not you.

Please drive more responsibly in the future - thanks.

Thanks deluded and all.
Thread closed 👿

Why was you speeding did you not see any speed limit signs or just think 5 mph over the limit of a possible unsigned dual carriage way was acceptable?
As a cyclist I would assume you would be more attune to road safety, even more so that you have been on a awareness course.
Frankly you should not be asking whether to pay the fine or go to court, you shouldn't have put your self in that position.
However if the dual carriage way was unsigned then you can be slightly forgiven for the +5mph over the standard unsigned limit and just pay the fine and be a better motorist .

As deluded said, you're been lucky. Take the points.

However, someone I know, insists he just ignores any letters regarding speeding and eventually they don't chase him up. As they are not recorded or anything how can they prove delivery? I am not condoning this behaviour and I do not know he is telling the truth by the way!

However, I had moved house and I thought I had been caught by a camera van. I hadn't changed my address with the DVLA.
My old place was at the other end of the UK, on the market and empty. I went up there 4 weeks later, no ticket. I went there nearly 4 mths later, in a pile of post a 2nd reminder from about 2 mths ago but nothing else. I am a coward so I phoned up and grovelled. They were perfectly nice and happy to take money and give points. I often wonder what would of happened if I just ignored it?

you were clocked at 75 so probably doing an indicated 80ish. all i'm sayin'
😉

If you ignore the post it goes to court you then ignore the summons you get convicted and fined and points in your absence you then ignore that you then get an arrest warent which most police forces won't actively chase till they have a project or they trip over you this means the day you report a crime or get what would otherwise be words of advise you instead get hauled in to the nick . If it is Saturday morning you will be there till Monday unless some one buys you out in cash for the full fine plus costs. Many people also get nicked on warents at the airport too not the best start or end to a holiday.

If you ignore the post it goes to court

No it doesn't. I accidentally missed the initial and 2nd contact asking who was driving the vehicle and there had been no correspondence for about 2 mths.

Besides, none of the letters were recorded, "proof of delivery is not proof of receipt" and all that. How can they proof I had received the notification?

Besides, none of the letters were recorded, "proof of delivery is not proof of receipt" and all that. How can they proof I had received the notification?

there's loads of stuff online about this, but i wish you luck nevertheless.

I'd take the 3 points and £100 and count it a bargain.

they regard having posted it within 14 days to the registered keeper as sufficient.

I coughed to mine but it was over 3 mths after the offence. They hadn't chased me up or took me to court after 14 days.

I am not sure if I would have the bottle to try it but I wonder if anyone else has?

does make you wonder. Whenever you go through those cameras that tell you your speed it always indicates a speed a little lower then what your speedo says. Did all the car manufacturers get together and conspire to make all speedos slightly out? doing us all a favour and making the roads slightly safer.

doing us all a favour and making the roads slightly safer

Compared with my GPS it's normally about 10% high. Think it's some kind of liability protection.

yeah - compared with GPS it's 5% to 10% higher on the speedo for me too. Not that GPS are 100% accurate either. But if you were 75 o the clock, it's unlikely you were actually going that fast. Still a more than 50.

As advice above - your were caught - no arguments, take course of least resistance, accept the points and fine

Did all the car manufacturers get together and conspire to make all speedos slightly out

Yep, in the UK they did. A speedo has to be accurate to within 10% by design afaik so the sensible thing to do is design them to read 10% under so that you can't be sued if your car reads under and you get ticketed, or worse.

Of course nowadays eqiuppment is much more accurate, but I think they've tacitly left the situation the same since it saves fuel, reduces accident severity and helps congestion.

In the USA they don't have this 10% thing so speedos generally read bang on. Which is interesting when comparing fuel economy between US cars and UK cars.

yeah - typically domestic vehicles have the speedo calibrated so they read over. my van's is bang on @ 70. i've checked it with gps a couple of times. i sail past a lot of cars on the motorway!

Not that GPS are 100% accurate either.

When they have a good signal they are pretty close to it for intents and purposes.

