I wander if someone can help? I was driving home a couple of weeks ago and was stopped by a patrol car (Skoda Octavia) who claims that the single officer had followed me over a period of time and at one point i had touched 80 MPH on a 60 MPH road. When the officer had pulled me over he asked what job i did and his words were i should know better when i told him i worked in leisure. The officer then asked me to get into his car whilst he wrote out the fixed penalty notice. Whilst writing the notice he made and error by writing that speed limit exceeded 80 MPH in a 40 MPH i explained that he had made a mistake and he changed the 4 to a 6.
I questioned this with the traffic division who said that i should take the matter to court. I surrendered my license within the 7 days and was going to pay the fixed penalty and called the fixed penalty office. The lady who answered the phone explained that the officer had called the fixed penalty office that morning to ask if i had given my license and paid the fixed penalty notice. I havent paid the fixed penalty notice up until now and have about 10 days left to pay it.
In the meantime i have recieved a letter from the police to say that i have an NIP for careless driving. The NIP was for exactly the same road at exactly the same time only 3 days later (Obv a mistake on the paperwork).

Also the NIP was posted on the 14th day from the date of the Fixed penalty Notice therefore wasnt recieved within the 14 days and despite having a different date on. Does this matter?

Does anyone have any suggestions on the way forward. I have written to the police and advised i wasnt on the road at the time of the alleged careless driving offence as i was shopping and sent a copy of the receipt to them to prove i was shopping at that time.

I have been quoted £1000.00 for a solicitor to represent me through this case.

Any advice would be gratefully recieved.

If the mistake with regards the date is your sole basis for thinking you could fight the case I'm afraid that I'm going to have to disabuse you of the idea. A mistake of this degree is of no consequence, frankly, and the ticket is good to go. Should you go to court then the sort of penalty you could face (and this is based on a guilty plea, not a not guilty) is 25-75% of your "relevant weekly income" (gross minus tax and NI). I'd guess that this would exceed the £60. However, to this you will have to add costs (current average = £50) plus the Victims Support Levy of £15, taking what was a £60 relatively painless extraction to a trip to court and a bill for £125+ on the end of it. Bear in mind that this is based on an early guilty plea and so if your were to fight it in all likelihood the fine would be larger.

Is it possible that the NIP you have received (none is required in respect of the incident involving the EFPN) is in respect of another incident? The law requires that NIP's are served (i.e. in your hands) within 14 days where the day of the offence counts as Day 0. You might want to re-check this. If however, your calculation is correct then the fact that the NIP is dated on the 14th day means that it was incapable of being served in time and case law supports this (Nicholson -v- Tapp, 1972).

The fact that the NIP may have been served out-of-time, or is incorrect in some other respect, does not absolve you of your legal obligation to name the person who was driving at the time or to supply such other information as may be in your power to give that would lead to their identification. You must do this within the 28 days allowed or render yourself liable to being prosecuted for the offence of "failing to furnish" which carries a 6 point penalty and a fine usually of the order of £300+. If you were the keeper of the vehicle at the time (you were using the car to go shopping) then you are still obliged to name yourself. Naming yourself in this respect does not amount to an admission that you committed the offence alleged.

The dates of the offences are different however the NIP is out of the 14 days it was posted on the 14th day and also if the officer wanted to do me for careless driving then surely he should have done me for that offence from the outset? He cant change the offence after a fixed penalty has been issued can he? Unless he know feels he has insuffcent evidence for the speeding claim?
Any advice?

cant help thinking that your story is a bit strange ,why did you ring traffic, why did they tell you to take it to court

why didn't you

why would the lady tell you the copper had rang up

youve also got the wrong end of the nip. it isnt late, its with in 14 days of the alleged offence date, and therefore in time

it may have the wrong date on it, in which case its invalid, but you dont know that yet

no they cant change a fpn to a careless but they can charge you with careless as well

pay the ticket and see what happens next, if it comes back as declined then your very lucky as they can do bugger all with the careless charge if it relates to the same occasion as the fpn

you must return the 172 notice stating that you were the driver at the time, dont start saying anything clever in it , just an definite statement that you were driving

Whatchu talkin' 'bout Willis?

If you are looking at any kind of 'technical' defence, the devil is in the detail, and what you have posted seems to be fluent gibberish.

Do you mean that you have received a NIP for careless driving, or that you have received a letter telling you that you have been given one?
If you have received a NIP, the date of the Fixed Penalty Notice would seem to be about as relevant to that as the date of Easter last year.

Please visit the READ ME FIRST section (Click Here), answer all the questions in the NIP Wizard (including the detailed questions reached by clicking on the Additional Questions button on the second page), and the Wizard will then post its output back here to enable us to help you.

I have recieved a fixed penalty notice as a single police officer claims i touched 90 mph in a 60 zone. On the fixed penalty he said he would put i was doing 80 mph to save this from going to court as i wasnt driving dangerously but too fast.
A letter was deliverd to me 17 days later with a date on the letter of 13 days but the postmark showing it was posted the next day therefore it was posted on the 14th day since the offence.

Is this allowed and any advice appreciated.

If you want us to help you, tell us what happened, and answer the questions intended to clarify the apparently random ramblings you've posted so far. Do not start new threads to re-iterate those ramblings with less detail.

sequence of events as follows:

Fixed penalty given for excess speed. Single officer claims that i touched 80MPH in a 60MPH zone. He gave me te fixed pena;ty ticket and thought that was the end of it. Other than a smal mistake of the speed of the road this was fine.

