Speed awareness training courses

RobertinHerts

If you're only a small amount over the limit and, especially, if it's your first time you may be offered a National Speed awareness training course as an alternative to a fine and points on the licence. Strangley this is not mentioned on the Notice of intended prosecution and the offer is only made, if at all, at a subsequent stage. Official websites also fail to explain that it is not mentioned at the initial stage thus lack of mention of this possibilitily does not mean that the offer won't be made.

I believe that the course can be taken in any county in England not necessarily your own though I would like this verified.

It's very interesting to compare prices for these courses. So far I've found one at £66 and one at £110. With two adjacent counties having a difference of £40!

HO87

The standard criteria applied for the offer of a SAC is Post Limit + 10% + 6mph as set out by ACPO (Association of Chief Police Officers). The way in which courses are offered differs from force area to force area; some forces offer them only for excessive speed in 30 limits; others offer them across a wider range. I'm unaware of any that currently offer them for speeding offences on a motorway. In addition to the standard criteria you would not be accepted on a course if you have attended a similar course in the preceding 3 years. All the above presupposes that the driver in question holds a full driving licence and does not have 8 or more points on their licence.

The offer of a SAC or a fixed penalty can only be made to the driver at the time of the alleged offence who has accepted such by replying to the requirement attached to the NIP and its inclusion would therefore be somewhat superfluous.

Usually the offer of a SAC is made by the force in which an offence is committed and this need not therefore be your "own", i.e. your local force. By arrangement the attendance on a course can usually be transferred to your own provided that the course you are transferring onto is an ACPO approved one. Not all force areas operating courses offer approved courses and cannot therefore be transferred off or onto - usually. It is always worth asking though.

The cost of the course is probably determined by the organisation delivering the course. In some areas they are delivered by contractors while in others the courses are provided by the Casualty Reduction Partnership or the police themselves.

RobertinHerts

Thanks HO87. It would have save a phone call had the website or leaflet said 'In some case a SAC may be offered but such offers do not not happen until a subsequent stage in the process'.

Anyway the phone call did reveal that, in this particular case, it is intended to offer an SAC. So the next question is 'Can it be taken in another county, i.e. one which is neither home nor where the offence occured?' If so, from what HO87 says, the next step is to clarify whether the other county is offering an 'ACPO approved course'.

HO87

Try the following link for a reasonably up to date list and indication as to whether the course is ACPO approved. Transfers are by no means unheard of - clearly its somewhat unfair to have to travel to Cumbria, for example, to complete a course that would cost the locals £70 but could well cost you well over £100 if you had to travel an distance to get there. Good luck. Click Here

For the reasons outlined above it would be impractical and utterly irrelevant to include details about SAC's with every NIP - understand your concerns but remember that these courses are just a means of the system emptying our pockets so they have to make it look as though they are being magnanimous so we feel grateful. Couldn't tell your straight away as it might give it away.

RobertinHerts

Thanks HO87. Unfortunately the link to the list of courses does not work. Perhaps the desination page was removed intentionally to make it harder to compare courses and their price? As I said I'm looking at a significant difference between two adjacent areas.

Doing a search for that page I've found that the list appears to be restricted to account holders only.

This page explains the background http://www.driver-improvement.co.uk/index.php/home/driver-improvement-scheme

NDIS is a national scheme and therefore a person may opt to take the course at a course location that is convenient to them*. The * refers to newer courses which are not accepted as an alternative.

I take your point about the lack of mention of the SAC on the NIP however I still don't see why web pages describing the SAC don't explain that any offer of a SAC will be made at a stage subsequent to the NIP and hence that fact that SAC is not mentioned with the NIP does not, in itself, rule out a SAC.

Coblcris

SACs are not mandatory nor are they available at all times in areas which offer them.

HO87

RobertinHerts wrote: »

Thanks HO87. Unfortunately the link to the list of courses does not work. Perhaps the desination page was removed intentionally to make it harder to compare courses and their price? As I said I'm looking at a significant difference between two adjacent areas.

Doing a search for that page I've found that the list appears to be restricted to account holders only.

