Be happy it's $60. Here a regular parking ticket is $100 and the price of a moving violation isn't to be thought about.

If they tracked you via the rental agency they can get your credit card info. Better pay now than wait until it accumulates non-payment penalties.

You can ignore it or pay it; one way your conscience will be clear; the other, who knows?

Usually the only notice one receives of a speeding ticket is a mysterious 20€ administration charge from the rental company levied for passing information along to the National Police that the car was a rental. Case closed.

This is the first time I have heard of someone actually receiving the ticket.

The speed limit, by default, on any country road (D or N) is 90km unless it's posted lower. There may or may not be any sign specifying 90km but it's still the maximum speed. The only time vehicles might exceed 90km is on a divide highway.

Curious that you were travelling 106km. Maybe you should pay it.

<<This is the first time I have heard of someone actually receiving the ticket.>>

Same here.

And why on earth would you think they should print the ticket in English? Does your state print tickets in foreign languages when they send them overseas?

Actually I thought I've read numerous reports here of people who returned to the US and received traffic tickets. No?

Europcar has charged me 25€ for the two speeding tickets that I received. One was for the 45€ infraction on the autoroute with about the same speeds reported by tomboy, but the last one for was 90€ for going 52 km/h in a 50 km/h zone. The lower the speed limit, the higher the fine.

And it takes a year for me to get back the point that I lost from my licence.

Neo, I think those reports are from people returning from Italy who have violated the ZTL rules.

kerouac - did you not pay the fine because you have a French drivers' license? The OP is from the USA, no French or EU drivers' license, and no jurisdiction for action by the French police.

I have never heard, up to now, of a US licensed driver operating a rental car in France, receiving a speeding violation, and subsequently being sent a fine to a US address.

If you go down the "good citizen" route you should pay.

However, as it was in French and you only were able to get the gist of its meaning (i.e. not read the full Ts and Cs) you could just not pay and plead ignorance if it ever came back to bite you...

If it were me, though, I'd probably pay...not because I think I'm necessarily a good citizen but just thanks to good lady fear

In olden times, I ignored a speeding and parking ticket from California and parking tickets from Belgium and Switzerland. Probably, I could still ignore new tickets from California, but in Europe all of the countries are signing reciprocal agreements now to enforce fines from the other countries.

And of course, if the rental company charges a service fee, it is deducted automatically because you agreed that they could do so when you signed the rental contract.

As Dukey1 suggests, I think I'll just pay and have a clear conscience. I'll just think of it as my contribution to the European bailout. Or maybe as a reward to France for being ...
French.

It's mildly amusing to me that the French administration got their bill printed and across the ocean, while Europcar hasn't (yet) posted to VISA the $25 administrative charge for squealing on me to the FrenchFeds.

Just wondering tomboy but, how are you going to pay them? Maybe they accept credit cards, the National Police can be very progressive on some subjects, such as radar cameras and accounts receivable.

Typically, you can settle up by purchasing special stamps in the amount of your fine at a local tabac, attach the stamps to your notification paperwork, and drop it off at any nearby Prefecture. Just guess how I know this. That probably is not terribly convenient now that you are back home.

Of course they already have some personal information and know where you live but I don't think they will accept a personal check or money order in US dollars.

Then there is the international EFT or money order which would be a bit of a hassle to set up just to pay a ticket.

What a pain, never mind the expense. Sorry this happened to you.

I prefer the old days when all you paid was the mysterious 20€.

You can pay the fines online with Visa or Mastercard.

Paying the fine was the least of our problems; the police take credit cards. But early in the process, the bottleneck was Avis Recouvrement (not a part of Avis). Their "avis" in the mail was the first we knew of our traffic infraction. They wanted 20 euros to provide our address to the police but they wouldn't take credit cards. I called and told them we had no way to pay except by credit card. I was concerned that by not paying them, the fine itself wouldn't reach us and we'd be scofflaws and not be able to rent a car in France again. (We didn't pay, and therefore we now avoid Avis.) The bill for the ticket arrived in the mail just before the due date, and in fact if we had been a few hours later calling our credit card company, we would have missed the deadline, France time.

