Hi,

whilst driving in france a couple of days ago, i got caught by a speed camera… I was just wondering, if anyone else has got one? I'm confused by hwat i have found on the net, as to my punishment.

Will i just get a fine, or fine and points, or will i not hear anything back?

also how long do the tickets take in general to come throught to the UK?

I'm really pissed off, as i was trying drive carefully the whole time. I have been looking forward to having a clean liscence in august as well…

CHeers, Andy

i don't think you can get points from another country, though i'm sure i'll be corrected imminently! i think if anything you'll get a fine, if they can be bothered to pursue it.

Its definitely in the pipeline for a EU-wide points system but not active yet I triggered 'a couple' on the way through Belgium/Netherlands etc into France last August and didnt hear a jot back.

I've not had one but if there's a reciprocal agreement between the UK and France you may get a fine here.
A mate lives is a Monaco resident (but lives just outside in France) and loves getting speeding/parking tickets as France and Monaco have no reciprocal agreement so he never gets done 🙂

brilliant… I shouldnt have worried so much then.

Is it just me by the way, or are the french really bad drivers? The ammount of dodgy overtaking manouvers amazed me ( i was driving a van, so not the quickest round the corners).

Also they looked really quite puzzled when i tried to give way to them…

the french are much better motorway drivers than the english, though, in that they actually use lanes correctly. if all that money spent on the M1 widening had been spent on campaigns to educate people in this country on lane discipline the effect would have been the same – i drive down there now and it just means there are 2 lanes people aren't using instead of 1. 😡

you wont get points as the arrangement hasnt been enacted yet as hora says. Some EU countries sell their tickets to what are effectively debt collection agencies who write official-sounding, legalesey but ultimately hollow letters. A sunday paper financial section did an article on it a few months ago. The collection agencies rely on people's ignorance/fear to pay up and have quite a high success rate, but if you ignore them they can do nothing about it.

I'd only be worried if you intended to drive the same car in france again, as its a fair assumption the french have their own versions of ANPR and PNC, and IF they also put non-fine payers on it you COULD find yourself getting stopped next time your there.

If you'd been stopped rather than flashed you would have got an on-the-spot fine and no points.

I live on the Spanish / French border. If I get flashed in France nothing happens (Spanish car!) but if the fuzz stop me then I'll get a fine but no points.

I'd only be worried if you intended to drive the same car in france again, as its a fair assumption the french have their own versions of ANPR and PNC, and IF they also put non-fine payers on it you COULD find yourself getting stopped next time your there.

Thats a VERY GOOD point. Dont take the same vehicle. I know I havent/wont!

In Germany I parked dodgily, cameback to the car to see two really cross traffic wardens staring at me accusingly whilst every other car had a ticket. You know, just for once I didnt feel bad and I grinned at them (they didnt grin back).

On this topic anyone know how the cameras work with the dual speed limit?

does it have a rain sensor on, or do they look back and judge it later, or does it only apply at the higher speed. what's the line between wet and dry?

I was considering this as i was flashed when it was a little wet and wondered how it works? I never heard owt though

the french are much better motorway drivers than the english, though, in that they actually use lanes correctly. if all that money spent on the M1 widening had been spent on campaigns to educate people in this country on lane discipline the effect would have been the same – i drive down there now and it just means there are 2 lanes people aren't using instead of 1

+1 !

theflatboy – Member

the french are much better motorway drivers than the englishBritish, though, in that they actually use lanes correctly. if all that money spent on the M1 widening had been spent on campaigns to educate people in this country on lane discipline the effect would have been the same – i drive down there now and it just means there are 2 lanes people aren't using instead of 1.

+2!

+3, but I do think it's helped by the motorways in France being generally much quieter.

Plus, you have to pay tolls, which keeps the proles on the back roads.

I'd certainly agree that they're much better drivers on 2 lane autoroutes, but the lane dsicipline went completely out of the window on 3 laners.

I *might* have got picked up by a car on the way back from the mega – didn't see if it had a camera in or not – doing 145 max in a 130 limit and had forgotten that french plod cars are blue not white. They didn't chase, or stop me at the next peage, so is there a fair chance I've got away with it? I killed the excess speed pretty abruptly, so think I'm probably OK…

As for the french on minor roads,yup nutters. I ended up going around a RH hairpin at the top of the ADH road side by side with a guy trying to overtake me round the outside. I couldn't see what was coming, to god alone knows how he thought he could.

bit of a shit about your fine- i've got a parking ticket in every european country i visited- has become a bit of a game now…

good luck man!

The French in general are much better drivers than the british, as are the italians, spanish, portuguese, germans, dutch, swiss…..

bit of a shit about your fine- i've got a parking ticket in every european country i visited- has become a bit of a game now…

I was working in Frankfurt last year & parked on the pavement outside of the site
After I'd been there an hour or so a traffic warden came in & told them that if the car wasn't removed in the next 15 mins, a 15€ ticket would be issued
I thought that was a reasonable price for a days city centre parking so I told them I'd take the ticket & leave the car where it was thanks

That really f***ed with their minds, they were visibly shocked 😆

JonEdwards, maybe he was tired of being French and wanted to be reborn another race? 8) (Al Murray link included to protect myself from French Juan and the racialisers)

Smee – Member

The French in general are much better drivers than the british, as are the italians, spanish, portuguese, germans, dutch, swiss…..

Don't accident statistics refute that? Or is there an AA/RAC conspiracy to just make it seem like that?

Also they looked really quite puzzled when i tried to give way to them…

Do you mean when you flashed your headlights to indicate 'go on mate, your turn'. In France flashing headlights means the opposite i.e. 'Get out of my way boyo'

mugsys, thats probably why then… Oops.

