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       #Post#: 46297--------------------------------------------------
       31 in 20:  NIP/172, driver confirmed, no comms for 5 months -
       SJPN now received! 
   DIR By: WinterDay
       Date: November 19, 2024, 5:21 pm
       ---------------------------------------------------------
       Found my way here having used Pepipoo for parking fines years
       ago. I have researched posts on this forum relating to a
       speeding offence issue my wife now has and would really
       appreciate any advice.
       Driver:  My wife.  Age:  40+  Licence:  Full, 5+ years, clean
       (always), no recent address changes.
       Vehicle:  14 year old Astra, her car - she is registered keeper.
       Logbook correct, no recent address changes.
       11/06/24:  Caught speeding by camera van, 31 in a 20, Local
       Traffic Order.  West Yorkshire Police.
       13/06/24:  NIP/172 received by my wife.
       15/06/24:  She reviewed photos online, nominated herself as
       driver online and gave full licence details.
       Nothing further heard of it for 5 months, until:
       16/11/24:  SJPN received by my wife!  Charge date 14/11/24.
       Statement of facts includes:
       "....The defendant has responded to a request under S172 of RTA
       1988 which was sent on 13/06/2024 and provided an admission to
       being the driver at the time of the offence.  Retraining Course
       offered but not booked or taken.  Conditional Offer - no record
       of licence details or payment being received by HMCTS"
       No offer or any other correspondence was received.  No question
       of this.  We are very organised and nobody else has access to
       our house.
       
       We HAVE had postal delivery issues previously.
       1) We are number "X" on our street with next door number "Xa".
       They are the only "a" on the street.  They've had our post and
       us theirs a few times in the 3 years we've been here.  Haven't
       been on the best terms with them in the last year or so, but I'd
       hope they would still pass on any wrongly delivered mail as we
       do.
       2) 2-3 letters have not arrived to us previously and we've
       received 2-3 cards/letters addressed to street with a similar
       name which isn't too far away.
       However, my understanding is that the police need only
       demonstrate proof of postage which we assume they will be able
       to.  As we have nothing documented to evidence our previous
       postal issues it seems not worth trying to argue any of this to
       sway the "balance of probability" that nothing was delivered.
       Is this correct?
       Should she now just plead guilty by post?
       Should she include / not include anything specifically (assume
       attempted mitigation) in the section "What do you want the court
       to consider about your guilty plea(s)?"
       Is outcome likely to be?
       - 2/3 to 1 weeks net salary - potentially reduced by 33% for
       guilty plea
       - Victim Surcharge of 40% of the fine
       - Prosecution costs of £90
       - 4-6 points on licence
       Can she now at all avoid this much bigger financial penalty and
       more points vs if she had received the initial offer and taken a
       speed awareness course....or even chosen a £100 fine and 3
       points?
       Total cost of the penalty appears to be roughly equal to the
       value of her car and assume will further impact through higher
       insurance costs.  All very hard to accept given the situation
       here which she could have done nothing to avoid.
       #Post#: 46306--------------------------------------------------
       Re: 31 in 20:  NIP/172, driver confirmed, no comms for 5 months
       - SJPN now received! 
   DIR By: andy_foster
       Date: November 19, 2024, 5:42 pm
       ---------------------------------------------------------
       No idea how or why you're attempting to post in HTML. Wasn't
       supported on PePiPoo and isn't supported here.
       Do you want a good rant, or do you actually want some advice?
       If the latter, you might have better luck if you tidy up your
       post and post proper questions, rather than sticking question
       marks at the end of statements.
       #Post#: 46313--------------------------------------------------
       Re: 31 in 20:  NIP/172, driver confirmed, no comms for 5 months
       - SJPN now received! 
   DIR By: WinterDay
       Date: November 19, 2024, 7:51 pm
       ---------------------------------------------------------
       Seemed a weird glitch to me too, but the preview of my post kept
       showing as one big wall of text without me manually adding the
       HTML line breaks!
       So was trying to make it more readable, which now seems somewhat
       ironic given your criticism.
       Whatever the issue is continues in this post too.
       In the input window my post has a single line spacing after each
       full stop - with no HTML line breaks coding added.
       Not so in the preview window - and so testing this for the final
       post....
       #Post#: 46314--------------------------------------------------
       Re: 31 in 20:  NIP/172, driver confirmed, no comms for 5 months
       - SJPN now received! 
   DIR By: WinterDay
       Date: November 19, 2024, 7:57 pm
       ---------------------------------------------------------
       Ah.  So it appears it's the Preview post function that doesn't
       work properly, but the final post actually displays correctly.
       I'll edit my original post.
       Ok I will edit the more statement like questions too as
       evidently not appropriate.
       #Post#: 46316--------------------------------------------------
       Re: 31 in 20:  NIP/172, driver confirmed, no comms for 5 months
       - SJPN now received! 
   DIR By: JRHartley
       Date: November 19, 2024, 10:13 pm
       ---------------------------------------------------------
       The Speed Awareness Course is now gone, unfortunately. That
       settlement is not available to the court.