I would add that I'd rather we get a ticket on the spot rather than find out a month later. Getting an early ticket encourages slower driving for the rest of the trip. Not mentioning any names.

I got a speeding ticket in East Germany once before the reunification and believe me, I paid on the spot! (in West German marks of course)

We just returned from France so I will bookmark this post and hope that I don't have to refer back to it.

Did we speed? I don't think so, but who knows---maybe without realizing it or not slowing down fast enough.

Tomboy, we were first notified about a speeding ticket by our rental company after our return from Germany. They, of course, charged the credit card a fee for sending us the notice. A couple days later our ticket and explanation arrived all in German. It was quite a task to get a translation of how to pay the ticket. I guess we should be happy our speeding was done in a 30km zone because our fine was only 15 euros. My husband had many email "conversations" with exceptionally helpful staff at whatever the "DMV" is called in Germany Deborah

Disappointed to hear "gangsta speak" such as "squealing". Society is held together by the rule of law. You broke the law, pay the fine.

This is interesting. I got "flashed" in June in Italy and Switzerland - I think it was me but maybe it was the guy next to me. No tickets yet. I have a friend driving in France a couple of weeks ago, he was lost, frustrated, honking horns, drove thru a red light. Bam! Got him! He, however, speaks a passable French, apologized, said he didn't see the light, they let him go. I will definitely brush up on my French!

The French, in the name of public safety, have placed radar cameras, some marked, some hidden, all over the country in ever increasing numbers. Critics say that a budget conscience government is more concerned with their revenue potential than it is with public safety. No matter the reason, radar cameras are now everywhere in France. Evidence that the rational is more one of money than of safety is that GPS´s which show camera positions are now illegal in France. Radar detectors have been illegal for some time.

Previously, the National Police made little effort in collecting fines from foreigners, particularly non EU foreigners. Apparently that has changed. Drivers should be careful about speed and know what the limits are and where. Speed limits are not always posted, even though they change. For example, when travelling into a town, the sign showing the name of the town indicates that the speed limit just dropped from 70km or 90km to 50km. The sign displaying the town name with a red slash across it (indicating you are leaving the town) means that the speed limit is raised back to 90km.

Drivers should remain vigilant. Particularly when travelling on roads which are unfamiliar.

Look for a bank routing number on the ticket paperwork. Your bank can remit the amount directly to that number. It was prominent on my Vicenza ticket.

Speeding tickets in Connecticut seem to cost most of my friends ~$250, so I sort of agree with nytraveler that you got off lucky.

I ignored a speeding and parking ticket from California and parking tickets from Belgium and Switzerland.>

Man to break the laws in other countries and then proudly boast about it - now that to me is being a very UGLY American, or 1/2 an Ugly Yank in this case.

Bravo!

"Proudly boast" ? Where did you see that?

I've parked in the wrong place and got a ticket, buzzed round to the police station, apologised deeply (in french) and the guys took the thing back. I've also driven in a bus only lane in Norway while racing for a ferry and sent the local police a letter of apology (in English this time) and got a lovely letter back.

In France, if you pay within 15 days, you pay €45 for speeding up to 20 km/h in areas where you're allowed 90km/h. However, if you pay later but still within 45 days, the fine is raised to €68. If you wait even longer, it may rise to €180. So, pay quickly!

Infraction on the 12th September.
The ticket seems to say, if you pay within 61 days, it's 45; if you pay later, or contest it, it's 68.
Any hints on how to pay?
The ticket, of course, is all in French.
I scanned it into word, and copied the text into Google Translate, and it seems to say I can pay online at:
www.amendes.gouv.fr
But the URL doesn't work, nor do any of the English pages of it which I found by Googling.
So, I'm willing to pay, and can't, because their website isn't operative, and the clock is ticking.