On the 14th day (postmark says) an NIP for exactly the same road at exactly the same time as the FPN, however 3 days later i recieved a NIP for careless driving. On the date stated in the NIP i can prove i was elsewhere and not on the road stated.

My questions are

1) i was told that the NIP had to be recieved within 14 days not just posted.
2) If i pay the fixed penalty notice will that void the NIP even if it was changed by form of a further letter, as i would have dealt with the speed by paying the FPN?

Hope this makes it a bit clearer.

Apologies!

My questions are as follows:

1) Can a NIP be sent to the registered owner/keep on the 14th day folllowing the alledged offence?

2) If the date is totally wrong on the NIP will this void the NIP totally?

3) Would a police officer change the offence from speeding to careless driving due to lack of evidence?

4) In your opinion would you think it would be worth taking both parts to court as not only is there a mistake on the FPN of the speed limit of the road being changed but the date is totally wrong on the NIP and also depening on the answer to point one may well be out of time as well.

Thanks in advance,

Slightly clearer, but not much.

How many NIPs have you received through the post?

Please complete the NIP Wizard for each NIP received and post the output in this thread

One NIP recieved for the careless driving on the wrong date.

Will do the wizard now

So, you received an FPN at the roadside for speeding, and only one NIP - alleging a care less driving offence on a separate date but at the same location as the speeding FPN, more than 14 days after the alleged speeding offence but within 14 days after the date of the alleged careless driving offence? And no NIP for the alleged speeding offence?

There is no requirement for a NIP for the alleged speeding offence as you were given an FPN at the time.

If the careless driving allegation relates to the same incident, and the NIP was posted 14 days after the incident (the date of the incident being day 0), it is too late - end of. However, on the face of it, the NIP relates to a separate incident and the NIP seems to be in time.

The requirement to serve a NIP for a particular alleged offence within the 14 days (subject to the statutory exceptions) is mandatory, but the required details are merely directory - that is to say that the failure to serve a NIP in time, where one is required is fatal to any prosecution for that offence (subject to proof that the NIP was late), but if the details are wrong, that is only fatal if the recipient/accused was misled by the error.

If the date of offence on the NIP is wrong in that it refers to the original incident, the fact that it is late invalidates it, and the wrong date may or may not invalidate it.
Does the NIP contain a requirement under s. 172 RTA 1988 to provide the driver's details?

Yeah the NIP requires you to say if you were the driver at the date and time stated. I have obviously denied i was the driver at the time of the offence stated in the NIP and proved this with relevant receipts etc.

I have returned this by hand to the ststion and have a receipt to say so wthin 28 days.

Is it likely that a patrol car will have the necessery callibration to convict someone of speeding as it was a single officer in a patrol car?

Thanks for your help.

do you remember the bit a few post ago where i said admit you were driving at the time and date, just not there

at the moment you risk 6 points for failure to id the driver, coz you were driving only somewhere else

I have said i was driving my vehicle however not on the road that they are saying i was driving on.

]I received a fixed penalty notice back in january for speeding 80 mph in a 60 mph. I then received a NIP for careless driving on the same road at the same time just 3 days later. I called the Criminal Justice Unit and they explained that it was a mistake but if i was to pay the fixed penalty notice they would most probably drop then careless driving charge. I foolishly paid the fixed penalty notice and then argued the point with the police force afterwards. Now the police have said i have admitted guilt by paying the Fixed penalty charge. The car the single police officer was driving didnt have a journey data recorder and wasnt calibrated on the day of the alledged offence despite this being force policy.

Is there any way of fighting with them to have the points removed?

Any help will be gratefully accepted.[/font][/size]

Remove the points in relation to a fixed penalty that you accepted? On what grounds?

Please do not start new threads for an existing case.

Note that you can easily find your previous contributions by clicking on your profile name and viewing your posts and topics started.

The matter of the FPN and the points is over, done, dusted. The ticket for speeding was issued. The OP accepted to pay the fine and the points were added. So the rest is history. It is very difficult (or even impossible) to persuade a court that the points should be removed with no real argument to support the proposal. So if the OP was speeding at the time, has admitted it and has paid up I would put it down to experience and move on.

The matter of the NIP for careless driving is a bit strange. It may be that the OP is so confused by the details that there is genuine confusion of the circumstances. That of course is not supposed to happen with a NIP. So what does the NIP allege? Careless driving at the same time of day and place as the original FPN but 3 days later. If the OP filled in the NIP wizard it might help others to advise by providing the important details.

If the NIP relates to the original offence then it was issued out of time. If the NIP relates to a later separate offence then it may be in time but the details of the alleged offence may be wrong. In essence the OP has been charged with something the OP says they did not do. That is a matter for trial. Sometimes the Police or even the CPS can be persuaded a mistake has been made. But it will take some effort and a lot more detail before they acknowledge that has happened.

As for advice from the forum - the OP would have to post a lot more detail before any sensible advice could be given.

It would seem that the only 'issue' the OP has/had with the FPN is that he subsequently received a (probably) defective NIP subsequently, and some kind of presumption that the defect not only invalidated the NIP but somehow also invalidated the FPN .

IMHO, the NIP was never anything more than a distraction. It might have been a minor inconvenience if it had been pursued, but does not negate the FPN.
It is arguable that by paying the fixed penalty, the OP killed any careless charge.

If the OP had not paid the fixed penalty, he might have been summoned for speeding, careless or both. Unless he was summoned for careless only, he would be likely to be far worse off.