Italian traffic fine

Dunder28

Hi, not sure where to post this (this forum is huge and daunting).

I was in Italy 4 years ago and had a great holiday. Six months after I got back I received a letter from Florence saying I had driven in a bus lane and I owe them x amount of Euros. I duly ignored this.

Fast forward 3&1/2 years and I now have a second letter saying I now owe them €173 and if I don't pay they will pass my debt on to a UK debt collection company. Can they do this? How do you go about contesting an Italian driving charge? Surely the fact I'm from the UK would show them that I likely wasn't dodging traffic queues but just oblivious. Can't even remember the roads being that busy so they must know I wasn't doing it on purpose.

Thanks in advance.

Moto2

Dunder28 wrote: »

Hi, not sure where to post this (this forum is huge and daunting).

I was in Italy 4 years ago and had a great holiday. Six months after I got back I received a letter from Florence saying I had driven in a bus lane and I owe them x amount of Euros. I duly ignored this.

Fast forward 3&1/2 years and I now have a second letter saying I now owe them €173 and if I don't pay they will pass my debt on to a UK debt collection company. Can they do this? How do you go about contesting an Italian driving charge? Surely the fact I'm from the UK would show them that I likely wasn't dodging traffic queues but just oblivious. Can't even remember the roads being that busy so they must know I wasn't doing it on purpose.

Thanks in advance.

The fines are issued automatically, nobody is going to look at it and think, we'll give the poor confused Brit a break.
Can't really imagine you can contest it this far down the line.

Whether or not they'll get someone to actively pursue it, I don't know.

hollydays

Dunder28 wrote: »

Hi, not sure where to post this (this forum is huge and daunting).

I was in Italy 4 years ago and had a great holiday. Six months after I got back I received a letter from Florence saying I had driven in a bus lane and I owe them x amount of Euros. I duly ignored this.

Fast forward 3&1/2 years and I now have a second letter saying I now owe them €173 and if I don't pay they will pass my debt on to a UK debt collection company. Can they do this? How do you go about contesting an Italian driving charge? Surely the fact I'm from the UK would show them that I likely wasn't dodging traffic queues but just oblivious. Can't even remember the roads being that busy so they must know I wasn't doing it on purpose.

Thanks in advance.

You don't remember Florence roads being busy?!
If they weren't, more reason you should have seen the bus zone warning sign.
The rest of your post is frankly hard to believe.
How could you contest something you did?

benjus

I got one of these for entering a restricted traffic zone (wasn't even me driving, but the car was hired in my name). I paid it. I don't know if they would have chased me for it or if ignoring it would have had any consequences, but I go to Italy fairly frequently and don't want to risk having any issues.

pogofish

If it has been passed/sold-on to a UK debt collector thhen there is nothing more they can do to pursue you. Debt collectors cannot take court or any further action beyond scary letters against you.

So simply ignore them totally.

For more info, please get yourself into the Parking Tickets subforum in Motoring and see the Newbies sticky and Prominent "READ THIS FIRST" thread about debt collectors.

benjus

pogofish wrote: »

If it has been passed/sold-on to a UK debt collector thhen there is nothing more they can do to pursue you. Debt collectors cannot take court or any further action beyond scary letters against you.

So simply ignore them totally.

For more info, please get yourself into the Parking Tickets subforum in Motoring and see the Newbies sticky and Prominent "READ THIS FIRST" thread about debt collectors.

Can you say for sure that there is no risk of any repercussions if the OP returns to Italy? Say if they get stopped by traffic police on a routine stop?

danielthomark

pogofish wrote: »

If it has been passed/sold-on to a UK debt collector thhen there is nothing more they can do to pursue you. Debt collectors cannot take court or any further action beyond scary letters against you.

So simply ignore them totally.

For more info, please get yourself into the Parking Tickets subforum in Motoring and see the Newbies sticky and Prominent "READ THIS FIRST" thread about debt collectors.

Three points you seem to be missing.

Non-payment (if it was a rental) would result him having trouble hiring.

I would urge you to check if failure to pay is a criminal offense in Italy.

Thirdly, he seems to admit he did it, and ignorance isn't a defense.

hollydays

There Is some past evidence that hire companies charge hirers credit cards a fee afterwards for providing this information to the ' council' or whoever.

littlereddevil

Why would you not want to pay what you are due? It's hardly a fortune

pogofish

danielthomark wrote: »

Three points you seem to be missing.

Non-payment (if it was a rental) would result him having trouble hiring.

I would urge you to check if failure to pay is a criminal offense in Italy.

Thirdly, he seems to admit he did it, and ignorance isn't a defense.

If the op had posted in the correct forum, they would have found we have seen this one pretty regularly because you seem to be missing the fact that the UK, Ireland and Denmark have an opt-out from the 2014 Cross- border/international EU agreement on traffic offences and fines.

We don't have to comply until 2017 but under the current climate, that looks highly unlikely to happen at all.

Its only serious offences that can be pursued across the whole EU - via a European Arrest Warrant, which only comes into play for crimes carrying a twelve month prison sentence or longer. So drunk/dangerous driving maybe but speeding, parking and most other minor stuff won't be an issue.

Also, if its a UK debt collector involved, then that almost certainly shows its a scam and the legal authorities have washed their hands of it. There are several firms of these pond life who specialise in buying-up otherwise unenforceable tickets from several EU countries - notably Italy, for a pittance, then sending official-looking, even threatening but utterly meaningless documentation designed to scare the recipient into paying-up.

A careful check of the small print (sometimes with a magnifying glass) will usually reveal the real source. Spain is the only country so far that seems to take any meaningful action on out of jurisdiction minor fines. Usually when you try to re-enter the country - but again, checking the provenance of any paperwork is pretty important.