Do they throw the person in jail? What does the “law” do?
The courts will work out payment plans and short of that, you’re almost certainly going to get community service rather than jail time.
If you’re my neighbour and you don’t pay your parking tickets, one morning you go out to find your car locked down with one of these. I suspect that was a case of “didn’t” rather than “couldn’t” however.
Here in Pittsburgh, if you have an unpaid parking ticket, it goes into collections (with an out of state agency, which is a bit of a concern) and can ding your credit.
If you accumulate 5 unpaid parking tickets, they’ll boot your car, and it takes payment of all ticket fines and an additional fee to get the boot removed.
A co-worker of mine had her license plates removed by the cops during the night. I’m not really sure what it accomplished since the car was still drivable, but that’s what they did. OTOH, she did go in and pay her tickets the next day, so I guess it accomplished that.
There’s a show called Parking Wars on A&E. On that show, people with too many parking tickets get their cars booted. If they still don’t pay the fine after a certain amount of time, the parking authority comes back and tows the car. Then the person has to not only pay the fine (plus late fees) but they also have to pay storage fees and an additional fine to get their car out of the impound lot.
One guy removed the boot himself (and damaged his van and tire in the process). Not only did they immediately tow his van, but now he also had to pay an additional fee for destroying the boot. He wasn’t a very happy camper.
In Calif if you have unpaid parking tickets you can not renew your registration. And you can end up with your car impounded. So to get your car back you now have impound fees, tow fees, and storage fees.
If you get a ticket, and can’t afford to pay, go to court and explain it to the judge. He’ll minimize your costs and put you on a payment plan. Unless he doesn’t like you, which is a good reason never to go out with a judge’s daughter.
Way way back a friend of mine had a thousand dollars or more of unpaid parking tickets (which at $8 a pop was a lot of tickets; he just never bothered looking for legal parking downtown). This was before the Denver boot was invented. He said that if he got towed, he would just abandon the car. I don’t know what happened to the car, but he got a new driver’s license under a fake name (much easier to do 50 years ago when they just believed you).
This is typical of a lot of cities. The state may also eventually refuse to renew your registration or license.
OTOH if you owe tickets but no longer own a car and don’t care about dings on your credit, fuck 'em. The collection agency has the option of taking you to court but I can’t imagine they would ever bother over a couple of hundred dollars.
“Not able to, but willling to pay” is a huge difference to “doesn’t pay (because apparently unwilling to)”. Think about it like any other debt: if you are honest and want to pay it back, you go straight up to the creditor and work out a payment plan. There may be added interest, but with the state, it’s usually lower than the interest a bank would charge on a credit.
If you don’t pay but also don’t say anything, the state/ creditor will naturally assume that you are unwilling, and will use force to try and make you comply. Once you signal your willingness, a payment plan can still be worked out (though additional fees for your initial non-compliance are probably added). Usually, sitting things out and waiting for force to be applied is the worse proposition for all sides: it wastes a lot of time and effort for the creditor, and may not get them their money back (clamping a car doesn’t get immediate revenue).
So always the best way is to go right upfront and say "I can’t pay right now the whole amount, but I will get money next month / can make payments of 10 $ / week… " whatever, as long as you are honest about it.
Parking tickets are a violation. They can never result in jail time.
Wow, this thread reminded me of an interesting high school friend. He racked up tons of tickets before the Denver boot was common. He eventually got a summons to appear in court. The judge gave him the choice of paying the tickets (which I seem to remember was hundreds of dollars), or spending two nights in jail.
He took the two nights in jail. And a week later said it was the biggest mistake of his life.
I don’t recall if anything happened to his car, like if it was impounded or anything. But the look on his sorry face describing what a stupid choice he made still makes me giggle.
ETA: seeing the above post, which makes much sense, I now wonder if was gaslighting us all. If that’s the case, well done my old friend – it took a few decades to uncover your scheme.
That’s true. But if one ignores the summons, and fails to show up for court, that’s Contempt Of Court, and someone I know (in New Jersey) did get jailed for it.
And on one occasion, when I myself went to a police station (also in NJ) to pay a very long overdue ticket, the person there said to me, “It’s a good thing you came in to pay this. Did you know we had a warrant out for your arrest for Contempt of Court? You’re lucky you didn’t get pulled over.”
Do they allow you to pay tickets by check? What happens if the check bounces? (I know paper-hanging is an offense, but is there any recognition of the fact sometimes people think things will float longer than they do?)
I recently had a ticket I simply forgot to pay. I got a notice about it, and still forgot to pay it. Yup, I’m very forgetful… Eventually they suspended my license. Had to pay the ticket and a reinstatement fee.
Some people try to drive with the boot still on. (Video)
In my court, if you don’t pay your parking ticket(s), you’ll get a summons to come to court to explain why. If you fail to come in, a bench warrant will issue for your arrest. If you’re then stopped for running a red light on, say, Friday afternoon, you’ll be kept in jail until you’re arraigned before a magistrate like me on Monday morning. You can then get time to pay (TTP) for as long as you need, within reason, or you can ask for community work service (CWS), although that’s disfavored, as it actually costs the court money to administer the CWS program. Not everyone who asks for CWS gets it.
Short answer: Pay your parking tickets and you won’t have to find out.