FAQ Traffic monitoring

Hearing form

The hearing form informs the road user of the traffic offense of which he or she is accused.

The road user is given the opportunity to raise objections to the charge on the hearing form. However, objections on the hearing form do not count as an objection to the subsequent fine notice.

Anyone wishing to comment on the accusation must return the hearing form with their details to the administrative authority. If the hearing form is not returned or the offense is disputed, the fining authority will arrange for the identity of the driver or person responsible to be established and the objections will be examined.

Witness questionnaire

As part of the driver investigation, a witness questionnaire is sent to the owner of a vehicle if he/she was obviously not driving the vehicle (deviation due to age or gender) or if a company is the owner of the vehicle. If a person cannot be considered responsible for an established violation, the administrative authority will question him/her as a witness. The witness is obliged to testify if he or she does not have the right to refuse to testify.

Hearing/witness questionnaire in the warning procedure up to 55 euros

The warning with the offer of a warning fine is an administrative act requiring cooperation on the grounds of an administrative offense.

A warning (warning fine 5 to 55 euros/no points, payment slip enclosed) is settled by timely and complete payment. The return of the hearing/witness questionnaire is invalid in this case. If the warning is not paid, the questionnaire must be returned, stating the reason or naming the driver/responsible party. Warnings are not recorded in the driving license register in Flensburg.

The warning offers an unbureaucratic way of dealing with the offense. It is not a punishment as such, but an administrative procedure preceding the fine proceedings, which is intended to make prosecution and thus a decision in fine proceedings unnecessary. However, there is no legal entitlement to this. If it is clear from your statements that you reject the warning in principle, a fine notice with fees and expenses of 28.50 euros can be issued without further notification.

A warning can only be contested to a limited extent. You cannot lodge an objection to a warning, as this is merely an offer to settle the proceedings without a fine notice.

Hearing/witness questionnaire in fine proceedings from 60 euros

The hearing/witness questionnaire must be returned in the notification procedure (fine from 60 euros/no payment slip), stating the name of the driver/person responsible. The questionnaire can be returned by post, fax or e-mail.

In general:

Full personal details (name, address, date of birth) are required.

You can submit your objections in writing on the hearing/witness questionnaire. These will be examined.

Sometimes you may receive the same letter twice. This is the case if you initially received a witness questionnaire as part of the driver investigation. If you then state in the reply that you were driving yourself, you will receive a hearing form. The fining authority is legally obliged to do this.

Attention:

By reporting a false driver, you may be liable to prosecution under §164 StGB (False Suspicion). In this case, the police are obliged to initiate a criminal investigation against you.

Right to refuse to testify

The right to refuse to testify is regulated in Section 52 of the Code of Criminal Procedure. According to this, a witness does not have to name their fiancé, spouse, partner and relatives or in-laws in the direct line, relatives in the collateral line up to the third degree and in-laws up to the second degree.

Inspection of files

According to the statutory provisions, the person concerned is not entitled to have the files sent to them. The person concerned may be granted access to the files under supervision.

This can be done by prior appointment on the premises of the Idar-Oberstein Public Order Office. Information can also be provided to the person concerned.

A defense lawyer may be granted access to the file by being sent the file, provided he is not the person concerned.

Notice of fine

The fine notice is the decision of the administrative authority with which the traffic offense is punished.

Violations for which a fine of at least € 60.00 is possible can only be punished with a fine notice.

The fine notice always stipulates a fine and possibly a driving ban of up to 3 months.

In addition, in accordance with § 107 OWiG, fees of at least € 25.00 and expenses, e.g. for postal delivery, of € 3.50 are charged as procedural costs.

An objection to the fine notice may be lodged within 2 weeks of service. The objection is only admissible if it is received by the administrative authority before the expiry of this period.

Final decisions on fines are reported to the driving aptitude register at the Federal Motor Transport Authority in Flensburg. There, the decisions are assessed with points.

Please note the legal information and explanations on the back of the fine notice to avoid any disadvantages.

Catalog of fines

The basis for the assessment of penalties for road traffic offenses is the national catalog of fines, which applies nationwide and is intended to ensure uniform punishment of similar offenses. It sets out the consequences for a standard case. However, if the traffic offense was not without consequences or if there are already relevant previous registrations, this has an aggravating effect.

Less serious violations are subject to a fine of €5.00 to €55.00 (without points) in the catalog of fines. As a rule, a written warning is issued for these offenses and a payment deadline of one week is set. If no payment is made and the authority does not discontinue the proceedings for other reasons, a fine is issued. It does not matter why the payment was not made.

Objection

An objection is the temporary legal remedy against the fine notice. The appeal period of 2 weeks begins with the delivery of the fine notice and therefore on the day on which you received the letter from the postman or on which he put the notice in the letterbox due to your absence. You will find the date of this substitute delivery on the envelope.

