So back in May I was driving into Oxford in my car we were wall to wall in traffic and my Bluetooth kit was dead so I had my apple headphones in so I could take calls whilst sat in the traffic a call came through and I picked my phone up slid the answer bar across and put it back in the door handle. Two mins later a police office walks out into the road and pulls me over I was a bit confused at the time but ended my call and opened the window (thinking must just be a routine check) the police officer then told me I had broken the law by handling my phone regardless of the fact I was stationary at the time and had my headphones in. He went onto to say he had to give me a ticket as his Sgt. Was watching but that it would be to just attend a course. I m not one for making a fuss so apologised to the office explained what I done he showed me there was a button on the headphones (news to me) to answer calls accepted my ticket and went on with my day. Yesterday I got in from work to open a letter with a conditional offer of 3 points and £100 fine to say I m annoyed is an understatement if I had been driving along at 60mph with it stuck to my head in my view bang to rights the law is the law wether we agree with it not but I was trying to stick to the law I even showed the officer my Bluetooth piece that was sat on the passenger seat that had died. I ve spoken to a solicitor who has advised me that they don’t HAVE to offer the course although I should and can call Thames Valley police and ask them to reconsider
I know how you feel mate, and you have my sympathys.
I came out of a multi storey car park and stopped at the lights. I noticed my phone was still on the dash so I picked it up and put it in the centre console at the handbrake. Lights changed and round the corner the blue lights came on and I got stopped and given a ticket for “using a hand held device”. She didnt care one iota that I had just moved it and didnt use it. I disputed the ticket and when it came to court her report said
“The defendant appeared to be texting using a hand held device. The road was busy with traffic and pedestrians”.
She seemed to forget to say that I was stationary, with the hand brake on, behind a bus with stationary traffic on my off side lane as well and that the pedestrians were no where near my car. I couldnt get legal aid as I was not recieving benefits so I had no leg to stand on as all I could do was state the facts and hope they took them into account. Fat chance.
My license had been clean for about 12 years and now it has 3 points on it because of some lying cow who wanted to take her bad mood out on someone. Like you,I was not moving but apparently it was safer for me to drive onto the motorway with a potential hazard to slip under the pedals than move it when I was stationary at the lights. The law is an ■■■
I always took the side of the police in most cases but not anymore after her twisted version of events and after I was told I wouldnt get legal aid as I worked and a guy up on the same day as me got a soliciter on LA as he was on benefits, lots of my income gets “forgotten” when im filling in the tax return forms.
Fair play and this is the biggest issue with the U.K. Today if your honest hard working and strive to be on the right side of the law you will get ■■■■ on conned and robbed by the government. Had you of been a doll waller you would of got legal aid and probably walked out of that court room Scott free still with a clean license
Were the police officers in uniform ? if they could see you handling the phone then surely you should have been able to see them - the first rule in breaking the law must be making sure there is not a police officer standing nearby, or had the phone distracted you from this protocol? When I see a police officer nearby I always hold the steering at ten to two and adopt a nonchalant expression.
more seriously though, the police do like easy targets to keep their number high and this catching people eating an apple or having a drink of water in stationary traffic is not good law enforcement. There is plenty of dangerous driving taking place where we would all like to see them taking action, but I guess that is more troublesome than catching people in a traffic jam.
Classic trick of Thames Valley Police around Oxford. Their favourite place is the Wolvercote roundabout where a plain clothes copper wears a cap and has his finger to his ear. He’ll radio any income, sorry offenders, to waiting coppers in Sunderland Avenue (the tree lined part of the A40). I’m yet to see them pull in anybody who fails to indicate leaving the roundabout or who uses the wrong lanes however.
Have to confess I’ve done similar to Snowman, phone on the dash instead of in its holder and on charge.
Nervously looked round and quick as I could slipped it in (yep story of my life).
Wrong I know but when you see one of the buggers with it pressed to their ear weaving in the lane there’s never a plobber about.
