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Traffic, parking and transport-related offences are the most common. Enforcing fines If you receive a fine and do not pay it on time, you will be subject to additional fees. The system The infringements system is in place to discourage unlawful behavior and to give people the option of resolving their matters by paying a fixed penalty, rather than going to court.
Penalties and values Penalty units Penalty units determine the amount a person is fined when they commit an infringeable offence. A number of complexities arising from approaches to the Ombudsman about nominations added to the difficulties in obtaining quick and satisfactory resolutions. The holding failures affected a number of nomination statements. Provisions in the Road Safety Act Vic and the Infringements Act Vic allow a person issued with an infringement to nominate another person, the person responsible for committing the offence.
Fines Victoria processes allow for nominations to be made online or by submitting an approved hard copy form. This means the driver of the vehicle and the registered owner are liable for an offence, and the only defence available to the registered owner is to submit a nomination statement identifying the driver in accordance with the requirements of the Road Safety Act.
There are time limits for submitting nomination statements. An ESI offence is one of a number of offences which involve exceeding the speed limit by 25 kilometres per hour or more, or by driving at a speed of kilometres per hour or more regardless of the speed limit. The Road Safety Act provides that an infringement notice issued for an ESI offence takes effect as a conviction for the offence 28 days after issue, unless the recipient of the notice elects to have the matter determined by a court or makes a valid nomination statement.
In the case of other operator-onus offences, a nomination statement can be submitted any time before the fine is registered for enforcement with the Director, Fines Victoria under Part 3 of the Fines Reform Act. However, as noted above, an enforcement review can only be determined on specific grounds set out in the Fines Reform Act.
The fact that a recipient of an infringement was not the driver of the vehicle in question and wishes to nominate another driver is not itself a valid ground for an enforcement review. Fines Victoria reported that its role is limited to collecting nomination statements on behalf of Victoria Police and acting on the outcomes of Victoria Police decisions. This includes administrative functions related to the processing of nomination statements. In response to our enquiries regarding a complaint not directly referenced in this report, the Department of Justice and Community Safety advised some functions are provided by Civica BPO, including processing nominations, but:.
Civica BPO is not exercising discretion in these matters, but rather, it is carrying out administrative functions as instructed, and in the name of TCO.
This arrangement is consistent the requirements of the [Road Safety Act]. Under these rules, an officer of Civica BPO receives nomination statements, either in hard copy or electronic form, and makes an assessment. The Business Services Agreement sets the target for processing ESI nominations as one business day, and three business days for other nomination statements.
In March , Simon incurred an infringement while driving a company car. Simon completed a nomination statement, nominating himself, by completing the required form and sending it to Fines Victoria by post.
In completing the form, Simon filled in the section requiring his personal details section B including his full name, address, driver licence number and date of birth. On the same page, but further down the form, the nominated party was required to enter their name, signature and date they signed.
An example of the way in which Simon filled out the form is shown below. Fines Victoria rejected the nomination statement. Simon resubmitted the nomination statement and also made several attempts to call Fines Victoria but says he did not have time to wait in the phone queue. On another occasion he reportedly called Fines Victoria and was advised that his paperwork was being processed. He contacted Fines Victoria and was told his nomination statement had been rejected on the grounds he had not provided his full name in section D.
By the time Simon had become aware of this, the deadline for submitting the nomination statement had passed. Simon complained to the Ombudsman. He was aggrieved that while he had submitted a form with only his initial in section D on more than one occasion, he was never told this was the reason his statement was rejected. Following our enquiries, the nomination statement was accepted. Fines Victoria said the TCO had originally rejected it because it did not meet the requirements outlined in the Nominations Business Rules.
Simon included all the information required in a nomination statement. It is reasonable to expect an assessment of the nomination statement would consider the information in section B alongside the information in section D. While the TCO ultimately accepted the nomination statement, this type of decision should have been made without the need for Ombudsman intervention. To avoid the bureaucratic entanglement that might ensue, we consider the decision maker should have some discretion to make further enquiries, albeit limited, to the nominating party to determine the completeness of the nomination statement.
