MalcQV
Senior Member
I'm hoping somebody may have some advice.
Myself and my fiancee had a hire car (as we usually do) in Italy in July 2015. Later in September the same year I had a letter from the hire company telling me they had taken €40 off my credit card to pass my details to local authorities (this is quite normal). Money paid. Two months later two more arrive and a total now of €120 for three.
I looked into it and it seems the Italians unlike say Germany have 12 months (360 days actually) to notify you of the offence after they have sourced your details which in my case was September 2015.
So yesterday I get a letter from an Italian solicitors requesting a (small) sum of money for a traffic offence. Now the fine is nothing at all (less than €20) and I should just pay it but I am thinking as they have missed their deadline of 360 days by about 7-8 months I should perhaps challenge it. The reason being the other two fines may well be speeding and they could add up to €300.
Not a lot but to contest/appeal those could then elevate the fine to €600 which hurts a bit.
As a guinea pig if this offence doubles because they ignored an appeal or a refusal to pay it would only be €40.
So has anyone ever had similar from Italy? Am I being a tight arse and should I just shut the .... up and pay? If they had notified me within the 360 days I would of course have just paid. To add to that I actually like Italy and the Italians and we go there regularly.
Thoughts please.
Myself and my fiancee had a hire car (as we usually do) in Italy in July 2015. Later in September the same year I had a letter from the hire company telling me they had taken €40 off my credit card to pass my details to local authorities (this is quite normal). Money paid. Two months later two more arrive and a total now of €120 for three.
I looked into it and it seems the Italians unlike say Germany have 12 months (360 days actually) to notify you of the offence after they have sourced your details which in my case was September 2015.
So yesterday I get a letter from an Italian solicitors requesting a (small) sum of money for a traffic offence. Now the fine is nothing at all (less than €20) and I should just pay it but I am thinking as they have missed their deadline of 360 days by about 7-8 months I should perhaps challenge it. The reason being the other two fines may well be speeding and they could add up to €300.
Not a lot but to contest/appeal those could then elevate the fine to €600 which hurts a bit.
As a guinea pig if this offence doubles because they ignored an appeal or a refusal to pay it would only be €40.
So has anyone ever had similar from Italy? Am I being a tight arse and should I just shut the .... up and pay? If they had notified me within the 360 days I would of course have just paid. To add to that I actually like Italy and the Italians and we go there regularly.
Thoughts please.