Was speaking to one of my rozzer buddies about using a satnav whilst driving the other day, apparently this is a two tier offence (or something like that) and they need to see that not only was the sat nav being messed with but also that my driving was affected.
I understand where your coming from and no your right I did nt see the officer who had caught me so clearly it did take away my concentration. It does not irritate me that I have been caught as what i did was made clear to me at the time against the law my irritation comes from the severity of penalty we all know that these courses exist but surely these courses exist for people like myself to educate I was making the effort to be as I though within the law by using a hands free device just in an incorrect way so why is it I m having the book thrown at me with points for at least making a concerted effort?
The OP should remember it’s an offence to opperate / handle a mobile phone while in control of the vehicle, even if the vehicle is stationary, engine running etc. This is obvious when you see vehicles pulled up at the side of the road and the engine is venting exhaust fumes, and the brake lights are on but yet the fools are yapping on their phone. But if he’d been sat there in stationary traffic with the handbrake on & keys in his hand when the copper approached him he wouldn’t have been busted.
peirre:
The OP should remember it’s an offence to opperate / handle a mobile phone while in control of the vehicle, even if the vehicle is stationary, engine running etc. This is obvious when you see vehicles pulled up at the side of the road and the engine is venting exhaust fumes, and the brake lights are on. But if he’d been sat there in stationary traffic with the handbrake on & keys in his hand when the copper approached him he wouldn’t have been busted.
On the topic/point of the engine being running, what about the new vehicle that cut the engine when stationary?
Evil8Beezle:
On the topic/point of the engine being running, what about the new vehicle that cut the engine when stationary?
The keys are still in the ignition and the engine is capable of running.
As I stated if you happen to be swinging the keys around your index finger with handbrake on I doubt the copper could bust you as your demonstrating the vehicle is immobilised. He might get annoyed at you blocking the road.
Stanny_1985:
So back in May I was driving into Oxford in my car we were wall to wall in traffic and my Bluetooth kit was dead so I had my apple headphones in so I could take calls whilst sat in the traffic a call came through and I picked my phone up slid the answer bar across and put it back in the door handle. Two mins later a police office walks out into the road and pulls me over I was a bit confused at the time but ended my call and opened the window (thinking must just be a routine check) the police officer then told me I had broken the law by handling my phone regardless of the fact I was stationary at the time and had my headphones in. He went onto to say he had to give me a ticket as his Sgt. Was watching but that it would be to just attend a course. I m not one for making a fuss so apologised to the office explained what I done he showed me there was a button on the headphones (news to me) to answer calls accepted my ticket and went on with my day. Yesterday I got in from work to open a letter with a conditional offer of 3 points and £100 fine to say I m annoyed is an understatement if I had been driving along at 60mph with it stuck to my head in my view bang to rights the law is the law wether we agree with it not but I was trying to stick to the law I even showed the officer my Bluetooth piece that was sat on the passenger seat that had died. I ve spoken to a solicitor who has advised me that they don’t HAVE to offer the course although I should and can call Thames Valley police and ask them to reconsider
Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk
That button on the headphones can also request siri to read out text messages for you and ask if you want to reply to it via dictation which i may add isn’t bad, she will also initiate phone calls for you as well, all without touching the phone…
Not wishing to add to your misery but we have to report any points we get on our licences to our TM. He then notifies the Traffic Commisioner. The story went around that the Senior Traffic Commisioner had said that she expected to see Vocational Licence suspensions for lorry & PCV drivers caught using mobiles, even if the offence was commited in a car.
We can’t forget to notify either. Our licences are checked online about once a month I think. We are always signing some data protection thing giving permission.
Stanny_1985:
I was making the effort to be as I though within the law by using a hands free device just in an incorrect way so why is it I m having the book thrown at me with points for at least making a concerted effort?