This was done to allow the nomination to be assessed, processed and determined without the infringement progressing to enforcement stage.
This did not apply in circumstances where members of the public had submitted nomination statements for ESIs that were considered incomplete. In ordinary circumstances an incomplete nomination would be returned to the nominating party promptly, allowing them to resubmit within the statutory deadline. Where backlogs existed and there was possibility to extend the deadline, as is the case with ESIs, parties were out of time to submit a corrected nomination.
Under section 15 1 of the Ombudsman Act Vic , the Ombudsman must refuse to deal with a complaint that appears to involve police personnel conduct, other than for the purposes of notifying the Independent Broad-based Anti-corruption Commission.
A clause in the Business Services Agreement expressly acknowledges the Ombudsman has jurisdiction over Civica BPO where it carries out administrative functions for the Victorian Government. The Chief Executive Officer of Civica BPO is the principal officer for the purposes of the Ombudsman Act; and is required to make arrangements to ensure it complies with notices from the Ombudsman. However, where there is an issue about when a nomination statement was received, or whether a nomination statement was correctly completed, this may be a complaint about the conduct of Civica BPO, or about the conduct of the TCO.
This includes contacting the TCO. Harry is a taxi driver and is the registered owner of a taxi which is operated variously by him and two other drivers. One of the other drivers who use his vehicle was driving at the time the infringement occurred and admitted responsibility. Harry submitted a nomination statement by posting the required form and documentation to Fines Victoria.
Harry advised our office that he did this some weeks before the deadline for nominating another driver, although Fines Victoria said the statement they received was posted on 3 April The statutory deadline for nominating another driver was 4 April and Fines Victoria advised they received the nomination statement on 5 April On or around 18 April , Harry received a letter from Fines Victoria giving notice that his nomination was rejected as it was made out of time.
Harry called Fines Victoria who told him the nomination form was received one day too late. Harry was told there was nothing he could do and the suspension of his driver licence would last for one month.
On 2 May , Harry received a letter from Fines Victoria notifying him his nomination had been accepted and his suspension would be lifted. Harry called Fines Victoria to complain that he had served a suspension for no reason.
Harry told the Ombudsman that Fines Victoria also suspended the nominated driver. Harry was of the view that this meant, in effect, two people have served a suspension for the one infringement. Harry contacted the Ombudsman after his licence had been restored. He wanted to register his displeasure with the conduct of Fines Victoria. He stated:. When we make a mistake, we pay.
While it is unfortunate that [Harry] missed the deadline by one day, Fines Victoria is unable to accept a late nomination in these circumstances. What appears to be an isolated human error led to his nomination statement being considered a second time, and for reasons that are not clear, being accepted. As a result of this action, the infringement was withdrawn from [Harry], his suspension lifted, and the conviction which had been recorded for the offence was removed.
Some of the more protracted complaints we dealt with show issues with how Fines Victoria respond to complaints and enquiries. Others illustrate issues with the way in which information is shared within Fines Victoria and with VicRoads.
Some issues arise because of difficult circumstances created due to delay or from human or system errors. Delay and system errors, such as those detailed earlier in this report, can be difficult to resolve. It appears that where Civica BPO or Fines Victoria officers have to unpick a series of errors and delays that have created a number of interlocked issues, it can sometimes result in unsatisfactory or inaccurate responses, or responses that do not address the specific grounds for complaint.
Fines Victoria often operates in circumstances where its decision making is bound by statutory time periods or strictly prescribed grounds for review. This can limit the discretion that officers have in any given case. We note that a satisfactory proposal was reached after the intervention of the Ombudsman. We acknowledge that the TCO made this decision alone, however it is concerning that it was only made after an enquiry to Fines Victoria by Ombudsman staff. They also point to an inflexible approach in circumstances where errors were apparent and clearly caused by systems operated within Fines Victoria.
In many of the cases detailed in this report, Fines Victoria has facilitated satisfactory resolutions where the Ombudsman has become involved. Again, we question why these cases needed to get to the stage where the Ombudsman becomes involved. Fines Victoria has been forthright in admitting faults arising from processing and other IT related challenges.
