It was bad enough to get caught speeding but now you’ve lost your paper ticket. You would pay your fine if you only knew who to pay. Failing to pay or missing your court date will add a Failure to Appear (FTA) charge to your pending citation and that will trigger a Bench Warrant for your immediate arrest. We can help you navigate this complicated legal situation – hopefully before additional charges are filed.
What do you do if you’ve lost your paper ticket? First, you need to pinpoint the location where you received your ticket on a map. Using Google Maps is an easy and fast way to do this because zooming out from the location will show you the county where the violation occurred. Next, you will need to call the county and municipal courts in that area to determine which court will handle your case. If you are lucky enough to have been pulled over in an area with an online citation database, you can do a search and bypass the time-consuming phone calls. The presence of an online citation search capability will likely be listed on the court’s website.
If you have no idea which area you were in when you were pulled over, you will need to retrace your route from beginning to end. Isolate the counties surrounding the area where you most likely were stopped. You can use an online mapping program to do this. When you zoom out to see the locale, make a list of all the counties included in the area and go to their respective websites. Check with each court, including Magistrate and City courts, to determine which one, if any, has your citation. If you do not find the court you need, move down or up from the place you selected on the route and keep searching.
What if you’ve already missed your court date? Visit the Violations and Suspensions page of the Georgia Department of Driving Services (DDS) website (https://dds.georgia.gov/violations-and-suspensions) to check postings against your name and Driver’s License number. If your court date is past, information on your ticket will be posted along with the other charges that resulted from not appearing in court. This approach will only work for drivers licensed in Georgia. Drivers from other states will need to check with the DMV/DDS in their home state to see if the lost Georgia citation has been recorded on their record.
Are you a Super Speeder? Georgia defines this as travelling 75 mph or faster on a two-lane road or 85 mph or faster on other roads and highways. If you fell into this category when you were issued your ticket, you will need to pay a $200 Super Speeder violation fee to the Georgia DDS. A first-class letter will notify you of this status and you will have 120 days from the date of the letter to pay this additional fine. This fee is in addition to whatever you paid to the court. Fail to pay that additional amount and the state will suspend your license. To restore your driving privileges, you will have to pay the Super Speeder fee and an additional $50 to have your license reinstated. For more information about what it means to be designated a Super Speeder, visit https://dds.georgia.gov/reinstatement-faqs-super-speeder
