Speeding ticket from Italy

mjd543

Hello,

I received a speeding ticket through the post on 04/05/24 from a trip to Italy in June 23 where I was travelling 17km/h over the speeding limit in a rented car. 

The letter states that if the fine is paid within five days of the date on the letter (18/04/24), it is only €184. However, as that time is now passed it has now increased to €254. I've contacted the attached email address on the day I received it asking if I would be able to pay the original amount as it wasn't in my possession for at least 3 weeks after that however they've basically said tough luck, pay it.

I know i'm in the wrong for speeding but €254 is an eye watering amount for going 17km/h over the limit and seems wrong no?

WellKnownSid

That's because we let people off in the UK...

https://www.theguardian.com/world/2023/jun/06/finnish-businessman-hit-with-121000-speeding-fine

Mr.Generous

I'd be tempted to tell them to come and get it, but with the EU I can see them nailing you in any other member state at some point.

El_Torro

I'd be surprised if another EU member state called you up on this when you visit them. However I do know someone who didn't pay an Italian fine and when they went back there some years later were made to pay the fine at the border. 

KeithP

El_Torro said:

I do know someone who didn't pay an Italian fine and when they went back there some years later were made to pay the fine at the border. 

But was that in a rented car?

El_Torro

KeithP said:

El_Torro said:

I do know someone who didn't pay an Italian fine and when they went back there some years later were made to pay the fine at the border. 

But was that in a rented car?

I believe so, yes. They got the fine in a rental car and when they went back they weren't in a car, it was at the airport.

Goudy

Italy have a sliding scale for speeding fines.
The more you break the limit the more you pay.

If they were to have stopped you on the spot, you would have had to pay there and then as a non Italian license holder, otherwise they confiscate the car no matter who's it is.

It's not unheard of that they pass the debt onto local debt collection agencies, they are free to do that even after Brexit under the cross boarder enforcement directive.
Some slip through if they can't identify the driver, but in your case the rental company have done that for them.

El_Torro, you must know my brother in law!
He got a fine in Italy a few years ago.
The fine followed him back to the UK but he and my sister moved out to Greece shortly after, (that's why he was bombing up and down the Autostradas, moving out stuff out there)

The fine found it's way to their address in Greece somehow but it was still ignored, that is until another ferry trip saw him land at Brindisi port and he was asked to "wait there a minute" until some sort of financial police officer arrived and made him cough up the fine.

Daft !!!!!! hasn't learned and has been in trouble for the same thing in Greece.
He couldn't pay the on the spot fine so the police unscrewed the number plates from the car and sodded off.
He had to go in a taxi to the police station, pay the fine and collect the number plates.
Since then he's had the plates riveted on, like all the locals do!