However, the manner in which issues arising from these faults has been addressed and resolved has not been equally forthright. Complainants such as Karen and Brian below needed Fines Victoria to approach their situation acknowledging that processing errors had occurred, make a careful appraisal of how these errors might have impacted on their circumstances, and identify how errors could be avoided in the future.
In January , a car driven by Karen but registered to Brian her husband failed to stop at a red light and incurred a traffic infringement. On the same day, Brian notified VicRoads that his address had changed from an address in Bulleen to an address in Rosanna.
In May , Karen, who had not previously been aware of the infringement, became aware of the Notice of Final Demand. Karen paid the infringement immediately to avoid the matter going to court. Also on 8 May , Brian submitted a nomination request to Fines Victoria and Karen submitted an enforcement review request to Fines Victoria. One of the grounds for review was that fees and charges had been unfairly added. The requests were submitted online and listed the Rosanna address as their address.
Brian and Karen wrote to Fines Victoria on 6 June and 3 August as they had not received an update. These letters were submitted by fax and post, and signed by both of them.
In August , Karen contacted our office for assistance resolving her dispute with Fines Victoria. We had to point out that both Karen and Brian had signed the documents submitted on 8 May, 6 June and 3 August Fines Victoria then said an acknowledgement was provided to Karen and Brian on 10 July to the Rosanna address. Upon further enquiries, Fines Victoria conceded the acknowledgement was sent to the wrong address.
Fines Victoria subsequently sent all previous documentation to their Rosanna address and requested that the Traffic Camera Office reconsider the nomination requests. The TCO accepted the nomination, withdrew the infringement and provided a full refund of the infringement, plus fees.
Fines Victoria is aware of and are investigating a further system error that is, in a small proportion of cases, preventing addresses from being updated promptly where VicRoads provides Fines Victoria with updated information.
The Ombudsman saw a spike in complaints in late about Fines Victoria sharing accurate and timely information with VicRoads to enable VicRoads to process demerit point nominations and licence suspensions properly. Between 1 July and 31 December , we received 14 approaches regarding this issue. Ten of these approaches were in December , comprising over 10 per cent of approaches for that month. VicRoads manages the demerit point and licence consequences of traffic infringements issued in Victoria.
VicRoads also provides support to Fines Victoria by sharing relevant information about individuals and vehicles for whom infringements are issued. An example of automated information sharing is the process for issuing demerit points. Through an automated process, Fines Victoria notifies VicRoads of an event such as when a fine is paid. If a fine remains unpaid, but is registered to the Director, Fines Victoria for enforcement review, VicRoads is similarly notified through an automated process.
Both the above notifications would have an effect on the issuing of demerit points. VicRoads issues demerit points once it receives the relevant notification.
However, Fines Victoria does not consider that information sharing with VicRoads was amongst the significant challenges in From the complaints we received, there appear to be two main themes: sharing of up-to-date address information and referring customers between the two agencies.
Members of the public complained that Fines Victoria was sending notices to old addresses, even after they had reason to know that an address had been updated. We acknowledge the requirements for issuing Penalty Reminder Notices and other infringement notices set out in section of the Infringements Act. Some of the complaints, such as those from Karen and Brian, involved people who had notified only VicRoads of their address change. We did not focus on the extent of this issue in our enquiries.
Leanne committed a driving offence, and the resulting infringement and application of demerit points meant that her licence would be suspended for 12 months from August Leanne did not dispute the infringement, and instead applied to Fines Victoria to pay it by way of payment plan. In November , Leanne received a letter from VicRoads stating that Fines Victoria had informed them that her traffic infringement had been cancelled. Leanne contacted both VicRoads and Fines Victoria, believing that an issue with the payment plan had resulted in the demerit period re-starting.
She was aggrieved that she would have to serve a 12 month period afresh when she had already served almost four months of the demerit period. Leanne was referred between agencies which caused her significant frustration. Fines Victoria stated:. We acknowledge that the volume of infringements and related activities administered by Fines Victoria which impact VicRoads means that automated notifications are essential.
