UH-OH! TICKETED IN AREZZO
Hi! Got an unexpected souvenir in the mail yesterday even though we visited Italy in March / April. I was evidently photographed in my rental car while making a quickie sidetrip to Arezzo after day-tripping to Cortona. I seem to remember reading about the historic downtown area being off-limits. Anyway, the ticket was charged to my credit card on file with Autoeurope. Would appreciate any info on this scam, as there obviously is no way to contest it...it's already appeared on my credit card. I guess I'll just chalk it up as one more Italian memory (albeit a few months late!).
Roy
Fredericksburg, VA USA 8/12/08
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Lotsa discussion about this in recent months. Many Italian cities have traffic limited zones, and catch violators by camera. They send the ticket to the registered owner (the car rental firm), which then charged you, as per your rental agreement. It's like being caught by a red light camera in the U.S. Unfortunately, not a lot of North American drivers research this, and the rental companies don't help a lot :( For potential future drivers in Italy, do a google search under "zona traffico limitato" and you'l find lots of info.
It's not a scam. Many cities in Italy have these special zones. You actually drove into a posted Zona Traffico Limitato that has cameras that snap pictures of your rear license plate. By law, you can enter these zones if you have to get to your hotel or car rental agency but they have to immediately notify the police department with your license plate number. You really have no defense if your were just day-tripping around and entered a zone that you should not have entered without proper registration.
Well, the more veteran travelers may not consider it a scam, but notification four months later, long after departing the country, no opportunity to contest it (although I'm obviously "guilty as charged"), automatically deducted from my credit card....hmmm. Walks and quacks like a scam to me. Hope they use my euros to hang a flower box in Arezzo in my memory :)
Roy,
if you had rented a car in Canada, drove by a multi-nova camera in excess speed, a ticket would have been sent a few weeks later to the rental car company. The Company would have debited your cc and you've received notice - as well weeks/months after you've already left the country with little opportunity to contest. No scam involved in that. So why should the same procedure also involving a camera recording a traffic violation in Italy be a scam? Just because of the time delay? You always get that kind of delay with camera controlled traffic violations.
And Italy!
I doubt you'd get the ticket any sooner even if the camera printed it out right then and there! ;-)
It's unfortunate, but it's also almost certainly legit. Another reason I prefer public transportation in Europe.
Roy, are you entirely certain that AutoEurope paid your fine? I'm more inclined to believe that what really happened is that AutoEurope (or more precisely, the auto rental company you actually used for which AutoEurope is a broker) charged you for the fee associated with providing the police information about the driver of the vehicle at the time the offense occurred. This has been the experience of the vast majority of people who have written about this topic. I don't believe the auto rental companies have the right to pay for your fine, though they can certainly charge you a fee for the cost of providing info to the police. Did you receive actual paperwork from AutoEurope identifying that they're paying the fine for you and a breakdown of the cost?
Thank you, Neil...I finally found someone a little bit sympathetic to this crazed, law-breaking rental car driver! :)
I actually had the wrong rental car company...it was Europcar. Now, the (potentially) bad news. You are right...the paperwork from Europcar says "Administrative fees for notification of traffic violations." 40 euros for the notification, plus 8 more euros for VAT. Yikes...maybe Europcar will be the ones hanging a flower box in my memory...good work if you can get it!
What now? Am I going to get hit with additional fines? Anybody else care to educate me on what I can expect? (Seriously, thanks to all for your responses.)
Rick says, travel like a temporary local. What would an Italian local do in this situation? Try any and every which way to get out of paying, even if guilty!!
I would try to dispute it through the credit card company. It's difficult to get overseas charges reversed, but if you're in good standing with the cc company, they may eat it to keep you as a customer. Worse thing that happens is that you get a couple months reprieve before you eventually have to pay it.
Roy....you'll probably get a notification from a central Italian collection agency that seems to deal with many municipalities in Italy, telling you of the infraction and listing the fine. It'll probably be another 6-8 months before you get that (if not longer!) Then the decision's up to you.
