Parking Fine - Unpaid notice 1 year after I sent a 'Request an Internal Review'

• 

  spackbace on 23/09/2015 - 15:06

  +2

  Were the letters sent registered post?

  ---

  And separate from that, did you park illegally? At no point have you put your hand up here and said "I did it" (or didn't do it)

  • 

    973728 on 23/09/2015 - 15:28

    +3

    Yes and yes.
    And to answer nocure as well - I am happy to pay the original amount of the fine, but not the inflated amount. I simply followed an option available to everyone and kindly asked for a warning through the Internal Review. In one case I paid the fine promptly, in the other case, I never heard from them until now.

    This isn't a 'how can I get out of a fine' post, but more of a question as to my options given the circumstances. I don't view that someone should pay an inflated price for a ticket when they have followed the process correctly.

    • 

      spackbace on 23/09/2015 - 15:31

      -8

      Yes and yes.
      And to answer nocure as well - I am happy to pay the original amount of the fine, but not the inflated amount.

      So you did the crime, but thought you could get out of it because someone would probably just determine it was too much paperwork to bother with?

      Yeah no sympathy here, pay what's owing.

      • 

        spackbace on 23/09/2015 - 16:56

        @Drew22:

        Situation has been comprehended. To quote the OP:

        To clarify, I usually pay fines if an internal review fails, but my stance is that I sent a letter requesting an internal review and never heard anything from the council subsequent to this.

        Why, when he admits above to parking illegally?!

      • 

        [Deactivated] on 23/09/2015 - 16:57

        +1

        @Spackbace:

        He was offered the opportunity to review which he took, they didn't do their job in that process.
        He's not trying to get out of the fine, he's trying to rightfully get out of paying the additional fees imposed on top of the original fine.
        Why? The additional fees are a result of the organisations fault and not his.

      • 

        spackbace on 23/09/2015 - 17:00

        -1

        @Drew22:

        He was offered the opportunity to review which he took, they didn't do their job in that process.

        He wasn't offered, it's in the rules and (reading between the lines with 2 fines to work with) he uses this to try to make it harder for them to issue the fine, so they just retract it (file it under 'too hard basket').

        He tried to get out of the original fine, and it's come back to bite him in the ass!

        Lesson learnt, when you know you're at fault, own up! Surely kids are taught this these days?!

    • 

      Olokun on 23/09/2015 - 15:38

      I don't view that someone should pay an inflated price for a ticket when they have followed the process correctly.

      I don't think that you have followed the process correctly. You knew when the due date of the infringement was and when you didn't get a response to your review request you chose to ignore it and hope it goes away.

      a prudent person would have either faxed another copy the day it is due and/or call to ensure it has been received. Not ignore it indefinitely.

• 

  nocure on 23/09/2015 - 15:22

  +7

  Another day , another "fine" post… why can't people just say "my bad" and pay the damn fine.

  • 

    tomleonhart on 23/09/2015 - 15:24

    +9

    Because it's always someone else's fault :)

  • 

    spackbace on 23/09/2015 - 15:40

    +3

    It's a fine day…!

    ;)

• 

  Olokun on 23/09/2015 - 15:29

  Who doesn't follow these things up, especially if you know that you moved houses.

  I am currently helping a work colleague with a fine review and we are checking the registered post tracking and review progress every day.

• 

  Slippery Otter on 23/09/2015 - 16:01

  +1

  Our customer parked the car illegally and threw out the written ticket.

  We received a late payment parking fine second reminder to pay.

  I faxed in (I know right? Who faxes..) the nomination.

  3 months later I receive another fine of more than double amount from Magistrates court to pay for the fine.

  I called Maribrnong City council and they claimed they never received the nomination. They asked me to fill in a revocation form and see if it goes through. If so then they will nominate the correct person.
  I did this.

  Three months later I get a letter from the courts as they have escalated…. I went to court and spoke to the person who was representing the council and they said that when anyone fills out a revocation form. It automatically goes to courts. So I got incorrect information, i have all the details of the employee who told me but I settled out of court because it was Me VS council and the likely chance I'll win will be 20%… Plus no convictions etc etc..

  So I learn't not to blissfully trust a fax, call them after a week if you haven't heard anything. This goes to anyone when faxing, email anything to councils or Toll. Call them, ask for an extension if paperwork has not been processed.

• 

  ausmechkeyboards on 23/09/2015 - 19:29

  +6

  Hey mate, ignore the delusional "morality" warriors here. You're 100% correct both legally and ethically, and the people who are trying to dispute that are trying to suggest that the council stripping you of your legal right to challenge their parking scams (and arguably punishing you for trying to exercise your rights) is somehow legally or morally correct.

  For the people who defend the scammers, you can park illegally and still dispute a fine:

  1. In many cases the fines can't be higher than the maximum possible loss incurred by you parking there. That is, if it costs $20 to park at [car park] all day, they can't fine you more than what they stood to lose ($20, say 10c for the ticket, and lets push it and say $5 for the time it took the person to physically issue the ticket).

  2. You can contact them asking for leniency. If it's your first time or if it was an honest mistake, or if you're unemployed, you are able to ask for leniency and have the amount reduced or the fine completely cancelled.

  3. You can contact them asking for a payment plan. Not everyone has the ability to suddenly pay out [x] amount of dollars, especially if you're a pensioner, unemployed or studying.

  • 

    spackbace on 23/09/2015 - 19:39

    -2

    Hey mate, ignore the delusional "morality" warriors here.