The objection is only admissible if it is received by the Idar-Oberstein city administration within the deadline and in the specified form. The date on which you wrote the objection is therefore irrelevant. Nor does it matter when you posted the objection.

Objections by e-mail alone do not currently meet the legally required form and result in the objection being inadmissible.

Objections can also be submitted in writing to the competent authority.

A late objection must be rejected as inadmissible. If an objection is not lodged in good time, the administrative order imposing the fine becomes legally binding. The fine notice can then no longer be amended.

After a timely objection, the administrative authority reviews its decision and, if it does not change the decision, forwards the files via the public prosecutor's office to the district court in whose district the traffic offense was committed for a decision.

You will only be notified if the decision is changed.

An objection can also be withdrawn by submitting such a declaration to the administrative authority or the court before which the fine proceedings are pending.

Driving aptitude register (points in Flensburg)

If the requirements are met, information about road users who have been found to have committed an offense in road traffic is stored in the driving aptitude register (FAER) at the Federal Motor Transport Authority in Flensburg.

The decisions to be entered in the driving aptitude register, Annex 13 to Section 40 FeV, are assessed with one to three points depending on the type and severity of the offense and are deleted after certain periods. Not every offense leads to an entry in the FAER. Only those offenses that have an impact on road safety are stored in the FAER. Once the statutory time limits have expired, the entries stored in the register are deleted.

The redemption periods are

- two years and six months for decisions on an administrative offense that is assessed as an offense affecting road safety or equivalent with one point or

- five years in the case of decisions on an administrative offense that is assessed as a particularly road safety-impairing or equivalent offense with two points.

If you have such previous registrations, these can be taken into account by the fining authority when calculating a fine, which leads to an increase in the actual regular fine.

Once an entry in the FAER has been deleted, the offense and the decision may no longer be held against the person concerned for the punishment of administrative offenses in connection with road traffic.

Notification of the driving aptitude register is mandatory for the fining authority. It has no discretion not to do so. Stating the points in the fine notice merely serves to inform the person concerned. If this is not done, the points will still be entered in the driving aptitude register.

Further information, in particular on the question of how many points the person concerned currently has, cannot be answered by the Fines Office. For this you must contact the Federal Motor Transport Authority directly. On the homepage at www.kba.de you will find further information and various ways of obtaining information on points.

Driving ban

As a car or motorcycle driver, you must generally expect a driving ban as a secondary consequence to the fine if you exceed the current speed limit of 30 km/h in urban areas or 40 km/h outside urban areas.

A distinction is made between

- Driving bans with a grace period of four months. If a driving ban has not been imposed on the person concerned in the two years prior to the offense and will not be imposed until the decision on the fine, a grace period is granted. In this case, the driver's license must be returned for safekeeping no later than four months after the fine has become legally binding. The person concerned can choose the driving ban period within this time frame. The driving ban comes into effect when it is placed in safekeeping (i.e. when it is received by the fining authority), but no later than four months after the fine becomes legally binding. This period is fixed by law and cannot be extended.

- Driving ban without grace period. The driving ban takes effect when the fine becomes legally binding. The driver's license must then be surrendered immediately.

How is the driving ban enforced?

If you are in possession of a driving license document issued by a German authority, the driving license must be kept in official custody for the duration of the driving ban, even if you are resident abroad.

Foreign driving licenses are only kept in official custody if they are issued by an authority of an EU or EEA member state and the holder of such a driving license has his/her normal place of residence in Germany.

In all cases, the original driver's license must be presented. Please note that presenting a copy of your driver's license is not sufficient.

If the person concerned has not returned the driver's license to official custody after the deadline, a request to surrender the license will be sent. Any driving of a vehicle after expiry of the deadline constitutes a criminal offense (driving without a license).

If the driver's license is not sent even after this request, a request for assistance is sent to the responsible police station. The police officers visit the person concerned and demand the driver's license.

If this measure is also ineffective, the competent local court will be asked to issue an order to search the house. If the whereabouts of the person concerned are not known, a search for persons will be initiated.

The person concerned has two weeks after notification of the fine to lodge an objection. Once these two weeks have elapsed without an objection being received, the notice becomes legally binding and the fine and any driving ban imposed are enforceable.

Where do I have to hand in my driver's license?

If the driver's license is to be kept, this is generally done at the office issuing the fine. For this purpose, the driver's license must be sent by post or handed in directly to the administrative authority.

As an exception, the driver's license can also be kept at any other authority (administrative authority). To do this, ask the authority of your choice in advance whether the driver's license will be accepted there. If this is the case, the driving ban period begins on the date the license is handed in. You can also ask there whether you can pick up your driver's license again at this authority.

