Penalty Points - speeding

But I am not the last known keeper of the plate, the person who it was sold to is. No arguement from me or my neighbour that he should have put his own plates on it, that was agreed as his failure.

My point is that the number had been legally divorced from me and my name, and ownership had legally been passed to another.

For the record I had not used it since the old car’s demise, other than with temporary plates of one of my current 2 cars. It seemed easier than physically removing the legally rivetted ones.

The vehicle has been scrapped and the scrapyard do not put said vehicle on the road. Therefore for anything related to offences, the last owner before ‘cession pour destruction’ will be considered responsible

So what if the scrapper did put it back on the road, and sold it without of course following the legal procedure, or even used it on the road himself?
According to that I could be faced with parking and speeding tickets for years, is the law really so stupid?

In that case, if there was enough room available, seems it would be better to just park it up to rot. I know that legally insurance must be continued in such a case but there are ways round that too. As far as I know the insurance companies are the only ones who police such things and, if the customer is a good one with other insurances with them, they will turn a blind eye.

Also, if, as has been said, the powers that be are only interested in convictions and increased fine revenue, why, faced with an incident with a vehicle that is registered as being scrapped, weren’t they chasing me for an even more serious offence?

Firstly, there is an automatic 90€ fine for a trailer that does not have the same license plate as the vehicule being used to pull it. (This obviously does not apply to trailers registered separately who have their own carte grise). If your neighbour only got caught speeding and was only fined for that, you should both consider yourselves lucky.

With regards to your car. Once you have sold the vehicle for destruction they cannot legally put it back on the road. Normally you should have received a certificat de destruction. If it wasn’t sent to you, you can ask for it.
I would point out, that having sent the vehicle off for destruction, you should have removed the license plate from the trailer straightaway and certainly not lent it to someone with it on. That way, whatever happened afterwards was not your responsibility.
Having a certificat de destruction to hand also covers you should anything happen in the future.
Only agreed professionals can scrap cars
and they have procedures that they have to follow and are inspected upon those same procedures. It is not in their interests to do anything illegal.

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I recall being stopped by the gendarmes in Rochechouart (87) about 15 years ago. My trailer reg didn’t match the car reg and I was fined €65, looks like the fine has gone up by 50% in that time.

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Neither a lender nor a borrower be if you’re that concerned !

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Yes @Peter_Bird , a lot of fixed penalty fines have increased regularly over the last few years. There are far more 90€ and 135€ fines than ever before.

Wow, better get the hammer and chisel out then, or whatever is required to remove rivets. Of course I would lend it again if the need arose, good neighbours are worth their weight, and they are very good neighbours of almost 30 years standing, but only after the plaque is removed.

What is the procedure then for a trailer that is pulled by more than one vehicle. I do have separate plates available but obviously can’t be rivetting and derivetting all the time?

You want one of these.
38B99AE300000578-3804440-image-a-5_1474655840025

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I’m not sure how legal it is but I regularly see plastic squares with the handwrittren number plate of the vehicle towing the trailer… 🤷
You could, as one of my friends did, buy a blank number plate and stick a piece of paper on it with the plate. He’s never been stopped or.had a problem.

Trailer plates can be fitted with screws for this very reason according to my CT inspector.

I have proper spare plates for both of my cars, one of them is the original Paris plate but with a legal national number. I suppose that would be legal temporarily for the trailer as the regional bit at the right is optional anyway.

And quite legal ways too, our insurance company was insisting on insurance for a vechile that is currently not drivable and himself doesn’t have time to fix at the moment. We found the ruling quite clear on the gouv.fr site that as long as it is not in a state to be driven, with battery / wheels removed then you are fine to not have it insured. Quick email back to the them quoting this and the link to the gouv.fr website and suddenly not only did they not want thier €300 we got a refund for the unused bit of insurance from when we’d stopped using it (failed CT so knew the date!) :rofl: :rofl: :rofl:

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Just received a notification and update of my points situation and was surprised to learn that my 12 points total is now reduced to 6.
The last time I had such an update I had 9 and I can’t see how I could have lost a further 3.
The letter gives a link, a dossier number and a mot de passe to reveal my current, and historical details, but whatever I do it simply won’t let me do so.

This is my history of the last 8 years with the dates of payment which are normally about 14 days after the offence.

Feb 13
Apr 13
May 14 X
July 15 X
Feb 16 X
Apr 16
July 16
Apr 19 X
Jun 19
July 19
Feb 21 X

As far as I know a point deducted is restored if no other infractions are recorded in the following 6 months. Those marked with an X should signify following a 6 month free period and thus a restoration.
There are 5 such periods thus leaving me a maximum of 7 points not 6.

However, rightly or wrongly, I understood that points not restored by 6 month free periods, were restored anyway after 3 years. Does anyone know if this is correct?

If so, should not all those incurred before February 2016 be spent now anyway, irrespective of the periods between them?
In which case my current tally should be 8. Or 9, taking into account the 6 months clear between July 2019 and February 2021.

Very perplexing, especially as, if I am right, they could reduce that tally even further without any other infractions at all. :astonished:

I finally found the right bit to click on on the Ministry site but had difficulty wading through it all. It seems there are some cases where simple speeding points take 10 years to drop off the edge. :astonished: :frowning_face:

None of these cases seem relevant to my situation so I am still in confusion over it.

It’s a minefield, I’m down to 5 at the moment and just keep an eye on it. Will do a stage to get some back if necessary but I’m not there yet, and hope not to be in the future too!

Heres a list of infractions and there points
https://www.service-public.fr/particuliers/vosdroits/F31551

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Yes that is the page I finally managed to find and from it deduced that all my infractions were in the lowest category, that is 1 point each time and recoverable within 6 months of commission.

There were at least 5 times when I went 6 months clear and once when I went 2 years clear, so I suppose that explains it, but I had no idea it was not so straightforward.

This is the further explanation of the above.

The most irritating of all was the last one in February. I had been diverted from a long section of the N79 heading to Moulins and when I got back on it was still in road works. I was doing 70 in what is normally an 80 zone but, unbeknown to me, because of a Latvian lorry driver slowing in confusion and then stopping blocking off a temporary 50 sign, I was 20 over the limit. I never saw a flash so didn’t save the dashcam file and never knew about it till it was too late and it was overwritten.

Anyway, as all these offences were in the car on long distance dog journeys, and they have dwindled to a trickle now and may stop altogether, I hope I can avoid any other such accidental transgressions. Otherwise it is the e-trike for all the shopping in future. :roll_eyes:

I wonder what happens if an English resident in France incurs points whilst driving on a UK licence?

Mandatory exchange for a French licence?

You pay a fine, my licence is in the application process since Dec-20 - got speeding then on Jan 1st. From what others have suggested I probably won’t get (loose) points this time.

I am still a bit puzzled how I was speeding on that day, in that place - I will explain why, my neighbour had told me the night before that on New Years Day the previous year whilst going to the beach that we were going to on their recommendation that he was flashed for speeding on Pont d’Aquitaine Bordeaux. As we approached my wife reminded me and I drove over the whole bridge at way less than the limit on the road signs against the indicated speed on my SatNav. So for one particular day in this specific location I was so careful.

The rest of the time I could fully understand if I were snapped as I often go too quickly.