As you have figured out, your 48 Euro is not the fine, just a fee charged by the rental car agency to provide info to the people who will fine you. That fine will be maybe 100-200 Euro. It would be rare that the fine would be charged to your credit card, but depending on your rental contract, it is an eventual possibility. You can certainly contest, but to little avail(face it, they hold all the cards), and they will double or triple the fine through the process. There is much debate whether they actually have much recourse (they can't take your license or jail you in the US) or even if on a return trip you will encounter problems. There are actually some time limits in place, but generally these are based on actions only they can verify, and distance, language, and local laws aree against you. Scam, no, and it could just as easily been in the UK, Switzerland, or as mentioned Canada or in the US.
Wow - what a shock that must have been! You did not even know that you had broken the law?
I read the three pages in RS book about driving. Is there another good source with printer friendly info we could print out and read on the plane? I found some on a website, but my hubby steers clear of computers and he will do most of the driving.
Check this out. It might be helpful.
To avoid these sorts of incidents Americans really need to familiarise themselves with European road signage.
Unlike the US where signs are generally just black English text on an orange background (easy for native English speakers but next to useless for foreigners) most European signs are symbolic.
In the instance of the ZTL example provided in the previous post, the empty white circle bordered in red is a standard sign meaning no vehicles are allowed. I don't speak Italian but I guess that the text lists exemptions allowing resident's vehicles. If you understand basic European signs, even though you didn't understand the precise details, you could know that you were taking a risk entering a vehicle free zone without knowing if you had a valid exemption.
And the Slow Travel website given by Leslie
click here
has more info, go to it and scroll down a until you see the above sign.
Here's what the website says this sign means:
"It is good to know how to read the sign. For instance, this sign indicates that it is a restricted area between 7:30am and 7:30pm (19:30) from Monday to Saturday. The crossed hammers on the sign indicate these restrictions do not apply on Sunday and holidays. If in doubt as to what the sign says, always err on the side of caution. It is permissible to drive to a hotel within the restricted areas or to a parking garage, but, it is imperative that the hotel or garage call your license plate number into the police. This will give you safe passage. Do not assume that this call will be made, ask them to make the call and then check later that it was made. To be safe, keep your hotel or garage receipt in the event that you do get a ticket, then you can challenge it."
It's the navigator's job to spot these signs: if you've elected unsuspecting "hubby" to fulfill his manly duties by driving in Florence (the unsuspecting brute has no idea what he's about to face), he's going to be too busy focusing on not running over vespas to look for traffic signs. So if you the navigator (you wimp!) don't see the sign, you should pay the fine.
If we are cited in this country we pay; why not over there?
Ignorance of the law is NO excuse. I have heard that all my life. I guess it applies to countries we travel in also.
I was charged for a traffic violation in Oslo in a similar manner. I was guilty...thats all that matters.
Whether we like it or not, we pay and count it is another expense of travel.
If we are cited in this country we pay; why not over there?
Last year when the big fines first started getting mailed out to US drivers, we had some people on this site incensed about the very idea of it--but by now most people here just want to comply with the law but they need to know what the regulations are and how to spot these signs, so they can comply with Italian law--and they can educate themselves by looking at the above photo and going to the website link given by Leslie and again by me.
While Arezzo and Florence are mentioned, many Italian cities have the same restricted zone system like Rome, Pisa, Siena, and many more. Some are entire central areas like Arezzo, some are done by sections, like Florence, and some are street by street like Rome. As Kent mentioned, several months ago it was both outrage and a flat out pronunciation of scamming, that has toned down. At that time what amazed me was that at it's heart, this is a very practical way to limit traffic in a historic area only ruined by a glut of traffic...something positive for all of us travelers seeking a bit of quaint Italy...but nearly all that was voiced was negative. Nearly all of these cities are no place for cars, especially when driven by the likes of someone like me! Park the rental in the first big lot outside of town and hoof it or use public transport to your destination.
Roy, I'll provide you with an answer to your specific question about what you can expect. I expect you will receive a curious letter entitled oddly enough, "Notification of Payment Before the Notification." The gist of the letter can be summed up thusly: "The police say you should be cited for a traffic offense. If you pay us now, for which we have provided a handy website and English speaking operators standing by the phones in case you have questions, the police will disremember the entire incident."