    Lol

    the people who are trying to dispute that are trying to suggest that the council stripping you of your legal right to challenge their parking scams (and arguably punishing you for trying to exercise your rights) is somehow legally or morally correct.

    What is there to challenge?

    Refer to the OP's first comment

    He/she admits to parking illegally.

    Now please tell me why there was any reason to ask for an 'internal review' of the original parking fine?

    • 

      ausmechkeyboards on 23/09/2015 - 20:06

      +2

      Sure.

      • Parking illegally because your car is broken down

      • Parking illegally because you've just been in a car accident

      • Parking illegally due to incorrect advice (i.e inducement by an official, for example you ask a police officer or parking inspector if you're allowed to park in spot [x], they say yes, turns out you're not and you get fined)

      • Parking illegally to help someone who has been injured

      • Parking illegally due to medical emergency (if your mate is bleeding out of his neck, you're not going to follow a rear to the curb law)

      • Parking illegally out of duress (your passenger threatens you to park in a certain spot)

      • Parking illegally due to inadequate signage

      • Parking illegally unintentionally (at 12pm you parked at a 10am to 2pm spot expecting to return in 10 minutes, but you got hit by a truck and woke up 3 hours later in the emergency department)

      • Parking illegally due to medical conditions (you're 35 years old and driving along the road, all of a sudden the left half of your body goes numb because MS decided to give you your first major attack)

      • Parking illegally in defence of you or someone else (i.e to block the path of a criminal)

      • Parking illegally out of necessity (i.e to get out of your car to avoid being attacked by your passenger)

      ad infinitum. And this also excludes what I mentioned above which you casually ignored. In some of these situations you may be willing to pay a low fine and just move forward, but if the fine snowballs then you might decide it's worth your time to take it further.

      In all of these situations you would have violated the letter of the law and would have been parking illegally, but it goes against the spirit of the law. You're probably going to ignore this and say something like "BUT OP ADMITTED TO IT" (which is exactly what you did in the comment I'm replying to) so there is a good chance I won't respond from this point. Good luck.

• 

  973728 on 23/09/2015 - 23:38

  +2

  OK, so this thread has gone in the wrong direction like most do these days.

  I agree that sometimes you read posts and have more questions because information has been selectively excluded. I chose to exclude the specific circumstances of the infringement as I chose to post in OzBargain as a place where people might want to 'help one another save money' through sharing experiences. Personally, when I visit the forums, I come to either (a) offer my experience or (b) gain insight from the experiences of others.

  I chose to admit to parking illegally as I thought that might end that discussion and move on to the actual question I was asking. The fact is, I am not entirely sure.

  • I regularly visited a particular take away where one side of the street was permit only and the other was unlimited. Note that I wasn't aware of the permit only until after the fine as sign posting was limited (not that this is a valid excuse).
  • If I parked in the permit only area, I would have been there for no more than 10 minutes (not that that makes it OK).
  • No notice was placed on my car at the time of the ticket - perhaps the ticketing officer hadn't finished issuing it as a result of me only been parked there for a short period!
  • I couldn't recall exactly where I parked when I received the infringement notice a month later and went to check out the parking noptices!
  • I acknowledge that permit only parking is required to ensure people living in an area have access to parking and I don't think it is OK to break the law, but I didn't post a debate on the law, or whether fines are reasonably priced, or whether they are revenue raising etc.
  • I asked for an internal review to review the evidence, which if provided to me and if it clearly showed I was in the wrong, I would have paid the fine.
  • If you send an internal review letter (and can prove so by use of recorded post), then the DUE DATE NO LONGER APPLIES. The issuing authority have a set period in which they must respond to you. I know some authorities take up to 6 months to do so (from friends).
  • The law does not require me to check whether or not the issuing authority has responded, though Olokun is right that it would be prudent to double check.

  The fact that I have had more than one parking infringement does not provide evidence that I am a repeat offender. I received notice of both infringements within the same week, thus learnt my lesson from a double whammy and now I triple check when parking. Similarly, I have only received one speeding ticket and no longer risk speeding.

  A key question was whether or not the issuing authority is considered to have responded to me if they have not double checked my current address. Clearly the other authority did, so perhaps it is in their processes and procedures, but was not done on this occasion.

  Thank you ausmechkeyboards and repair-pro for actually addressing the question!

• 

  Fred Nork on 24/09/2015 - 08:10

  +1

  To the OP: I cant say i have a solution but if you can prove you sent the letter (and proof of receipt) asking for an internal review and they cant prove same in the follow up letter I would have thought the onus is on them to allow leniency, problem is court may be the only opportunity to extract this.

  To the berating Trolls who have never ever done anything wrong, never made a bad decision, , taken a risk, or been unlucky, stop clogging up the forum. Your very boring holier-than-thou comments are unwanted and unwelcome. please go and troll talk back radio instead.

• 

  BobD on 24/09/2015 - 08:25

  You may have saved yourself a lot of trouble if you had your mail forwarded by Australia Post to your new address. The cost is a lot less than the fine you are now going to have to pay.

• 

  StuffnStuff on 24/09/2015 - 08:53

  +1

  Maybe write to them and forget about it again for another year.

• 

  meumax on 24/09/2015 - 13:05

  I thought that you're supposed to pay fines by their due date even if they're the subject of appeal so as not to incur any penalties for late payment. Long time since I got a fine, but I think there's usually some wording to that effect on the fine.

  Then if the fine is struck out, you just get refunded. So OP really should have paid the fine by the original due date even if they send in a request for review.