Speeding ticket after one year with wrong info
 

Hello,
I am from Canada and was visiting italy in nov 2015.
Just today I received a registered letter informing about speeding fine during my visit caught by camera.
The ticket came over one year from my visit with the wrong year in the date of birth.

Is it safe to ignore it? considering it came over 365 days of the offence date with the wrong DOB?

thanks

Who cares about DOB ?
One year late is not unusual.

So what is your question ? You want us to tell you, sure it is safe to ignore a fine ?
You were speeding ? You think it doesn't matter ? You don't want to pay ? You want our blessing ?
I don't care what you do - you take your responsibilities.

So tacky, ttohme. Just pay it.

You do owe it -- whether you pay it or not is up to you.

(Not relevant to much of anything, but the DOB as provided by the rental agency - is it just the month and day are reversed?)

Pay it, or your name ends up in worldwide computer systems shared by who-knows-how-many companies, any one of which can deny you in the future when you wish to rent a car in who-knows-which-corner of the world. The time when you could weasel out of such obligations has long passed.

Good point. Rather than being dishonest & cheap, you can think of it as renewing your world-wide car rental license.

I am surprised it wasn't already charged to your cc on file with the car rental company.

Our ticket in Granada was put on our cc. Dang gps.

Pay it. You screwed up an were caught and you are now "in the system". You're forever noted as a f-up. Pay it.

The charge on the cc from the rental company is the fee they are charging you for finding out your info for the authorities who just contacted them with the licence plate and offense and wanted to know the driver at the time. After that, and yes sometimes a year later, you get the real ticket from the authorities which you have to actively pay (wire transfer).

michele_d - You will likely still receive a ticket. If anyone bothers to read the fine print (they don't) on rental car contracts, you will see the contract lists a charge of providing your info to the police for any infractions (typically a fee of 30-75€). The rental company does not attempt to collect for the actual ticket (that comes later and typically 100-200€).

Even in the US, that fee is in the contract (in dollars).

Great question. I'd pay up.

The authorities have over a year to get a ticket to you if you live outside of Italy. It's not unusual at all for tickets to show up a year to 16 months after your trip. Usually the rental company will charge your credit card a fee for needing to provide your information to the authorities. You may want to go back to see if this happened to you.

Anyway, pay the fine or they can (and will) send a collection agency after you to get it. Date of birth doesn't matter, if you were photographed breaking the law then they have enough evidence to fine you and send a collection agency after you.

My suggestion for everyone traveling to Europe from the States and who picks up a rental car. This will help ease post-European Bill Stress Syndrome. Budget a few hundred bucks for traffic and parking tickets, putting the wrong petrol in your car or running into lampposts. This way, there's no consternation when those bills arrive in the mail. And, in the event of no extra charges, you have free money!

((H))

Maitaitom gets the price for best reply to this question!

Except of course when you're talking about Switzerland, where traffic fines can go into 4 figure sums...