Refund of a fine for speeding and referral of the case to court

BoryslawMax

I was issued a fine for a minor speeding offense and paid it in full and on time, as instructed. However, six months later, the payment was refunded to my account without any explanation. Then, after twelve months, I received a court summons demanding payment of £400 for the same offense. This occurred without any prior communication or notice regarding the refund or the referral of the case to the court. I find such actions to be highly unfair and possibly unlawful, as I had complied with all initial requirements. 

Mildly_Miffed

The usual reason is that you haven't complied with everything, normally around providing your licence.

What did you do when you noticed the fine had been refunded? Ignore it and hope it went away? Or contact them to find out what the issue was?

born_again

BoryslawMax said:

I was issued a fine for a minor speeding offense and paid it in full and on time, as instructed. However, six months later, the payment was refunded to my account without any explanation. Then, after twelve months, I received a court summons demanding payment of £400 for the same offense. This occurred without any prior communication or notice regarding the refund or the referral of the case to the court. I find such actions to be highly unfair and possibly unlawful, as I had complied with all initial requirements. 

Did you?
Did you send you send licence as often requested?

Given they have refunded, clearly you missed doing something to cause them to do that. 🤷‍♀️

LightFlare

When you sent payment did you also provide your licence details as instructed?

When the process works as intended- they typically have to be provided on 2 occasions

Thats the usual point of failure.

As to communication- have you changed address or car etc in the last 6months ?

What did YOU do when you noticed the refund ?

TooManyPoints

As above, you are required to submit your driving licence details to the police as part of accepting the fixed penalty offer. This is regardless of whether you did so when naming yourself as the driver.

The reason this has happened is almost certainly because either you did not submit them, or the police did not receive them.

When you say you have received a "court summons" this is unlikely. Few summonses are issued these days. A summons is used to bring a person to court and there are now different ways to begin court proceedings. What you probably have is the result of the hearing that took place in your absence and without your knowledge. The recommended fine for the least serious speeding offences is half a week’s net income. When the court has no information regarding the defendant’s means they use a default figure of £440pw. So the fine would be £220. You would also pay a “victim surcharge” of 40% of the fine (£88) and prosecution costs of around £95. So I imagine this is how the £400 you mention is made up.

If you have been convicted without knowledge of the proceedings against you, the remedy is to perform a "Statutory Declaration" (SD). This sets aside the penalties imposed and you will then be asked to enter a plea to the charge again. 

If you did indeed fail to submit  your licence details you should plead guilty. You would then qualify for a discount of one third off the fine. Whether or not it is worth doing this depends on your income. If it is more than £660pw you will end up paying more (as well as spending time going through this process).

If, however, you did submit your licence details (and can prove it to the court’s satisfaction) you should perform your SD and enter a not guilty plea. If you complied with the conditions and requirements of the fixed penalty offer, no proceedings can be taken against you for the same offence.

How long ago did you find out about this fine?

BoryslawMax

I provided my details during the process of paying the fine online. The instructions for the fine (it was the result of a road camera) clearly stated that submitting my driving licence was not necessary for registering penalty points because the system would check my driving licence and automatically add the penalty points. To make it more interesting, I received two or three similar fines in the same location within a week. There was no sign indicating a change in the speed limit from 50 to 40 miles per hour—just a camera that had not been active before. I admitted to the offense and paid the fine as stated.

Six months later, the situation changed. The fines were issued in February, but in September, the money was refunded to my account and confirmed via email. The reasons for the refund were not provided. Each refund happened at a different time—two in September and one in October. At that time, I no longer lived in the UK. I had moved to another country. They had my email address but did not contact me with any explanation.

This year, I returned to work in the UK and have been here for the past three months. Just a few days ago, I received two court notices for payment—one for £400 and the other for £800. Additionally, a few weeks ago, I sent my driving licence to DVLA to update the address to my current residence. The driving licence with the new address was returned without any complications after a few days.

Currently, I do not have any penalty points on my record, as confirmed by the DVLA website. My company (I work as a driver) checked my record a month ago and again yesterday, and I have 0 penalty points. I do not understand this entire situation.

BoryslawMax

What do you advise me to do in this situation? Should I appeal for clarification? I have already paid one of these court-issued fines for £408, but just a few days after making the payment, I received another one for £800. I am not a cash machine that can simply pay hundreds of pounds on demand in just a week. I've never been in such a situation before, but I’ve spoken to other drivers, and they tell me that this is a common practice in the UK. Fines they have paid are refunded, and then the court sends them invoices for hefty amounts. You learn something new every day, they say. I’ve been living here for 20 years now.

What do you suggest: should I pay the second fine or submit an appeal against the court's decision? And who should I write to? I sent one email to the court asking for clarification about what this fine is for, but I haven’t received a reply yet. I’m pretty upset about being treated like a cash cow. It’s unheard of elsewhere.

