After 16 years with a clean driving licence.......

[petunia]

....I've been caught speeding. No, don't want sympathy, (was doing 37mph in a 30 zone last Sunday) but just so annoyed that I've never even had a parking ticket and now I've been clobbered. I've had DH and my Dad saying that I'm the safest driver they know so it makes me feel slightly better.

You irresponsible lunatic driving seven miles an hour over the limit!!! Sympathies.

The insurance co prob won't care about an SP30 if it makes you feel any better. It's once you're going faster and/or have more points that they seem to put your premium up. Not an expert but have 6 points so know this because of that.

I've had my license for 21 years and I am sure I was flashed the other day. My fault was in rush to get home after being stuck insnarl up fopr 2 hours on M25. Never had an fines or crashes till now. Just waiting for the plop on the doorstep soon

Oh Sorry, you diddn't want sympathy. Commiserations instead.

Same thing happened to me except I had clean licence for 21 years. As the first lot of points were expiring I got caught again 2 times in quick succession. Blame new car....

How bizarre! I've just got a speeding ticket for doing 37 mph in a 30! Thats after 13 years with a clean licence....ooh....13 years, maybe thats why

Rubbish isn't it!

Mine was clean before I got my points too, so that's from 1986 - 2002 and they finally come off my licence in Oct and Dec this year.

I am glad you don't want sympathy, and I don't think commiserations are appropriate. Hundreds of people are injured or killed by speeding drivers every year - if you don't want points -
DONT SPEED

I am wondering rather bemusedly whether it can be so that you have NEVER driven over 30mph in a 30 zone Hasbean! Not condoning speeding.... but....!

I don't condone speeding but i think it is pretty easy to unwittingly do it. Has happened to me.

I can honestly say I have never knowingly broken the speed limit in a 30mph are I have been driving for 10 years, I may have just gone over going down hills ect. but never more than 33mph.
At 37mph you were taking a risk

1. not to get caught
2. not to hit anyone

I have speed in other non residental areas, my local council seem to have a policy of reducing speed limits at the moment roads that were once 60 have been reduced to 40 and these I do speed on but these are non residential areas, good visability and no turnings on /off. I have become increasing annoyed with unneccasry lower speed limits as it increases pollution, However 30mph are usually in residential areas and should be respected at all times

Happened to me, too. On holiday last year. Not even sure where it was!! apart from it being on a long stretch of road possibly approaching a village and in a 30 from a 40 zone. After 24 years with clean license. So now I'm a proper pia when driving as I stick to the speed limit diligently. And I'm sure I'm more of a hazard now because of the drivers getting frustrated behind me who zoom past at their first opportunity.

mears- agree it's easy to unwittingly exceed the limit and think that's probably what happened. Yes, this was a main road in a residential area and I'm fairly sure that if it had been 2.40pm on a weekday that I wouldn't have got caught because it would have been too busy.
juuule- that's what rubs it in because we went out today and there were no end of motorists exceeding the speed limit/ overtaking me because I was sticking rigidly to the speed limit.

Do people need to get caught for speeding before they obey the limit ?
I take great satisfaction from stopping others speeding in built up areas by sticking to 30mph I usually have a queue of traffic behind me !
I am sorry if I sound judgemental but I have to stop at 4 Zebra crossings on the way to school and wait until usually at least 4 cars have passed before one stops, the others don't have time to stop because they are speeding and not predicting the road ahead.
I agree that most people speed most of the time and cannot understand why more aren't losing their licences due to the amount of points they must get the only conclusion I can come to is that despite there being alot of cameras supposedly about people either adjust their speed when they know where they are or the cameras are not up to the job.
Please try to enjoy slowwing others down, you are doing them a favour by reducing the risk of hurting someone and stopping them getting points

hasbean speeding is speeding whether you do it in a built up area or a country lane. How can you condemn someone for doing it the openly say you do it when it Suits you(puzzled emotion)

If only I had time to 'enjoy' the luxury of 'slowing down speeding drivers'. [eye roll emoticon] My daily existence (involving children attending school in town we don't live in.. and for unavoidable reasons as well) involves sitting at the wheel sometimes crying with frustration because so many drivers choose to drive at 40 mph on the straight ten mile road with a speed limit of 60mph, for reasons best known to themselves... and I am late, late, LATE,, again!! It would be fine if I wasn't always in a hurry.. but I am.. and usually late for picking up my Y2 DD who gets upset at being last to be collected nearly all the time. So leave earlier I hear you say.. well that's often impossible... I have to juggle a lot of different responsibilities most days of the week (won't bore you with the details but suffice to say I am NOT at the gym not having my nails done!)and have no time to spare.. and even today, when I DID leave ten minutes early, I was STILL ten minutes late at DD's school due to a 15 min delay because of temp traffic lights that were not there this morning... and then being stuck behind the inevitable uneccessarily slow driver on the 10 mile stretch. And these temp lights spring up frequently without warning. (Thank God DD's school are understanding or our situation.) I feel so narked I just want to get and fling them onto the nearest grass verge! (The traffic lights, not the school staff!!) Often there is nobody even working on the sectioned off bit of road!!

I will give myself an ulcer at this rate.

So if I sometimes do slightly more than 30 in a thirty zone, in an area where I can see no pedestrians in the vicinity, then I am not going to beat myself up over it. And I have no points on my lisence and have been driving ten years.. the last three of them in the aforementioned circumstances. In an ideal world I would never speed.. but I don't live in one unfortunately..

bit of road rage there?

Hasbean, (and everybody else), is committing an offence by exceeding the speed limit even if their in-car speedometer is within the 10% inaccuracy allowed by Construction and Use Regulations, Similarly by doing 31mph on that bit of road just past the 30mph speed-limit sign.

And then there's all that righeousness emanating from behind that 30mph-steering-wheel when the driving conditions are adverse. Better to admit that we all do exceed the speed limit, that the system for enforcement is not much better than a lottery, and that the speed against safety balance is rather more complicated than just the speed of the vehicle.

The problem with speed cameras is that there is no inbuilt common-sense: when parliament enacted the absolute speeding offence, today's camera technology did not exist - and prosecution (rather than an on-the-spot warning) depended on the discretion of the person behind the speedgun.

For 37mph you could ignore the pleas to pay the fixed penalty, on the grounds that when the system (in six to nine months time) comes to actually summon you to court, they will have beeter things to do (lots of 40mph motorists for example) that bother you.

I agree with you sleepyjess about the 40mph drivers in the 60mph they are infureating and are usually the drivers that continue along at 40mph in 30's I will often have a tail of traffic behind me in a 30 and they are soon lost when i accelerate up to the next speed limit (60) I rarely speed infact only on the motorways at night if it is quiet and the weather / conditions allow (I think the German autoban system is good where there is no speed limit, but people driving excessively fast or slow in the wrong conditions are prosecuted for dangerous / wreckless driving.) and also on some of my local roads where the speed limit has been reduced for no apperant reason other than to annoy everyone.
To me 30 's are set in stone but yes I hold my hands up I am guilty of speeding at other times and am quite happy to face the consequences

i got stuck behind someone doing 50mph in the middle lane of the M25 the other day, grrrrrr.

LOL at "prosecuted for wreckless driving"

Surely the reverse...

You're brave Misdee, I have been driving for 12 years and just avoid the motorway. I can't drive at the speed with that many cars near me!

We can't speed round here as they are putting bumps on every single road (or so it seems!)