I received two such letters in February 2008 for travel in July 2007. I ignored the letters and have heard nothing since. I would be quite surprised if your credit card company would pay the fine, from what I've read they cannot do that. My personal theory is that there are enough people scared of authority that they pay the fine after receiving the first dunning letter from the outsourcing group. I have read of people who didn't pay similar fines and had no problem re-entering Italy later on. Certainly the Italian customs agents don't enter your name into a computer database and see what pops up...they can hardly be distracted from their cell phones or newspapers or whatnot in the first place. Now, IF you got your ticket in Arezzo and IF you get pulled over by an Arezzo cop on a return trip, maybe the local police track these things enough that there will be some unpleasantness (though I doubt it). I don't believe the auto rental companies keep a current database of international traffic citation scofflaws.
Of course, this does not pertain to Brits and others in the EU as I understand they have some sort of agreement that causes you to pay up or face problems in your own country.
Now, I empathize with those taking the moral high ground who state one should pay because it's the proper thing to do. However, I think the fine is onerous (nearly 100 euros) and does not fit the crime. If it was half that, I'd consider paying.
"I think the fine is onerous (nearly 100 euros) and does not fit the crime." Neil.... do you take the same approach to Washington state laws?
Just to reply to Otter, most Italians (my husband included) suck it up and pay the fine, just like we would do if we were to get a traffic fine in the US. As for the fine being excessive, people are always complaining on this site about lovely, picturesque Italian towns being ruined by too much traffic in the center. These traffic zones have been put in place exactly for that reason, to keep cars out of the center. I don't get it, people moaning one minute about too much traffic in Italian cities and then moaning when they get tickets for what?--driving around the center of Italian cities!
Norm: I treat all fines the same way: what happens if I don't pay? It's difficult to get out of paying fines in the US, local or otherwise. Some people don't mind accumulating parking tickets and whatnot, I can't do that because I don't want something like that hanging over my head. But let's be honest here: The Italian police set up a camera, mail out these fines, and hope they get paid. This new system is all about "volume." I have heard that if you don't pay, they double or triple the fine. So...for that kind of money I want to see an actual ticket, from the police, mailed to me. Until that happens, I think they're just being hopeful.
Here's some more straight talk: if the Italian authorities were REALLY interested in less traffic as opposed to more revenue, they'd get the word out. They KNOW many tourists come to these towns, they KNOW most of them are unfamiliar with their signs, yet they seem happy to collect the money as opposed to being dismayed that they can't seem to stem the flow of cars. Rental car agencies stay mum about it because they get about 80 bones to hand over a sheet of paper to the police that takes them 30 seconds to print out. So climbing up on the high horse just doesn't cut it. Sorry 'bout that.
Now, I wouldn't intentionally drive in a ZTL. In my situation, I was trying to drive to the Florence train station parking garage, not knowing that there is a very narrow slot from the southeast one must drive to get there without passing through a ZTL. Of course, a year later there's all kinds of info about avoiding these zones, but the Italian authorities evidently stepped up this camera enforcement program very recently.
Now, if you told me that the RCMP issued you a ticket, and if you didn't pay it there would be no penalty and nothing would happen, you're undoubtedly a better person than me. Of course, I wouldn't believe you. But there you have it.
Neil...if the only reason we obey our laws is because we fear the consequences, without understanding why the law is in place then admitting our mistakes, then our society is failing. And how should Italian officials "get the word out,"...write a letter to every American informing him/her that their traffic laws are different from the ones at home? All one has to do is a google search to find lots of details. Assuming traffic regulations are the same everywhere is an assumption you shouldn't have made. As Carl said, "ignorance of the law is no excuse;" it's the same anywhere. I got a ticket a few years ago for running a stop sign...the usual cover-the-brakes until I thought it was clear. A friend told me to contest it because there was a chance the officer would be too busy to attend, and it would be thrown out. But I understand why that law is there, and I was a fault, so I took my lumps and learned my lesson.
Thanks, Neil...extremely well put. I'm taking a pretty good bashing for my unadulterated ignorance and brazen attempt to spoil the peace and quiet (right!) of Arezzo. (That's O.K., I asked for it.) In my opinion, anybody who can afford to travel to Italy these days with the euro at 1.55 to the dollar can probably afford to pay the fine (and admin costs). That's not the point...as Neil says, they're collecting largely from the tourists, not the locals, and their poor job of publicizing their traffic camera system is inconsistent with a sincere desire to reduce traffic.
Anyway, I hope this healthy discourse has helped at least a few upcoming visitors to keep their euros in their wallets and out of the Arezzo municipal coffers. Thanks to all for the spirited discussion!
