$800 stop sign ticket!!!

[paladin]

I think most would agree that many traffic laws in this country probably are bs, and could be done without, but its those ticket revenues that help bolster the police force.

 

[DonDavis]

California roll... I like those because they have those little slivers of pickled stuff in them and they're not real fishy...

 

[nsxtasy]

I tried fighting the ticket because it was such a lame ticket
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.
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But the cop showed up to court and of course I lost

once you fight a ticket, you can't take traffic school if you lose....

So let me make sure I understand this correctly.

When you received the traffic citation, you had a choice. You could (a) pay the ticket and have a conviction on your record; (b) take traffic school, spend a few hours doing it, pay a certain dollar amount (something around $100, I'm guessing?), and keep the offense off your driving record; or (c) plead your case in court, and if you won, you pay nothing and have nothing on your record, but if you lost, you pay the fine and have a conviction on your record. (Assuming I'm correct, that's the same basic system we have here in Illinois.)

And you decided not to choose (b), the "sure thing" that keeps the ticket off your driving record and off the radar of the insurance company's $800 rate increase, and instead chose (c), thereby accepting the risk that you might lose and your insurance rates might go up. Is that correct?

If all of that is correct, you chose to accept a risk and now you are suffering the consequences of your decision. Stop whining - that was your decision to make. Next time, you might want to consider going for the sure thing by taking traffic school.

 

[91 X]

So let me make sure I understand this correctly.

When you received the traffic citation, you had a choice. You could (a) pay the ticket and have a conviction on your record; (b) take traffic school, spend a few hours doing it, pay a certain dollar amount (something around $100, I'm guessing?), and keep the offense off your driving record; or (c) plead your case in court, and if you won, you pay nothing and have nothing on your record, but if you lost, you pay the fine and have a conviction on your record. (Assuming I'm correct, that's the same basic system we have here in Illinois.)

And you decided not to choose (b), the "sure thing" that keeps the ticket off your driving record and off the radar of the insurance company's $800 rate increase, and instead chose (c), thereby accepting the risk that you might lose and your insurance rates might go up. Is that correct?

If all of that is correct, you chose to accept a risk and now you are suffering the consequences of your decision. Stop whining - that was your decision to make. Next time, you might want to consider going for the sure thing by taking traffic school.

There you go ASSuming again....
1) You can't take traffic school every time you get a ticket...I wish you could, but not in Cali...
2) Even if I had a chance to go to traffic school, I still would have wanted to fight this ticket, it was rediculous!!!Sometimes you have to stand up for what you think is right, no matter what the risk.(BTW, the cop that cited me had plenty of other defendents there besides me, he was pretty busy that day) Too bad the judges take the officers word 99 out of 100 times though...
3) Whining??? I thought these forums were about expressing opinions and helping each other out...If anything I'm letting some people know about how high there insurance can go in a car like this and expressing my displeasure with the system...Am I supposed to take an injustice with a smile and roll over, like some of you seem to do???

sorry for any confusion, but assuming usually only leads to making yourself the first three letters of the word 'assume'

 

[D'Ecosse]

I think the whole point here from the insurance company's persepctive is that they are not penalizing you $800 for the stop violation - they are penalizing you for being a multiple offender. Just happens to be the stop sign violation that was the last one.
Since you have apparently numerous other tickets that have "dropped off" it's hard to see why you feel hard done by.
On the subject of dismissal classes, the whole point of that, with only having eligibility for one, is that you can't simply repeat offend & get off lightly.
No sympathy - you should have been overly cautious in your circumstances, knowing your "free get out of jail card" was used up.
How much time does anyone actually save with a "California Roll" anyway? Too simple to just stop completely & avoid the hassle.

