Now, There Are a Number of Problems with This Response by the Agencies

July ’08 Update

Dear ASF Member,

Well, we have been extremely busy since our last update in February and, even as we write, we are in process of putting together yet another e-book update which we release early next month.

In the meantime, we have had MANY queries from people saying that they have elected to go to court and they then decided to pay the original fine at the last minute only to have the agency concerned return the fine and incorrectly and ILLEGALLY tell them that they couldn’t accept the payment and they now had to go to court.

Now, there are a number of problems with this response by the agencies:

Firstly, despite their continued persistence that these fines are somehow a criminal offence, the reality is that they simply are NOT. These are Civil matters as they are trying to extract payment from your ALL CAPS name. Any court proceedings dealing with payment of money come under civil disputes. Speeding fines, red light camera fines etc. all only proceed to court because you failedto pay the prescribed fee – rendering them Civil matters.

This, by the way, is also why the 3 step process IS a legal and valid process because the steps leading to and including the private settlement agreement come under Civil law. But you MUST present this information in the correct way for it to be taken notice of. If you explain the paragraph above to the Judge they will start to get some understanding of what you are doing, rather than just “copying and sending letters off the internet”.

Now, because they are Civil matters they have certain obligations under Commercial Law. The relevant obligation here is that when payment is tendered then they must accept that payment. If they do NOT accept that payment then they give up any further entitlement to pursue that debt. We have written a letter to the Department of Justice on this point and will include any relevant replies in our next update.

For example, if we were to send you an e-book and say “Just send us a cheque when you receive it” – (sorry, no, we can’t actually do that, this is just an example) – and then you sent us a cheque - we can’t then turn around and send the cheque back and say “No, we only accept cash now.” A legal form of payment was tendered and if we refuse to accept that payment we cannot legally lay any claim to it any time in the future. If we were to then try and sue you for the price of the e-book you would simply explain that you sent a cheque and that lawful and valid payment was refused and therefore we have no further entitlement to the debt and a Judge would side with YOU.

So, what does all this mean to you? It means that if you send a cheque to the relevant agency a week or 2 before the final hearing date and they send it back then they have given up any right to pursue a debt from you. Therefore, there is NO need for you to go to court because they are only going to court to pursue the recovery of a debt.

We suggest sending in the Rejected Payment Reply letter – as always, by registered Mail and with a Delivery Confirmation receipt – which can be accessed via the Resources section or through the link below.

Rejected_Payment_Reply_Letter.doc

Then, we would recommend sending the court a copy of your letter attached to an Affidavit. If the court tried to make a Court Order in your absence then they would be in breach of Commercial Law as well as making in order in a court that does not comply with Chapter III of the Commonwealth Constitution Act 1900. These points can again be dealt with according to the Feb ’08 Updates and the information below.

Now, this brings us to our next point, how to effectively deal with Court Orders that were NOT made correctly or lawfully. We provided the background information to this in our Feb ’08 Updates so we won’t go over it again but please go back and read the relevant section of that Update in case you missed it.

We have now drafted a direct response to the courts in respect to these illegal orders and we would recommend the use of the Court Order Reply letter that can again be accessed via the Resources link or from the hyperlink below:

Court_Order_Reply.doc

And finally, we have an extra letter that can be used by all motorists who have been booked by a speed camera in Victoria. We welcome feedback from anyone booked in another state who wishes to try it out as well but it is specifically targeted to make use of the large number of media releases in recent times about the constantly inaccurate cameras. The Speed Camera Reply letter can be used on its own or in conjunction with the 3 step process.

Speed_Camera_Reply.doc

As always, we appreciate your continued efforts and support and, as we stated earlier, we are frantically working on the next important e-book update which will contain a HEAP of new and exciting information.

We are receiving letters constantly now from people who all agree that the current system is just out of control and is simply NOT working. We have politicians admitting that all these fines are simply about revenue raising and public is fed up. BIG changes are just around the corner so, keep fighting and stay tuned!