I moved the speedo sensor from the front wheel to the larger rear wheel on the motorbike, and the end result was an almost perfectly accurate speedo. Then I forgot, and became really peeved about my poor mpg. Luckily never did the "Oh, I can exceed the speed limit by 10% safely" thing or I'd have ended up with the worst defence in legal history 😆

However, someone I know, insists he just ignores any letters regarding speeding and eventually they don't chase him up. As they are not recorded or anything how can they prove delivery? I am not condoning this behaviour and I do not know he is telling the truth by the way!

I have a sneaking suspicion he's not being entirely honest.

As for the 10% guideline; it's cobblers. My car reads 72mph at 70 on the GPS. You don't need a calculator to know that isn't anywhere near 10%

Unfortunately you won’t lose your driving licence for life - Muppet

Exactly what he said.

Winston you have only had 2 months they have 6 in which to issue the summons . Proof of posting to address of registered keeper is presumed service on registered keeper in law. It is my day off and I can't be bothered to dig out wilkinsons but I bet I know as much about how this works in theory and practice as you .

In regards to the letters being posted, has anyone been in the situation where the registered address of the car has changed?

I may have been clocked, but on that date, the registered address of the car was our previous house, and admittedly, it took several weeks for me to remember (and post the form off).

Would the Police ask the DVLA [i]once[/i] for the address, and keep sending letters there? Or if it was returned (assuming the property is lived in, which I don't know), would they re-check?

I am not sure if I would have the bottle to try it but I wonder if anyone else has?

crankboy - If you had bothered to read my posts then you might of understood I am asking if anyone has tried this? I am not sure if he is being completely truthful.

someone I know, insists he just ignores any letters

The use of the "insists" would suggest I am quite skeptical.

Winston you have only had 2 months they have 6 in which to issue the summons

It was about 3 mths from offence to actually getting in touch with them. ASFAIK the 1st letter never did arrive, I never saw it, the reminder said it arrived about 4 weeks after the first but then nothing.

Apart from anything else, it would be worth hanging out for along as possible before responding as the points only last from date of offence not conviction.

Sorry if I misread Winston. My point is the system is designed to get the offender and is not outwited by just ignoring the post . Many people do or change address only to find out at the least convenient time that they have a fine points and a warrent for their arrest for non payment .

Serial ignorers run a theoretical risk of being disqualified in their absence then done for drive disqualified so thier first knowledge of the case is when they are arrested for an offence that carries imprisonment . Note banning people in their absence is now frowned upon the propper way forward is to have them arrested brought before court in custody and then ban them .

Xipon they would normally only check once with dvla then assume the letters are being ignored (see above) it is high volume low effort work the onus is on the registered keeper to keep the dvla up to date or deal with the resulting snafu.

[b]crankboy[/b] Am I asking for trouble walking into a Police station and enquiring?

Xipon not enough info to give a definitive answer . What was the offense and timescale ? Most non punters are only ever likely to have warents for non payment of fines or 1st instance warrants for failure to answer a summons both these will be on record at the local magistrates court for where the offense happens. Ring them ask to speak to fines dept they will know about fines warrants . "Court work" or "listings" will know about 1st instance warrants. Ringing the court sidesteps any immediate plod pain.

Otherwise ring your local nick and act all worried and contrite .
If you have a genuine fear that you have left it so long that a warrant exists and you need to surrender do so soon and do so before 8 .30 am on a weekday to an active police station close to the relevant court . 99% sure you have nothing to worry about 🙂

do so before 8 .30 am on a weekday

Any reason why?

Del - Member
yeah - typically domestic vehicles have the speedo calibrated so they read over. my van's is bang on @ 70. i've checked it with gps a couple of times. i sail past a lot of cars on the motorway!

Interesting. Assume this is the same with trucks?

Always wondered why when doing 50mph in roadworks you'll get trucks overtaking you despite them being restricted to 52mph.

i've checked it with gps a couple of times. i sail past a lot of cars on the motorway!

Cop next door reckons the TomTom he's used in the patrol car is pretty much as accurate as their calibrated speedo. My Nissan speedo is shocking, the Golf is a lot closer to actual speed.

If the incident was recent it will all still be in the hands of who ever the speed cameras are run by . They normally do a nip in 14 days then a reminder in a month then wait I think 28 days then at some point within 6 months apply for a summons so a quick call to them providing reg number should be your first port of call.