Newbies: This (above discussion) is just one of the reasons why some of us old timers have finally learned to do what the Italians do:
If a train goes there, take the train!
This goes counter to the instincts of western North Americans, where there are no trains, but there it is....
Exploring Tuscany hill towns is the only place in Italy where I'd rent a car.
Just wondering about this publicizing thing. Does Washington state or Virginia go out of their way to publicize traffic laws to visitors? Can you turn right on red lights in Washington state and Virginia? Well, I found out you can....by looking it up. Or Canada for that matter. Do you know if you can turn right on red lights in Quebec, or Ontario, for example? How would you find out....or would you assume it was the same as your laws? I doubt very much if there are figures to prove the contention that tourists are being nailed more frequently than Italian drivers. But, as Kent says....take the train...let someone else drive!
The police don't give out these kinds of tickets, these cameras are set up by the city and they are the ones who issue the tickets. Yes, they are surely a useful source of revenue, just like the speed traps employed by state police in so many towns in the US, where if you are going 37 in a 35 they pull you over and give you a ticket. Do you think they post a sign telling you that there is a speed trap coming up? In Italy there are signs all over, telling you where the limited traffic zones are, where the autovelox machines (which give you tickets for speeding on the highway) are, where the areas are monitored by video camera are. You just have to know what the signs mean when you see them. Keeping traffic out of the city center is a problem here in Italy, it clogs the streets and the air pollution is damaging to buildings and statues, Rome would be even more difficult to navigate if everyone could drive their car down Via del Corso. There is a reason for these traffic zones, they aren't there to screw you over, they are there to make the cities more liveable for the people who actually live there.
I think it is funny that there is an expectation that every traffic camera should be "advertised". That is the whole point, one should always drive in a correct manner, whether you think you are being "watched" or not. People here in Germany get their photos sent to them all the time. Sometimes it is just because their car is sitting over the white line at a traffic light! Is this a "scam" too? Do ya think Germans driving 110 miles an hour on US roads would call it a scam if they got a ticket, since they can drive that fast over here? Yep, take a train, it is tons easier.
Well Roy- you have certainly received a lot of advice (or some might say chastisement) I'll give you my two cents. I am sorry to hear about your ticket. I think you received it innocently enough and it was not a fun way to end your trip. I think your idea to "chalk it up to one more Italian memory" is excellent, and I appreciate you opening yourself up to all this abuse so that others could learn from your mistake. We will be driving through Italy in October, and have learned from your mistake. Sorry you had to pay the tab for our education.
The challenge for me, which I assume is shared by many drivers from the US (at least in the Northwest) is that unimpeded ZTL-like restricted roads do not exist. Perhaps they have plenty of these types of restricted roads on the east coast and Canada or whatever but the usual model for a restricted road around here is an electronically operated gate. You pause for a moment, swipe your card, and continue forward. This absolutely prevents unauthorized traffic from entering, if the goal REALLY is to reduce traffic as opposed to collect revenue. I'm just saying.
I don't think it would be a terrific burden for rental car companies to have at their counters a brochure about ZTLs. I mean, in the US if we had a huge number of tourists coming back to the rental agencies complaining about a similar situation, the agencies would address the situation because that's the way customer service generally works here. Perhaps there are no complainers, though, seeing as how folks don't know they received these tickets until the Italian authorities see fit to direct the outsourcing company to send collection letters nine months after the offense. Naturally, after this time period nobody knows nothin' 'bout nothin'.
Now, my comments on this topic are limited to ZTLs. I don't speed because I don't want to worry about hidden cameras and hidden cops.
And though this is not my situation, many people caught in ZTLs were simply trying to get to their hotel. The hotels did not forewarn them about the ZTLs, and it's a huge process to contest the tickets which requires cooperation by the hotel which sometimes happens and sometimes not. It's a terrific mess, and something that would simply not be allowed to exist in US heavily-touristed areas. The Italians just sort of shrug. It is what it is.
Oh for heaven's sake Neil. "would not be allowed to exist in the United States..." News flash. There's a whole lot of stuff that is allowed to exist in the United States that would never be allowed in Italy, Canada and most of the developed world (like people walking around with concealed weapons). One of the enjoyable things about travel is having the opportunity to see and experience different cultures, values, and customs. The ZTL's are not a secret and people visiting Italy do not have a god given right to assume everything will be the same as it is at home.
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