French Speeding Tickets
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- CuriousGeorge
I got back from a vacation in France a month ago and the French government sent me a few souvenirs in the form of three speeding tickets.
Question, does anyone know what will happen if I don't pay them?
- benfal990
Just pay them and don't ask questines.
C'est un ordre!
- e-wo0
1. Are you a UK citizen?
2. Were you in your car, a rental, or ___?
- dyspl0
haut les mains!
- omg0
Q. What do you do if you drive over a French man?
A. REVERSE!
- ETM0
Well, it depends if you wish to go back there again. Do you? Next time you land there and flash your passport, they may take you aside to settle your debt, or not gain entry.
- Does that actually happen? I definitely plan to go back.CuriousGeorge
- You said it was sent by the French government, not a municipality.ETM
- I shouldn't say for sure. I don't speak French well enough to know, looks official, all 3 are from different areas of France.CuriousGeorge
- yurimon0
Fck em change your name and get a new passport...
- benfal990
How much $$$ are we talking about here?
- CuriousGeorge0
Sounds like I should probably pay it. I was just wondering if there was any loophole for foreigners as I've heard some other countries have.
- TheBlueOne0
If you're not going back, fuck em.
- I'll definitely be going back. Love France.CuriousGeorge
- Well, that's your problem.TheBlueOne
- To each their own I guess.CuriousGeorge
- freedom fries!teh
- ETM0
It's kind of odd though, I thought generally the tickets go to the rental car agency and then they just charge your CC. Usually states that in the contract.
- omg0
Just send them back a ticket for throwing trash upon your car, and call it even.... French parking tickets are for french people anyhow. You're not a citizen.
- akrok0
i would pay them, if i was you.
- ukit20
I kind of doubt they would check people entering the country for unpaid parking tickets, but I guess anything is possible.
- akrok0
well, don't you get like a warrant for your arrest if you don't pay. that's the problem. not the tickets.
- CuriousGeorge0
I assume they were the result of speed cameras as most of our driving was on the freeways from town to town. The weird thing is that there isn't a photo accompanied with the ticket. Any time I've gotten a ticket from a camera in the past it always comes with a photo of the car and license plate.
- you could argue that it wasn't you who drove the car. it was parked at that time. lol.akrok
- they have to show proof.akrok
- no they don't, if they can't prove you're the actual driver, then they can't remove any points on your driving licence, but they can ask money to the owner/renter in this case.dyspl
- but they can ask money to the owner (renter in this case), as he is legally responsible for anything regarding the car.dyspl
- mikotondria30
Yeh, I'd pay them. If you love France, then you don't want to jeapordize any re-entry. You don't know what despotic system they might implement in the mean-time. You don't want to land to an outstanding court summons that you never attended, defaulted to an arrest charge, executable upon entry. It might sound outlandish to us, but the rules on what you have to carry around in the trunk of your car there seem odd to us. You just don't what you don't know.
- i_was0
post the papers
- WhiteFace0
I live in France and have accumulated a glove compartment full of french parking tickets. The general consensus is that English plates can get away with not paying, apparently they can't trace back to you if you don't pay them, apparently.
- this is speeding tickets, sent to his non-french addresssine
- Could be risky as they have his address.WhiteFace
- yep. if you don't pay you'll probably get court summons next. since you plan on returning this could be a problem.sine
- problem.sine
- but i would also ask for proof (as stated above) and challenge the tickets/have them revoked.sine
- How can they not trace back? They mailed him in America.ETM
- detritus0
Pay it with monopoly money.