@[b]crankboy[/b]

The 'offence' I think happened in late September, but it was only yesterday after somebody else talked about their NIP through the post, I remembered it (and the fact I hadn't received a letter!)

A small surge of adrenaline, muttering "Oh sh!t..."

I think I was clocked on a motorway late at night (M6 southbound through the Lakes), by an officer on a bridge. He was lying down, pointing 'something' at the cars (I glanced up as I went under).

Thanks for your advice. I'll phone one of the courts in Cumbria to get the ball rolling (as Cumbria was the county). I guess being [i]pro-active[/i] about it might swing in my favour (or at least balance the lack of correct address on record)

Good call on turning up at 8:30am!

(There's [i]always[/i] somebody on STW who can point you in the right direction, no matter what the topic!)

do so before 8 .30 am on a weekday
Any reason why?

Winston if you have an arrest warrant you get booked into police custody at the arresting station that can take a while . they then ring the private escort company they send a van to the station likely to be a milk run rather than specially for you the van takes you to court where a handover is done to the court escorts. That is you the body at court .

Meanwhile the police officer does the paper work he or another separately takes the paperwork to the court office, they then input it and allocate it to a courtroom .

Body and paper work are then united in the bliss that is a hearing slotted in after whatever else was listed.

So police , group 4 / geoamy , civil service office staff , stressed court staff all get the chance to lose something or someone before you get released.

Oh and the court have an arbitrary cut off time when they refuse to deal with you and send you back through the system to police cells to wait till the next day.

So in the unlikely event that you ever have a court warrant early surrender and never on a Saturday or Sunday.

Most fine default and minor FTA appear warrants are dealt with by Warrants Officer's of the Magistrates Court Services - not the cops.

Xiphon Sept is recent enough my bet is the police will not have even applied for a summons ring the cumbrian road traffic dept they should be able to sort you out. And the answer to the question are you admitting you were speeding is no officer I am just worried his device may be faulty and have wrongly clocked me.

Proof of posting to address of registered keeper is presumed service on registered keeper in law

I agree entirely. However you can always ask them to prove they posted it. I suspect that they can proove the computer system printed the letter, but I whether they can proove it was posted is something completely different.

think I might submit the OP post as evidence for the transport select committee on cycle safety....

@crankboy - thanks for the info all good stuff. Hopefully I'll never have to use the warrant stuff....

Regarding the summons for speeding offences, are they posted?
Surely they must be signed for?

IYO what would happen if you waited until you got a summons and then claimed you hadn't received anything and were happy to pay any fixed penalty?

Also, if they don't get to you within 6 mths of the offence is that the end of it?

[i] And the answer to the question are you admitting you were speeding is no officer I am just worried his device may be faulty and have wrongly clocked me.[/i]

Can't decide if that's sarcastic or not? If I was the officer on the other end, I'd be thinking "Arrogant arse, he's only calling because he's worried he's been clocked and not heard anything"

well if you prefer you can always answer 'yes i admit i was speeding' and get that warm, fuzzy feeling of helping them secure a conviction through an admission of guilt....
😀
you may only call cos you think you got done in the same way that they only ask if you want to admit to an offence. it works both ways!

Is speeding now a £100 fine? Robbing bastards! What justified the huge increase?

Summonses are just posted out by the court . No requirement for them to be signed for . If you never receive them you can make application to set aside any conviction or vary any order.

Generaly for cases that can only be dealt with in the magistrates court there is a six month time limit for bringing proceedings ie issue of the summons it normally runs from date of knowledge of the offense. Note most truely bad boy stuff murder theft serious assault falls outside this rule.

Xipon I was not being sarcastic Del sums it up . Be hard getting a speeding conviction on your confession alone but never conceed something you don't need to.

Having been on a Speed Awareness course, we were told the speedo is because all the car manufactures calibrate with a winter tyre which has a larger diameter. Because if they used a summer tyre then the customer put on a winter tyre the speed they were doing would be more than the speedo. So if you stuck a 15inch rim on a car that takes a 16inch the speedo would be showing you going really fast as it turns more for a given distance.

hmmm good point. I'll have to think very carefully (and write it down!) before I say anything.

Don't get me wrong - I'm not trying to wriggle out of it - if I was clocked, I'll face the consequences. What I don't want, is for it to get [i]worse[/i], if I don't do anything.