Do you mean when you flashed your headlights to indicate 'go on mate, your turn'. In France flashing headlights means the opposite i.e. 'Get out of my way boyo'

it actually means the same in britain too.

Rule 110 of the highway code.

110
Flashing headlights. Only flash your headlights to let other road users know that you are there. Do not flash your headlights to convey any other message or intimidate other road users.

Same rule applies here as well. You flash your lights to alert other drivers of your presence.

theoretically yes…

Yes, unless you are stopped by the gendarmes you probably won't have anybody follow it up.

I narrowly avoided allegedly speeding past a semi-concealed gendarme with a speed gun on the Calais road, but the chap in front was stopped at the next péage. I also managed to drive most of the way down France at a 'reasonable' speed, allegedly, (following a lot of Belgians) before I knew what the 'radar controle' signs meant and didn't receive anything in the post on my return.

My dad did a London to Monaco rally in Jag XKR a few years a go. Set off a lot of cameras and never paid any fines. He has been back to France a few times since and nothing has ever happened. So I reckon you can get away with ignoring them.

My brother lives over there, but has an English car (and a French one) and with the English one you get fines not points, and the fine varies and increases the more petulant you are (he has heard of a 500 Euro fine for a being a few KPH over the limit, but the driver wouldn't shut the **** up). You can also get fined for having your GPS/TomTom set to alert you to speed cameras. Oh and if you don't have the cash on you they drive you to the nearest cash point to take it out, and getting back to your car is your problem.

and finally if you get stopped by the Gendarme, don't be gobby they aren't like UK Police insofar as they have pretty unlimited stop and search powers and don't take any shit from anyone.

Oh yes, arent the motorway Police only one step away from being a Quasi-military force?

Got Festina'd a few weeks back. Customs stop at a peage ticket point. They took one look at the pile of kit in the back and sent us on our way. tHink it was lunchtime or something.

we did 6 in a row hi-tailing it back from Amsterdam to Calais and no bother!

Like Lyons who started this forum, I am worried. I'm currently stationed in Germany and high tailed it all the way to Paris (very heavy foot and ignorant of foreign laws; I just speed what can I say). I never saw flashes though, but I get the feeling something dreadful is coming my way. If all the detectors caught me from Saarbrucken Germany all the way to Paris, when should I expect the speeding tickets? 1 month? It took 3 months to get my first speeding ticket in Germany. Also, do they send the picture in the mail with the ticket?

Well, ive not recieved anything at all yet. I'm not worried now…

to educate people in this country on lane discipline the effect would have been the same – i drive down there now and it just means there are 2 lanes people aren't using instead of 1.

I know nobody agrees with me, but I don't see the point of this obsessive "lane discpline" thing. What happens is that you overtake, and pull over to the right (in France) and then you catch up to the car in front, and have to change lanes again. By this time, that lane is occupied so you either have to wait, or else (more likely) make a lane change into a space that is too small, creating a hazard. I'm not advocating tootling along getting in the way, but if you are generally travelling faster than cars in the slow lane, it makes sense (to me) to stay in the middle lane. If someone needs to pass you, he can use the fast lane.

OK – you can all hate me now 🙂

Is it just me by the way, or are the french really bad drivers? The ammount of dodgy overtaking manouvers amazed me ( i was driving a van, so not the quickest round the corners).

Not you're right the French are really bad drivers,infact I'd say the vast majority of them can't drive for sh1t…

"I know nobody agrees with me, but I don't see the point of this obsessive "lane discpline" thing. What happens is that you overtake, and pull over to the right (in France) and then you catch up to the car in front, and have to change lanes again. By this time, that lane is occupied so you either have to wait, or else (more likely) make a lane change into a space that is too small, creating a hazard. I'm not advocating tootling along getting in the way, but if you are generally travelling faster than cars in the slow lane, it makes sense (to me) to stay in the middle lane. If someone needs to pass you, he can use the fast lane.

OK – you can all hate me now"

And in one paragraph we have the reason every motorway in the UK is so awful regardless of size. I concede the continent's autoroutes are less busy, but every motorway in the UK, regardless of size is absolutely horrendous quiet or busy with a empty inside lanes and a 60mph procession in the outside.

As for lorries overatking each other at 56mph versus 55.8mph – don't even start me (also better controlled in France)!

And in one paragraph we have the reason every motorway in the UK is so awful regardless of size. I concede the continent's autoroutes are less busy, but every motorway in the UK, regardless of size is absolutely horrendous quiet or busy with a empty inside lanes and a 60mph procession in the outside.

Well, you saying it's so don't make it so. I don't think I advocated leaving the inside lanes empty – simply not making unnecessary lane changes. If you can see you'll have to pull out 100 yards down the road, I don't see the point of changing to the slow lane (and you haven't explained why I should).

>If you can see you'll have to pull out 100 yards down the road, I don't see the point of changing to the slow lane

No problems with remaining in lane 2 or 3 if it's obvious that you'll be overtaking a car within 100 yrds or so; unnecessary lane changing is to be avoided. It's the fools who just sit in lanes 2 or 3 when there's nothing to overtake.

of changing to the slow lane

What is this 'slow lane'of which you speak?

Looked in the Highway Code & cannot find it mentioned.

All lanes are subject to the 70mph limit.

Anyone know how the law on speeding tickets applies to hire cars? Is there a chance if I accidentally get caught on a camera that the hire company will charge my credit card that they swipe to cover the excess if I have a bump? Not triggered a camera yet over there as I generally pootle around but just wondering.

Yep, car hire company will take the fine from your credit card