       The best option for your wife now would be to plead guilty and
       ask to be sentenced at the Fixed Penalty level, as a COFP was
       offered, but couldn't be accepted due to administrative reasons
       unrelated to the offence.
       #Post#: 46336--------------------------------------------------
       Re: 31 in 20:  NIP/172, driver confirmed, no comms for 5 months
       - SJPN now received! 
   DIR By: WinterDay
       Date: November 20, 2024, 5:03 am
       ---------------------------------------------------------
       @ JRHartley - Thanks for replying.
       Frustrating that speed awareness course is now impossible as she
       quite obviously would have done that.
       Assume COFP means "Conditional Offer Fixed Penalty"?   Is that
       he £100 fine and 3 points?
       In terms of how to complete the form - should she simply state
       something like:
       "Please could I be sentenced at the Fixed Penalty level, as a
       COFP was offered, but couldn't be accepted due to administrative
       reasons unrelated to the offence."
       Or is that just a summary - and she should actually go into
       detail about her responding online within 2 days to the NIP/S172
       and would have taken speed awareness course but never received
       the offer.   And points around potential reasons why - I.E -
       potential postage related issues I noted above?
       She/I have no experience around anything like this and want to
       make sure she has the best chance of the lowest fine/points
       possible - and so don't want to leave detail out, or annoy a
       magistrate with too much irrelevant detail or the wrong tone of
       her response.
       #Post#: 46339--------------------------------------------------
       Re: 31 in 20:  NIP/172, driver confirmed, no comms for 5 months
       - SJPN now received! 
   DIR By: 666
       Date: November 20, 2024, 5:46 am
       ---------------------------------------------------------
       --- Quote from: WinterDay link ---
       >
       > @ JRHartley - Thanks for replying.
       >
       > Frustrating that speed awareness course is now impossible as
       she quite obviously would have done that.
       >
       > Assume COFP means "Conditional Offer Fixed Penalty"?  Is that
       he £100 fine and 3 points?
       >
       > In terms of how to complete the form - should she simply state
       something like:
       >
       > "Please could I be sentenced at the Fixed Penalty level, as a
       COFP was offered, but couldn't be accepted due to administrative
       reasons unrelated to the offence."
       >
       > Or is that just a summary - and she should actually go into
       detail about her responding online within 2 days to the NIP/S172
       and would have taken speed awareness course but never received
       the offer.  And points around potential reasons why - I.E -
       potential postage related issues I noted above?
       >
       > She/I have no experience around anything like this and want to
       make sure she has the best chance of the lowest fine/points
       possible - and so don't want to leave detail out, or annoy a
       magistrate with too much irrelevant detail or the wrong tone of
       her response.
       >
       --- End Quote ---
       I'd suggest "Please could I be sentenced at the Fixed Penalty
       level, as a COFP was apparently sent but was not received."
       (a) In general, it's best to be brief, and
       (b) the court will know it was unrelated etc.
       #Post#: 46549--------------------------------------------------
       Re: 31 in 20:  NIP/172, driver confirmed, no comms for 5 months
       - SJPN now received! 
   DIR By: WinterDay
       Date: November 21, 2024, 2:38 pm
       ---------------------------------------------------------
       Thank you for the info.  I'll tell her to complete with just
       that statement then.
       My instinct was to tell her to include much more information as
       I outlined - as reasoning to try and convince the magistrate of
       the truth of the admin/postal/whatever issue that must have
       caused her to not receive the COFP.
       But I suppose being as brief as possible indicates that she
       understands the situation now, regardless of what caused it, and
       so is being straightforward and quick - which hopefully is
       treated favourably?
       Either way, will take the experience of the forum - as we have
       none here!
       #Post#: 46861--------------------------------------------------
       Re: 31 in 20:  NIP/172, driver confirmed, no comms for 5 months
       - SJPN now received! 
   DIR By: WinterDay
       Date: November 24, 2024, 1:04 pm
       ---------------------------------------------------------
       Form has questions about finances - anyone able to help?...
       "Avg take home income (i.e after tax)"  So her gross - less
       tax...and NI?  (So before anything like pension contributions
       and a share save scheme she is in comes off?)
       Her base salary is low but she can earn monthly and quarterly
       bonus's and fairly often does.  None guaranteed though.   What's
       the correct way to complete this?
       
       Monthly outgoings - we share mortgage and bills but I earn and
       pay more towards them.  Should she state the full payments
       required (will look impossible for her alone) or about 50% which
       is more reasonable?
       Assets - asks to list, is this just "I own my car, my husband
       and I are co-owners of our house with mortgage" or does it need
       more detail?
       #Post#: 46872--------------------------------------------------
       Re: 31 in 20:  NIP/172, driver confirmed, no comms for 5 months
       - SJPN now received! 
   DIR By: NewJudge
       Date: November 24, 2024, 3:43 pm
       ---------------------------------------------------------
       Simply state how much she actually takes home each week/month.
       No need to get too bogged down; unless it is ridiculously low
       nobody is going to query it.
       Outgoings are only considered when agreeing a payment plan.
       Unless they are unusually high they will not influence that
       significantly and will have no influence at all if the total sum
       ordered is settled in one go.
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