However, this case involves a series of automated notifications being made due to failures within the VIEW system at Fines Victoria. As Fines Victoria has advised, those IT processes were deficient in Leanne said she was referred between the two agencies with both advising they could not assist.
This experience has been relayed to us by other complainants. Fines Victoria responded:. There could be significant consequences if Fines Victoria incorrectly advises a customer that they are able to drive when they have in fact been suspended by VicRoads. This response fails to acknowledge that Leanne was seeking to have the two agencies work together to resolve her problem.
The error could not have been resolved by going to a single agency. It appears that the issues arising where multiple automated notifications have been made cannot be easily retracted. In addition to enquiries from the Ombudsman, a number of professionals contact Fines Victoria on behalf of clients. These professionals, often representing members of the community experiencing disadvantage or specific vulnerability, play a role in assisting individuals to navigate complex legal systems.
Financial counsellors, for example, contact Fines Victoria to obtain information about outstanding infringements to assist individuals experiencing financial hardship to effectively manage their debts. Fines Victoria allow for nominated persons or organisations to make contact under either a full or limited authority. A full authority for a financial counsellor requires the following information:.
The difficulties facing Victorians experiencing disadvantage, and their representatives, are illustrated in the following two case summaries. Therese is a financial counsellor working predominantly with people recovering from addiction. Her client, Wendy, was in residential rehabilitation for addiction issues. Wendy had seven or eight infringements and provided Therese an authority to act on her behalf with respect to each matter. Therese made attempts to contact Fines Victoria to have the payment arrangements cancelled and for Wendy to be put on a Work and Development Permit.
Fines Victoria advised Therese that Wendy had to contact Fines Victoria herself, which presented some challenges because Wendy was receiving treatment.
Wendy attempted to cancel the payment plans a number of times and was faced with long call wait times. She was eventually able to cancel the payment plan, at which point, Therese was informed that Fines Victoria had already applied the funds that it was collecting to one of the fines.
This meant that even though Wendy was on a Work and Development Permit, one of the fines was not applied to that order. Fines Victoria conceded that the authority provided by Wendy allowing Therese to make contact on her behalf was not recognised by the contact centre, however could not explain why:. Fines Victoria is aware that persons who seek the assistance of financial counsellors may not have available to them the necessary information to support the more stringent requirements of a full authority.
Fines Victoria is currently seeking to [adjust] the requirements applicable only to authorities provided to financial counsellors. Ali, a newly arrived refugee under the age of 18, incurred a series of infringements in and around October As part of the online application, his lawyer selected the option requesting all future correspondence be sent to their office, rather than to Ali and restated this preference in the comments section of the online application form.
This request was made because Ali feared that he would be subjected to physical violence if his father were to discover the infringements. Ali had been subject to family violence at the hands of his father in the past.
In May , his lawyer again contacted Fines Victoria. Despite confirming correspondence would be sent to his lawyer, a written response to the internal review application was never received. Not complying with these rules can lead to infringements becoming unenforceable. The impact on representatives, particularly those who assist members of the community experiencing disadvantage or vulnerability, who need to spend time following up with Fines Victoria, is that other members of the community may miss out on receiving services.
Therese reported having a lengthy case load. The impact for the infringements system is also quite clear. Community lawyers and community based financial counsellors assist members of the community who often have trouble advocating for themselves and interacting with agencies such as Fines Victoria. These professionals help the efficient management of the infringements system by guiding their clients through the relevant processes and explaining options.
When community services cannot interact effectively with Fines Victoria, their clients can become further marginalised. This report has sought to show the key themes and systemic issues arising from complaints received by the Ombudsman in We did not set out to investigate the failures of the IT system.
However, we note the lengthy history of IT issues associated with the management of infringements in Victoria. We also note that, in October , Fines Victoria said the system would achieve full functionality in February Subsequently, we have been informed that full functionality will not be achieved until June Civil Law New South Wales.
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