Start of the driving ban

The driving ban period begins when we receive your driver's license by post. You will be informed of this and the exact period of the driving ban.

The driving ban can only be enforced if the fine notice is legally binding.

If you agree with the fine notice and wish to surrender your driver's license immediately after receiving the fine notice, you must also declare that you waive your right to appeal against the fine notice so that a legally effective driver's license suspension can be carried out.

Disposal by third parties

If you wish, the driver's license can also be handed in to us by you or a third party. If a third party is to surrender the driving license to us on your behalf, they will require a power of attorney issued and signed by you, which must clearly state the specific authorized person and the scope of the authorization.

Required documents / information when sending or submitting

- Driving license (also the international driving license or military driving license)

- Waiver of appeal, if applicable

- Important: File number of the fine notice

- Is the address up to date? (Are the address of the fine notice and the current address the same?)

Can the driving ban be waived in return for an increase in the fine?

The fine office can only waive the driving ban imposed in the fine notice in exceptional cases.

In this case, you must lodge an objection to the fine notice in good time, i.e. within two weeks of notification, stating the reference number, if possible in writing, and setting out the reasons and evidence for such a special exceptional situation in your case.

If, in exceptional cases, the fining authority refrains from imposing a driving ban in return for an increased fine, you will receive a new, amended fine notice.

If, after assessing your arguments, the fines office comes to the conclusion that it is not possible to revoke the driving ban, the case will be submitted to the competent district court for a decision on your appeal. The local court is not bound by the previous negative decision of the fines office, i.e. it can decide for itself whether or not to impose a driving ban on you in the proceedings, taking into account the reasons you have given.

Legal force

The person concerned has two weeks after notification of the fine to lodge an objection. Once these two weeks have elapsed without an objection being received, the notice becomes legally binding and the fine and any driving ban are enforceable.

Application for a court decision

An appeal against an administrative order imposing a fine may be lodged within two weeks of service.

An application for a court decision can be made within two weeks against other decisions of the fines office, e.g. against the rejection of the objection, against the rejection of the application for restitutio in integrum due to missing a deadline, against the imposition of the costs of the proceedings on the owner of a motor vehicle.

Reinstatement

If the person concerned was prevented from lodging the objection within the time limit, he or she can apply for reinstatement.

The application must be received by the Fines Office within one week of the obstacle being removed.

It is advisable to justify the application and enclose copies of the relevant supporting documents. This includes, for example, flight tickets, hotel bills or documents relating to a stay in hospital.

Non-timely payment

The fine (including fees and expenses) stipulated in the administrative order imposing the fine is due for payment when the administrative order imposing the fine becomes legally binding.

The fine notice generally becomes legally binding 2 weeks after the notice has been served. If you lodge or have lodged an objection to the fine notice within these 2 weeks, the fine notice will not become legally binding. In this case, you do not have to make any payment for the time being.

If payment is not made on time, the amount will be collected by the Idar-Oberstein city administration after a grace period of 2 weeks.

Measures:

- Reminder: Additional fees will be charged (at least 5.- Euro)

- Enforcement: e.g. wage garnishment, account garnishment, other garnishment measures

- Enforced detention: monetary claim remains in place

In detail:

First, a reminder is sent with reminder fees for the amount to be paid. If no payment is made after this, the debt is enforced. Possible means here may include wage garnishment, account seizure or other seizure measures. In addition to the amount already outstanding, further enforcement costs will be incurred.

If payment of the outstanding debt is not achieved through enforced collection, the fines office will apply to the competent district court for an order for enforced detention, subject to a charge. This means that the addressee of the fine can be imprisoned for up to six weeks if the local court issues a detention order. Detention does not release the person from the obligation to pay the outstanding debt, but is intended to give the obligation to pay the necessary emphasis.

To avoid further costs, the Fines Office therefore strongly recommends that you transfer the outstanding amount in good time or, if you are unable to pay, submit a written application for payment facilitation in good time.

Payment difficulties

A deferral of payment or payment in installments can only be granted in justified exceptional cases. The prerequisite for this is that you are unable to pay the amount specified in the fine notice in one lump sum on time.

Your application for deferral or payment in installments must be submitted in writing to the Fines Office. The application can be sent by post, e-mail or fax.

The application must contain the following information:

- Reference number of the fine notice

- Proof of the current income situation (possible by submitting copies of salary statements, notification of unemployment benefit, bank statements, confirmation of maintenance payments, etc.).

- Submission of a proposal as to when or in how many installments the amount to be paid can be settled.

Once your application has been processed, you will receive written notification as to whether and, if so, in what form you will be granted a payment facility.