Ok, great. So does a traffic ticket constitute a debt? And if so, how is it that they can refuse to accept payment in pennies or any other coin according to US Law?
I’ve seen many videos on Youtube of people trying to pay tickets in pennies and mixed coins, and being refused at the clerk’s office (or wherever they are trying to pay). They say that they do not have to accept coins, and then the people paying with coins spout off some stuff about the Coinage Act of 1965 (or something like that?) that says all coins are valid legal tender and must be accepted for any amount of debt. The government offices in the videos are never impressed and just tell the guy to move along and pay his debt with bills and not coins.
I feel like we need some more straight dope on this issue.
I fully understand that a merchant need only accept whatever payment they desire (boiled eggs, if that’s what they really want), because no debt has been incurred.
But if I want to pay a ticket in mixed coins, under what legal framework can the government refuse and still hold me accountable for the debt?
Well, it depends on the legal framework for the traffic fine, which varies from place to place, obviously. But in general you’re entitled to a trial if you want one, so there’s a degree of choice about a traffic fine; you can always decline to pay it and opt for a trial instead. So the fact that you can lawfully decline to pay the fine must create some uncertainty, to put it no higher, about whether it’s a debt or not.
Most contracts create a debt. Let’s say that you agree to mow my yard for $30. You mow my yard. I now have a $30 debt to you. If I dump 3,000 pennies at your feet and you walk away, can I say that I paid and that you are out of luck?
Not necessarily. Contracts contain implied terms. When you agreed to $30, it was implied that the $30 would be paid in normal, customary, and reasonable means. Anyone that understood our contract would know that I couldn’t tape a $20 and a $10 to an arrow and fire it at your heart as a method of payment. It was understood that some form of REASONABLE currency would be given to you.
I’m sure that such contract law could also apply to an acceptance of a driver’s license.
In the US at least, I think you’d have a good arguable case that they have to accept the pennies. But you’d have to wait around while they found the time to count the pennies, verify the amount and issue you the receipt as evidence that you have discharged the fine. And I don’t think any court would hold that they had an obligation to prioritise that particular item of work over other items of work they had in hand on behalf of less unreasonable citizens.
I agree with the last post, that they should make these idiots wait while each coin is counted individually in front of them, and a receipt issued. In fact, I think that’s what the IRS will do if you try to pay in coins… they will take them, but they will make you sit present while the amount is verified. Slowly.
For the record, my local Best Buy didn’t have the slightest problem accepting rolled coins when I bought my TV. I had well over $150 in coins. I had been saving my change a while for that one. They said it’s actually quite common for people to come in with a heap of rolled up coins. They just take them to a scale and weigh them.
Correct, so I would think that a court would determine this on a case by case basis. In your hypo, the bank is clearly being unreasonable and attempting to cause the loan to go into default. Judgment against the bank along with costs and any statutory penalties.
Another hypo: Same as above but I try to pay my mortgage by airdropping pennies over the bank branch. Or more reasonably, handing the teller a sack of pennies. I think the court would rule the other way. Now I am being unreasonable and not dealing with the bank in good faith. Judgment against me in that I did not tender payment.
Of course, traffic fines are somewhat different because they aren’t freely bargained for exchanges. However, I think that the implicit societal contract would enforce the same rules. The State can’t be unreasonable in its payment demands (only crisp 2004 series $20 bills) nor can the citizen (no sacks of pennies). When I am a judge, I would rule that “legal tender” laws create a prima facie evidence of payment which can be rebutted by other evidence.
As I understood it, the concept of legal tender came about because the US during and after the revolution chanced upon the simple expedient of printing money, which made it close to worthless. Some areas of the new country the merchants began demanding payment in British currency (or Spanish, or similar gold) rather than American paper. The government needed to impress on its citizens that its currency was the money in which transactions were to be made, as part of the transition away from being colonies of Britain. One a debt was established between to parties, the settlement of the debt can be made in legal tender and cannot be (reasonably?) refused.
(For example, if Fred owes Bill two cows and Bill goes to court to collect, the court won’t pick out two cows - typically they will award Bill the market value, in legal tender, of two cows.)
As mentioned, many legal tender laws have exceptions to prevent “nuisance” values of coins being used. In the example of Canadian $1 coins, $25 is one roll of the coins.
I think that ALL of the above posts, while perhaps interesting and maybe even informative, are rather beating around the bush.
I think, at the root of the OP’s question, the operative principle is that courts, departments of motor vehicles, city halls, etc., or whoever collects fines or other such payments, have the power (whether or not they also have any legal right) to demand whatever they damn well want.
And if you wanna argue about it? Well, good luck with that.
Call me cynical. Does anyone doubt that it mostly works that way?
Just for the record, the situation in England is different. The Coinage Act 1971 limits the amount of low value coins that can be used as legal tender - 20p in 1p or 2p coins, £5 in 5p or 10p coins, and £10 in 20p or 50p coins. £1 and £2 coins are good up to any amount. Link
There are now places that don’t accept and kind of cash.
My healthcare provider is one. Back in Feburary they had signs saying they would no longer take cash for any transaction. They said it was a money saving issue.
They accept checks, credit or debit cards.
Is this a typical things with landlords too? All the landlords and apartment managers I’ve had for the past many years (of whom there have been several) demand payment in checks, cashier’s checks, or money orders only. – NO cash.
They don’t want to have their front-office people handling large wads of cash, and they don’t want much cash sitting around in the rental office. Other forms of payment, however, leave some kind of paper trail, and they do want that. And so do all the payors, really, whether they realize it or not.
I agree. Mostly because it won’t be worth fighting it to get a reported court decision. If I owe the state a $187 fine for a speeding ticket and I am pissed off and pay with 18,700 pennies and it is refused, what is my next step?
Hire a lawyer to sue them in federal court? Even if the state loses, it will appeal to a U.S. Circuit Court. I will pay thousands of dollars in legal fees while my driver’s license is suspended because I didn’t “pay” the fine. And all of this takes years?
I can’t imagine some rich or stubborn enough to fight such a small amount and not give up and just pay with normal currency before it gets to that point. Or the state may simply not wish to pursue the matter and accept the pennies. Most judges are going to be pissed that a $187 dispute is taking up their docket and going to trial and will be browbeating the parties into settling: scheduling multiple mediations and the like.
And if you would somehow win and courts across the country get inundated with pennies for fines and you have made your point? Congress changes the law to stop it. So you lose.
No, the concept is much older than that. The Oxford English Dictionary has cites for the term “legal tender” going back to 1740. In America, well before the Revolutionary Wars various colonial governments issued paper money (known as “bills of credit”) from time to time. The British Parliament passed legislation as early as 1751, authorising the colonies to do this (within limits) and making the bills of credit legal tender for the payment of public, but not private, debts. So the colonial government was required to accept bills of credit in payment of taxes or court fines due, but a merchant was not obliged to accept them in payment of a trading debt.
Laws in various jurisdictions have actually removed coins from “legal tender”.
Specifically that the law does NOT require the handling of large amounts of coins.
If you live in a jurisdiction where the law has limited legal tender in this way.
In the US, currency is a federal matter, so it’s doubtful if any state or lesser jurisdiction can make a local law limiting the legal tender status of US notes and coins. Only the Feds can do this and, SFAIK, they haven’t done it.