The URL works quite well for me and it is in English.

What Sarastro said.

You must be in France.
According to what I've now learned by Googling, the French website cannot be reached by a non-French IP address.
That's idiotic.

I am in the States and reached the site with no problems. It then asked for an e-payment number.

So, what could be my problem?
I cleared my cache and continue to get the message,
"Internet Explorer cannot display the webpage"

I am not in France. I am back in DC. The website opened up with no problems at all for me, and it was (to my surprise) in English.

Try another browser. I use Firefox.

I am using Firefox on a Mac. Might that make a difference?

I hope Andrew looks in. I'm stumped. Cleared my cache, closed Explorer, same results with the basic (home) URL, and with its English language subset.

I'd fall back on just calling them tomorrow, but they probably don't have an English-speaking person, and my pigeon French isn't good enough for the basics.

Tom, change your DNS to use Google DNS and see if it works then:

https://developers.google.com/speed/public-dns/docs/using

It could be the DNS, could be the browser, I also use Firefox. Has anyone else using MS Explorer had problems with www.amendes.gouv.fr ?

I pay my fines online using IE but I am in France.

I WISH our fines were so low, here for a speeding ticket its at least 138$ for normal speeding, and then start at 368$ for excessive speed( which I think is anything over 10-15 kms per hour) ouch!

I am not sure why you think ticket should be translated for you. You went to a foreign country whose offical langauge is not english. Its not their responsibility to translate every ticket they send out, they would need a whole department to handle that, since they would have to translate tickets into many languages as they have foriegn tourists.

I am in the U.K., and had no problems opening the site www.amendes.gouv.fr using Firefox. The page was automatically in English, but it is also available in French, German, Italian and Dutch by clicking on the flags in the top right hand corner.

in uk, using firefox, no problems with the website above

Thanks, Andrew, for your response. Speaking as one who back in the mid-80s mistakenly reformatted my hard drive when intending to delete a file, I looked at your link and thought, "go to the library, use their computer". So I did. Mission accomplished. Paid in full. 45 euros, 16 days after ticket.

OK, glad you got it paid off. Just FYI, DNS is like the "phone book" of the internet. When you say "go to www.fodors.com" that isn't a real address - it must be looked up to find out the IP address (a sequence of numbers) that really corresponds to it.

If you have cable or DSL internet, you are probably using their "phone book" (DNS), and if for some reason they filter certain websites or have incomplete listings, you may not be able to look up certain websites - so you will hit a dead-end trying to visit them. That's why I suggested using Google's DNS instead, because theirs seems to be more reliable than the average internet service provider's in my experience. You may have these types of problems in the future with other websites, so keep this solution in mind.

That's good to know. The URL you posted would have run to maybe 6 pages, if I'd printed it out. Some of it was about other browsers. But when they talked about changing the registry, I draw back in fear of a repeat of my 1985 reformatting.

If it had been as simple as changing that set of four four digit numbers, I could have handled that. I suppose those are DNSs, or something similar.

I have ATT U-verse internet. So what I hear you saying is that they might filter out a foreign government address...but why some foreign addresses and not others?

The link was clearly much too complicated - sorry, it was just the first I found with Google. Changing your DNS does not involve changing the registry; you can do it in your TCP/IP settings, in about 30 seconds if you know where to find them (and it basically is just changing two sets of four-digit numbers and hitting "OK.") Of course, it depends which version of Windows or Mac OS you are using, etc. to give you exact instructions.

Just to add another voice to those of you who have never heard of these speeding tickets. I got one 3 years ago when I last visited France,it showed up in my LA mail box. I was pretty sure I knew where it had happened (yeah, the camera was just inside the new slower speed limit). I went to the website and paid the €45 with my credit card. No problem. I can't decide if I was being a good citizen or just afraid they wouldn't let me back into France again.