"No officer I am just worried his device may be faulty and have wrongly clocked me."

As I don't have a letter in my hand saying I [i]was[/i] clocked, I can't say I'm worried about bring [i]wrongly[/i] clocked.

Tricky!

EDIT:

Would something along the lines of "Due to moving house, the registered address of the vehicle XXXX XXX was not updated as quick as I should have. I was driving along the M6 at XX:XX on XX September 2013 and passed underneath an Officer with device pointing at the road, what I presume to be a speed radar gun. The registered address for vehicle XXXX XXX was changed from <old address> to <new address> on <date>, so there is a chance that any letters you may have sent were not received by myself."

^^ Key word being [b]MAY[/b] - is that (in legal speak) admission of guilt?

I'd put the above in writing, as opposed to using a phone.... for my own safety!

[quote=shuhockey said]Having been on a Speed Awareness course, we were told [s]the speedo...[/s] a load of rubbish

am so glad I've not been on one

Xiphon I would suggest you don't over think it . A phone call will answer your query you will be chatting to someone who is used to dealing with people spouting all sorts of guff and laying down the law. Probably not Morse ready primed to trap you . Be nice and a simple query should produce a straight answer from an abundance of caution I suggest you avoid an admission but all you need to convey is you believe you went passed an officer doing speed checks you have just changed address as a result of a stupid scare story on the internet you are now worried that there could be letters sent out to your old address that you may need to deal with would they mind checking their system.

Your suggested wording of a letter is spot on . Personaly I would go for the flexibility and instant reassurance of a phone call.

[b]crankboy[/b] I like that idea, I'll go with that one.

And yes, I probably am over thinking things. Lots. 😳

ACPO speed enforcement guidelines
Speed limit Min speed for a speeding ticket Min speed for prosecution
20mph 25mph 35mph
30mph 35mph 50mph
40mph 46mph 66mph
50mph 57mph 76mph
60mph 68mph 86mph
70 mph 79mph 96mph

A guide to speeding fines!

Slight hijack ... nothing to do with speeding ...

CaptainFlashheart - Member

The method of hanging the corpse of Captain Kidd is brilliant ... I like it very much.

I think it would be better if the person is alive while in the "cage" and let the tide take him/her.

[url= http://www.historytoday.com/richard-cavendish/execution-captain-kidd ]Blah blah story here ...[/url]
😀

ACPO speed enforcement guidelines
Speed limit Min speed for a speeding ticket Min speed for prosecution
20mph 25mph 35mph
30mph 35mph 50mph
40mph 46mph 66mph
50mph 57mph 76mph
60mph 68mph 86mph
70 mph 79mph 96mph

A guide to speeding fines!

Can you actually get caught for speeding on your bike? There's a 30 near me that roadies regularly go over 40 - 45 down. Must happen all the time.

Hey you lot, can we stop debating the niceties of police and court procedure and get back to the flaming?

[img] [/img]

What the camera clocks you at is what you will get fined or prosecuted it as simple as that.
I am not passing judgment, but according to the table above it looks like you are just under, i hope it works out for you a very minor wrongdoing in considering the world we live in.

Proof of posting to address of registered keeper is presumed service on registered keeper in law

try telling the DVLA that. Their view is, so they told me, that if they post it the customer must have received it. However if you post it that's not the case. Honest, some dimwit in their office told me that. Took months to sort out an apparent failure to notify them of a change of keeper. they ignored my proof of posting and recorded delivery and accused me of lying when I said I hadn't received any thing from them. I think that was actually lost by the PO but the point is...

theyll be building a jibbet as we speak...

You should be ok for the FPN unless the enforcing police force were having a zero tolerance campaign however the acpo guidelines are just guidelines so to a degree depends on where / conditions etc.

I was caught a few years ago doing 93 on a dual carriage way and was relieved to get only 3 points. My NIP didn't include the option of court or a FPN instead just to identify driver so if your letter mentioned FPN I think you should be fine. It made me think twice about speeding.

75 in a 50 zone, thats 50% like doing 105 in a 70 zone, call the firing squad.

The one question that's not been asked though, that would change peoples mindsets, do you drive an audi?