Link works fine - just tried it from a colleague's PC so he was viewing it as a guest. You do have to scroll down the page someway before you get the relevant table though.

RobertinHerts wrote: »

I take your point about the lack of mention of the SAC on the NIP however I still don't see why web pages describing the SAC don't explain that any offer of a SAC will be made at a stage subsequent to the NIP and hence that fact that SAC is not mentioned with the NIP does not, in itself, rule out a SAC.

Were they to include detail about the SAC's they would also have to include details about COFP's - Conditional Offer of Fixed Penalty - and more about the court processes - all potential resolutions. The plain fact is that the NIP and the Sec. 172 requirement it includes are legal documents and since when has any legal document explained in full what the potential was? Besides, unless any such detail was extremely well worded one suspects that others would seek to exploit it as being suggestive and, were they to be summonsed, for example, may attempt to argue that there had been an abuse of process.

Having said all of that I would be very cautious of advice provided to me in such circumstances by the police. Rarely is such advice complete, on occasions it is downright misleading and in other cases is plain wrong.

Above all, SAC's are, IMHO, merely another money-making exercise for ACPO (a private company, btw) and their retired ex-colleagues in commerce. Just look who is behind NDORS Ltd (National Driver Offender Retraining Scheme) and how it makes its money.

RobertinHerts

Thanks again HO87. As I couln't see the table I assumed you were referring to Association of National Driver Improvement Scheme Providers which does have a broken link.

Pity that, with two exceptions, all the information is over a year old. However it is VERY helpful, and unusual, to be informed how just old each piece of data is:)

Vising the official websites and having a better idea of what to look for now it looks like in this area it's £60 for 4 hours classroom in the adjacent county or 6 hours including practial for £100 in ours.

HO87

Just so its understood the table was compiled from multiple Freedom of Information applications. It took some to put together and as I'm sure you'd appreciate isn't going to be updated too quickly!

There isn't any other resource that has the relevant information in one place like this. To my knowledge the bulk of the information in the table is still substantially correct.

foxyruby

Hi everyone

Not sure if I should be starting a new thread or if I can post this question here, but I wondered if I could ask for your advice? Our van was photographed by a mobile speed camera doing 36mph in a 30mph zone in Brighton (the hill in question is tricky because the speed limit changes quite suddenly from 50mph to 30mph when you're going downhill near the bottom of the hill and the van hadn't quite slowed to 30mph in time). By the time we got the letter a few days later, we couldn't remember which of us was driving so we asked the police to send a photograph. When it arrived it was accompanied by a letter that said we might be offered a speed awareness course if we replied promptly confirming who the driver was. I wrote back to say we were 90% sure it was me (my partner and I are similar ages and both wear large sunglasses but we were reasonably sure it was me), and I asked if I could be offered the speed awareness course they referred to. I have never been on such a course before and have a squeaky clean driving licence. However, the reply I received said that I must pay a £60 fine and have 3 penalty points on my licence, and no speed awareness course was offered. I feel deceived! Why did they say they might offer such a course when they clearly didn't intend to? I know I was speeding and I am willing to take responsibility for my actions but that hill is known to be tricky to get the speed right at the bottom and I can't help thinking that that spot was chosen with that in mind. I am a law-abiding citizen and am feeling quite cross about the police heavy-handedness in this case, and I can't help comparing it to the several occasions in the past when they have utterly failed to protect me from crimes or help me to get justice when I needed and deserved it. For example, I was assaulted in the street once - I actually went into the station to report it straight away and told them where the person lived - but I was turned away because no officers were available and it took them a week even to get in touch with me. Another time I took a dangerous stray dog into the police station to get it out of harm's way but no police were there. After waiting inside for 15 minutes trying to control that dog I ended up having to phone 999 just to get someone to come out and talk to me. Yet there are traffic police and wardens on every street corner. Are our police officers simply tax collectors these days?! Sorry, I'm digressing but I feel strongly about this. Is there anything I can do at least to get them to reconsider the speed awareness course?

Coupon-mad

Snakey Hill, I bet?

Can you call into the cop shop and ask why you were not offered the speed awareness course you asked for?