 

[91 X]

I think the whole point here from the insurance company's persepctive is that they are not penalizing you $800 for the stop violation - they are penalizing you for being a multiple offender. Just happens to be the stop sign violation that was the last one.
Since you have apparently numerous other tickets that have "dropped off" it's hard to see why you feel hard done by.
On the subject of dismissal classes, the whole point of that, with only having eligibility for one, is that you can't simply repeat offend & get off lightly.
No sympathy - you should have been overly cautious in your circumstances, knowing your "free get out of jail card" was used up.
How much time does anyone actually save with a "California Roll" anyway? Too simple to just stop completely & avoid the hassle.

I wasn't looking for sympathy or to be attacked by those with an angel complex...I just titled it that way to make a point "$800 stop sign ticket"
Why is it right for insurance co's to make billions of dollars a year for such petty offenses??? I have NEVER had an accident or even filed a claim, but one little ticket and they triple your rates??
Is that fair??? Thats a sheepish mentallity to think that it is..Why don't they give you 1/2 your money back if you don't file a claim or have an at fault accident???

 

[nsxtasy]

Why is it right for insurance co's to make billions of dollars a year for such petty offenses???

It's called "capitalism". The idea behind it is, if you think they are making too much profit, you can start your own insurance company to compete with them.

Incidentally, many insurance companies go through years in which they lose a lot of money. Your comment about "billions of dollars" shows that you know virtually nothing about the industry or its economics. For example, you can see from the annual report of State Farm, one of the biggest in the industry, that they lost over four billion dollars on insurance underwriting in 2002, and another half a billion dollars in 2003.

The basic idea behind insurance companies is that they make enough on investments to offset losses on insurance underwriting. But as with State Farm in 2002, they sometimes incur a loss overall as well - a loss that can run into the billions.

I have NEVER had an accident or even filed a claim, but one little ticket and they triple your rates??

Fact number 1: They often don't raise rates when you have "one little ticket".

Fact number 2: You didn't have "one little ticket". You had a bunch of them.

Fact number 3: They didn't triple your rates. You said you had been paying around $1100 every six months, and they gave you a quote for $1326. That's not triple.

I guess you don't like facts to get in the way of your arguments, huh?

Why don't they give you 1/2 your money back if you don't file a claim or have an at fault accident???

Actually, they do - not half your money (their profits are not 50 percent of the premiums - you would know this if you knew anything about the industry) but they DO provide money back to good drivers. Most companies offer "good driver discounts" to drivers who have clean driving records. Furthermore, many companies have a "mutual" portion in which the policy holders are, in effect, stockholders, who receive dividend checks for their share of the profits; normally, only good drivers with clean driving records are eligible for insurance by the mutual company.

 

[91 X]

Fact number 1: They often don't raise rates when you have "one little ticket".


Fact number 2: You didn't have "one little ticket". You had a bunch of them.

Fact number 3: They didn't triple your rates. You said you had been paying around $1100 every six months, and they gave you a quote for $1326. That's not triple.

I guess you don't like facts to get in the way of your arguments, huh?

I guess you misread the FACTS that I have stated, huh?

1) true, but if you have two then you get bent, no matter your type of ticket or history...what I meant by that was I was fine with one ticket, then I got another one"one little ticket" and the price quote almost tripled...FACT

2) If TWO is a "bunch" then I guess I have a "bunch of them"

3)what I SAID was that I got a quick quote initially with ONE point on my record..(which is what I thought I had at the time of the quote last month) for $529 for six months..then when he ran my record to start the policy it turned out I had TWO tickets, instead of one..the new quote was $1328 for same six month policy..Not exactly tripled, but alot more then doubled...


I really hate going tic for tac with you when you misread me or vise versa...so lets just put an end to this thread that was never intended to start such a firestorm, I just wanted to let people know that one ticket is good, two tickets is one too many when it comes to insuring an NSX in California...and as a 16 year licensed driver with nothing more then minor traffic violations(no accidents, DUI's, reckless driving, F.T.A's, suspended license or even filed a claim) It kinda pisses me off...thats all

I hope that clears up some misunderstanding going on here....

Have a good day...and drive safe