LightFlare

BoryslawMax said:

I provided my details during the process of paying the fine online. The instructions for the fine (it was the result of a road camera) clearly stated that submitting my driving licence was not necessary for registering penalty points because the system would check my driving licence and automatically add the penalty points. To make it more interesting, I received two or three similar fines in the same location within a week. There was no sign indicating a change in the speed limit from 50 to 40 miles per hour—just a camera that had not been active before. I admitted to the offense and paid the fine as stated.

Six months later, the situation changed. The fines were issued in February, but in September, the money was refunded to my account and confirmed via email. The reasons for the refund were not provided. Each refund happened at a different time—two in September and one in October. At that time, I no longer lived in the UK. I had moved to another country. They had my email address but did not contact me with any explanation.

This year, I returned to work in the UK and have been here for the past three months. Just a few days ago, I received two court notices for payment—one for £400 and the other for £800. Additionally, a few weeks ago, I sent my driving licence to DVLA to update the address to my current residence. The driving licence with the new address was returned without any complications after a few days.

Currently, I do not have any penalty points on my record, as confirmed by the DVLA website. My company (I work as a driver) checked my record a month ago and again yesterday, and I have 0 penalty points. I do not understand this entire situation.

How could it, if it doesnt know what to check

Thats not how it works - communication will go to the address as stated on the vehicles V5 (initially) and then if applicable to the nominated drivers address -- note address as in physical premises NOT email

If its multiple infractions - then it could be heading to court for totting.

You probably need to be a lot more specific with details,dates, etc etc or try:

https://www.ftla.uk/speeding-and-other-criminal-offences/

but make sure you read the "before posting" very carefully. They can be quite intolerant of drip feeding/lack of information etc

I would suggest you phone the court to enquire if any or how many outstanding cases against you

BoryslawMax said:

What do you advise me to do in this situation? Should I appeal for clarification? I have already paid one of these court-issued fines for £408, but just a few days after making the payment, I received another one for £800. I am not a cash machine that can simply pay hundreds of pounds on demand in just a week. I've never been in such a situation before, but I’ve spoken to other drivers, and they tell me that this is a common practice in the UK. Fines they have paid are refunded, and then the court sends them invoices for hefty amounts. You learn something new every day, they say. I’ve been living here for 20 years now.

What do you suggest: should I pay the second fine or submit an appeal against the court's decision? And who should I write to? I sent one email to the court asking for clarification about what this fine is for, but I haven’t received a reply yet. I’m pretty upset about being treated like a cash cow. It’s unheard of elsewhere.

Only when you fail to follow the instructions (not actually uncommon - but thats another topic)

TooManyPoints

I’m also  bit intolerant to being drip fed.

You began by just telling us about one problem. This has now expanded into a litany of allegations where you suggest that courts have been sending you “invoices” for hefty amounts. Then you tell us you’ve been out of the country whilst some or all of this was going on.

The instructions for the fine (it was the result of a road camera) clearly stated that submitting my driving licence was not necessary…

That is correct (and has been since, IIRC, April 2015). But you must submit your licence details. Whatever you may believe and whatever  ”other drivers” have told you, it is a requirement to do so. It’s enshrined in statute. If you didn’t do it that is almost certainly the cause of these problems.

The police and courts do not follow you round the world. They communicate with you by letter at your last known address - which is not taken from your driving licence but either from the details of the vehicle's keeper held by the DVLA (if you are the Registered Keeper) or from the details the RK or somebody else in the chain provides (if you are not). If you fail to respond to those letters, justice will take its course without any input from you.

I am not prepared to sort out the intricacies of this with the garbled details you have provided (and people on FTLA certainly won’t). I suggest you contact the court(s) where your convictions were recorded to establish exactly why they have asked you for such “hefty sums”. You should also ask them why it is that, although you have been convicted of a number of motoring offences, there are no points on your driving record. In view of the number of offences that seem to be in play, one possible explanation for that could be that you have been convicted of offences which have taken you to twelve points, and you have been disqualified in your absence under the "totting up" rules (In which event your points total returns to zero). You especially need to find out if this has happened.

If you want any advice on any of the individual offences I’d be pleased to help. But I need:

- The date of the offence and is nature.

- Details of what you received from the police and when.

- Details of if and how you responded, and when.

- Details of any penalties a court imposed and when.

Grey_Critic

Why are you asking us? WE are not the people who returned your money and decided to summons you to court. We can only express our own opinions - the authotities are the people to ask.

You say you got several tickets at that spot so could it be the totting up procedure that has caught up - One ticket is a hazard we all face - Two is damn what an idiot - Three you really are looking at getting a bike

Nikki1391

I’ve just received an email too with a £100 refund. Fine was for speeding ticket 8 months ago in August. I don’t remember seeing anything about sending my licence off, I was just sent a form twice which asked me my licence number, details and to sign to declare I was the driver. I filled in both and sent back. I received a ticket year before and did the same process -to this day no issues and so I’m confused at what I’ve done wrong as I did everything exactly the same. I paid on time also. 

Haven’t received any letters so I guess I’ll just wait and see