Do let us know how you get on with your Italy trip.

I have a parking fine of similar vintage in Chartres. I'd actually paid/displayed but suspect warden didn't look in right place for ticket assuming it was the insurance thing French cars display in lower right of windscreen. Avoided returning to Chartres with same car but as we changed it witihn 18 months that wasn't a great imposition!!

I unknowingly drove into the "limited access" part of an Italian city centre without a valid permit in a hire car about 6 or 7 years ago, (I had no idea I had done this). This was in August.

In January if the following year, I received a fine from the city authorities for approx. €120 IIRC, (it had not come from the hire car company, but direct from the city authority).

The letter was sent recorded delivery, but our postie had simply put it through the letterbox.

The fine included a unique website address that (allegedly) showed me in the car at the time. I chose NOT to visit this website, as that would have alerted the sending party that I had received the fine (they know when you have visited a particular page).

I put the letter through the shredder and have hired cars in Italy many many times since without any repercussion (although I was slightly nervous the first time I hired a car about six months afterwards as it was also at the same airport).

Double whoops.

Fine arrived in the post yesterday. Got to love Italian efficiency.

90kph in a 70kph limit at 6.30 in the morning on our way back to the airport. Fair cop guvner. Cost is a rather high €284, reduced by 30% for paying within 5 days of receipt - so €198. That seems steep to me. Still, I did the crime so I'll do the time. I've paid the fine as I don't fancy the potential hassle of not, plus we plan to return to Italy next year (pandemic allowing of course) and hire a car.

One thing that did cross my mind - I must've been the slowest car on Tuscan roads, therefore the authorities must be raking it in.

True enough I suppose. Maybe that's why fines are high - to account for non paying nationals.

The Italians, same as the French discovered recently how lucrative the motorist can be when persecuted assiduously. Given their usual level of efficiency I would be tempted to let them whistle for it and ignore them. If you return you could always hire a car through your wife, assuming she has a licence and can name you as an additional driver. We do this when necessary so the car can be used without me having to drive. Especially after a decent lunch avec du vin!

Cheers Concrete

I say this not in a flippant manner. My good friend in the village is Italian. He has lived here for 40 years and was a university lecturer. He has been disposing of family property in Northern Italy and he marvels when anything happens at all. He thinks their whole administration system is a bureaucratic joke. Unless he goes in person once in a while nothing happens at all. Correspondence is ignored completely. It is thought that most major companies have a fair percentage of 'ghost' workers who either do not exist or exist but never turn up but claim there salary. If they cannot do basic checks on employees and cannot collect income tax properly how on earth will they enforce a motoring fine?

Cheers Concrete

Unfortunately I have already paid the fine as we plan to return to Italy next year and I don't want any potential hassle. Then again, the Italians probably aren't organised enough to link up offences with subsequent car hire agreements. I suppose paying also heads off any hassle from UK debt collection agencies although I know they can't do much.

At the end of the day I committed an offence and was caught. C'est la vie, or whatever it is in Italian.

Let's hope not!