I am glad that I find this forum. I have just received a speeding ticket from France for our April trip. I thought I need to pay 45 Euros plus 68 Euros. Now I know I only need to pay 45 Euros if I pay it within 46 days. I hope I will not have problem to pay it online. Thanks everybody!

I was in Spain from Sep 28th thru Oct 16th 2012 and was caught on camera in our rental near Valencia on Sep 30th doing 120 KL/H in a 100 KIL/H zone. Avis notified us via e-mail around the end of Dec! Avis administration charge: $40 Euros, and as of yet have not run the charge through the credit card. Nor have we paid otherwise. Valencia Municipality notified us via Snail Mail Received Jan 25th, with a deadline to pay by March 2nd, 2013. Has anyone any info on the consequences of not paying the fine? IE: Is there any chance of State DMV being notified and if so, can they do anything legally?

lawrenceturk,

What you decide to do is your choice. But don't expect a recommendation to be a scofflaw.

lawrence I guess the down sides of not paying could be
1) a build up of credit card charges
2) if significant US people failed to pay it would be worth Valencia selling the debt to a US debt collection organisation
3) danger or EU or Shengen countries intergrating their border control with their fine system (not beyond reason) and of course charges and interest associated.
4) as (3) but no charges just not allowed into the area and sent back to US. (this happens to people visiting USA by the way)

So any chance as you say? Always a chance, it depends if Euro 40+ is a big deal compared to peace of mind.

just yfi, the posters on the website of the mild-mannered
Rick Steves website must be lead footed b/c there are threads
a-plenty on traffic fines in Europe and what, if anything, to
do with them. Every possible scenerio seems to be covered.

I'm still waiting for a ticket from Torino for wandering into
the dreaded Forbidden Zone.

Bilbo: Thanks for come back....I see I didn't complete my report...it's $40 Euros to Avis as an administrative fee to cover their reporting our info to Valencia Municipal Police, and 100 Euros to Valencia. You are correct, Peave of mind is worth everything. My wife and I found it interesting that we did not once see any officuial "Patrol" vehicles during 2,000+ kilometers of Toll road driving through-out Spain and Portugal. Also, as noted by other Bloggers, I kept my speeding to 20 KL/H above posted limits, slowing when my Garmin GPS reported cameras in operation or when warned by lighted highway "info" signs, and yet most other motorists passed me at a higher speed, even right through the camera zones.

one of the reasons you didn't see patrol cars is that with the newer cameras, they really don't need so many patrol cars looking for speeders or other violators.

And please -- "everyone else was speeding so why are they picking on me" is just so lame. It's nice that you kept your speed to only 20 KL/H over the limits. Why do you think they post limits -- just as a suggestion?

You gambled that you wouldn't get caught but you did. You can now gamble that you won't get caught if you don't pay. Same odds, basically.

The correct abbreviation is Km/h. Kl is Kilolitre.

Speed cameras may or may not be obvious. Sometimes they are in gantries, sometimes in the armco, sometimes obvious in big boxes. If a police car sees you speeding normally they will stop you, and as a foreigner you must pay the fine on the spot.

20km/h over the speed limit is a significant amount. Go that much over the limit in the Netherlands and you would get a fine of €155, assuming you were on a motorway. On any other road it would be higher still. And here if you don't pay it is recorded and will be collected from you next time you try to enter the country.
You broke the law, pay the fine.

No way can 20km over the limit not trip a radar camera nowadays in Spain.

Those were the OLD days. I think the cameras are set a tad over 125 in a 120 zone. My husband CLAIMS it's higher, ( 130) but no way do I chance it.

"Why do you think they post limits -- just as a suggestion? "

I get the impression some people believe speed limits are a minumum rather than maximum.

To Nonconformist: Our 'Winter Residence" is in Southern Mexico, and down here, speed limits, stop signs, etc, ARE just a suggestion. I've had the local police swerve around me and yell at me for actually stopping at a stop sign!