Speeding fine

[mummabearfoyrbabybears]

Any solicitors about please?? Hi, I was caught speeding last year but the car I was driving is in my husbands name. My husband works abroad for long periods of time and I open any mail that looks official although we don't get a lot as it's mostly online. There was nothing received that would indicate it was a police issued speeding fine. Husband came home in January, opened his mail. Nothing. But two weeks later we have a fine from the courts for £900 plus 6 points for failure to identify the driver and missing a court date. We absolutely did not receive anything and they say it's up to us to prove we didn't receive it as first class post is legally binding! HELP!!

You can contact the court which gave the fine and ask about making a statutory declaration. This will wipe out the original fine and the case would then be reopened.
The onus is on you to prove that you didn't get the original letters but you can at least put your side of the case to the Magistrates. You could enter a ' Not Guilty' plea if you really think you have a strong case. As far as the points go, there is little you can do if you plead/are found guilty but the amount you are fined will be based upon your husband's income.

Strongly suggest you use a direct access barrister who specialises in motoring law. I used one last year and was extremely pleased with his expertise. Well worth his (reasonable fee). Search for AGT law, good luck sorting this.

That's ridiculous. How can you prove whether you did or didn't receive ordinary mail? It is pretty reliable but a certain percentage does get lost or misdelivered so not 100% (eg if you live in an estate where all the streets are the same name with Avenue, Road, Crescent etc, you will often get post for the same number on another street, and not everyone bothers to pass it on. I don't suppose you have noticed any other mail going missing?

Your DHs car is registered to your address I assume? He's not moved, or it's not registered to his business address or elsewhere?

I would just check that the car is registered to the right address and declare that I didn't receive the letters and ask them to start again.

They are aware of people using this as an excuse in the hope that the police will go away and will probably make stern warnings about perjury or attempts to pervert the course of justice, but if that's what happened, they have to accept it.

His car is registered to our home address, he can prove he was in a foreign country for that entire duration of summer until mid January. He can even prove he was abroad when the speeding fine took place. How on earth do I prove that we didn't receive the letters? I'm so upset and feel pretty helpless. I think as pp said contact a solicitor who deals with this sort of thing. We just can't afford £900.

I found an online solicitora specialising in motorong law who did phone consultations and think I paid about £70. He helped me word a letter and as he had experience of similar cases he was able to give me an idea of what to expect snd advise me.on how to proceed. If you Google it there are loads of them..

Being out of the country is not a defence to a charge of failing to provide information about the details of a driver (which I assume he has been convicted of).

For his defence to be valid he needs to prove that he made reasonable adjustments to have his mail dealt with, AND that the original speeding fine letters didn't arrive. Just relying on his absence in the country will not be enough.

Please speak to a motoring law specialist asap.

Thank you so much for all your replies. I will speak to a motoring lawyer. I just have no idea how to prove we didn't receive anything. I'm thinking it's a lost cause sadly. Thank you all.

Until you get legal advice you can't know if it's a lost cause or not. An ethical legal counsel will tell you over the phone if the situation is a lost cause. The direct barrister I suggested has a flat rate of dealing with straight forward situations for £150 not £900. I had a similar situation involving lost / missing post (not exactly the same as yours however) and I wrote to the police several times about it - they were extremely unhelpful and obstructive and insisted on going to court, very upsetting. I got nowhere until I got legal advice.

The barrister did all the paperwork / court docs for me and pointed out that it was an admin error and that this should never have gone to court. the magistrate agreed that it should never have gone to court, so I did not have to pay court costs.

I only had to pay the barrister £150 as it was sorted by email (he did not have to appear in person). The police and courts were vastly more responsive to the barrister than to a lay person. Dealing with this myself was stressful and futile. Hand the problem over to an expert.

Thanks bootikin. My husbands doing it first thing tomorrow. He abroad again so logistically a nightmare but he has to as it's all in his name. Thanks again

Hi, I was in a similar situation last year. I got caught out by my failure to update my V5 registration when I moved house. I got a speeding fine which I never received and the first I knew about it was a year later when I was notified by the DVLA that I had been convicted of a driving offence and found I had been convicted in my absence of MS90 or ‘failing to disclose the identity of the driver’ and fined over £800. It is worth noting that having this conviction code is also a nightmare with insurance companies as they tend to assume that the initial offence must have been serious if you refused to declare who was driving and therefore it can massively increase your premiums for the next few years.
Anyway, I was able to make a statutory declaration with a solicitor for about £10 (or you can do this for free at court). By doing this you declare that you knew nothing about the court proceedings and it resets the process to the point of summons. However that still left me charged with MS90. In the end, I attended court (self representing after a lot of research as the solicitor I contacted wanted £600). I asked the prosecutor in court if they would be willing to drop the charge if I agreed to plead guilty to the original speeding offence which they were happy to do. Apparently this type of plea bargain is very common. I ended up with just a speeding conviction, points and a £200 fine which I was happy with (considering what I had been looking at).
Your situation is more complicated as your husband is charged with the MS90 but it wasn’t him who committed the initial offence and therefore he is unable to offer the same deal to the prosecutor so I’m not exactly sure how it could work.
I managed to get some excellent advice from the fightback forums on pepipoo where some of the regular posters include ex traffic police and solicitors. Google it.
Good luck. I know first hand how frustrating and stressful this is and I hope you are able to find a good solution. X