Perhaps the officer felt that only a penalty would draw your attention properly to the concept of hands-free not being something that requires a wireless earpiece, but which implies simply that the phone is not on any account held in the driver’s hands.
That you admitted you didn’t know of the earpiece answer functionality isn’t really much of an excuse, because you still continued to do the forbidden act and handle the phone (rather than not using it at all, or stopping to think about the mismatch between the claimed functionality and the way you were actually using it).
Many officers will, of course, be jaded by hearing excuses regularly, and clearly you’d thought and prepared enough to have a wireless earpiece, and you’re a driver by occupation. With all the publicity about mobile phone use, if it hasn’t sunk in that you mustn’t put the phone in your hands, then what, he might have asked himself, would work on you short of an actual penalty?
As an aside, hands-free use could also be achieved by a speakerphone or by a passenger operating the phone then holding it to your ear.
On a related point, we’ve got those Parrot things to bluetooth to the phone and you can pickup / drop the call via a button on the Parrot. Does that mean we’re interacting with a mobile device even if we don’t actually touch the phone?
peirre:
The OP should remember it’s an offence to opperate / handle a mobile phone while in control of the vehicle, even if the vehicle is stationary, engine running etc. This is obvious when you see vehicles pulled up at the side of the road and the engine is venting exhaust fumes, and the brake lights are on. But if he’d been sat there in stationary traffic with the handbrake on & keys in his hand when the copper approached him he wouldn’t have been busted.
On the topic/point of the engine being running, what about the new vehicle that cut the engine when stationary?
Or like my car push button start with key in my pocket engine then stops when stationary.
Kerragy:
Not wishing to add to your misery but we have to report any points we get on our licences to our TM. He then notifies the Traffic Commisioner. The story went around that the Senior Traffic Commisioner had said that she expected to see Vocational Licence suspensions for lorry & PCV drivers caught using mobiles, even if the offence was commited in a car.
We can’t forget to notify either. Our licences are checked online about once a month I think. We are always signing some data protection thing giving permission.
According to the Senior Traffic Commissioners statutory document No 6 a vocational licence holder caught using a hand held mobile in their own car but with no previous disciplinary history can expect a warning letter from DVLA informing him next offence will be reported to the TC
A second or subsequent offence will result in suspension of the vocational licence as well as the points/fine.
A TM or operator should report convictions for traffic offences to the TC along with reasons it happened and what they have done to stop it happening again - even when it is in the drivers own car. This is one of the Operator Licence undertakings.
Also - there was a public consultation earlier this year proposing to increase to 6 points and £150 for a vocational driver. I expect that’ll come in next year.
It is also interesting to see France has banned all hands free devices unless built into the vehicle - so no Bluetooth headsets etc
trevHCS:
On a related point, we’ve got those Parrot things to bluetooth to the phone and you can pickup / drop the call via a button on the Parrot. Does that mean we’re interacting with a mobile device even if we don’t actually touch the phone?
The law does not forbid you from interacting with the mobile hand-held device - only that you must not hold it. A device is hand-held if it is held or if it must be held at some point during use.
I admit there could be ambiguity about what “hold” means in some scenarios, but I would think any time your muscles are being actively used to carry the phone meets the criteria.
I’ve never actually seen plod pull someone over BLATENTLY on their phone, like one-handed, steering around a corner, in heated conversation - all the things that make a driver “seriously distracted”…
I don’t understand why the police feel the need to “sneak” these citations upon people in “grey” situations at best.
I have yet to see a policeman using a hands free device instead of answering their radio when driving, hypocrites the lot of them just because the drive with a hi viz on does not make it safe.
Kerragy:
Not wishing to add to your misery but we have to report any points we get on our licences to our TM. He then notifies the Traffic Commisioner. The story went around that the Senior Traffic Commisioner had said that she expected to see Vocational Licence suspensions for lorry & PCV drivers caught using mobiles, even if the offence was commited in a car.
We can’t forget to notify either. Our licences are checked online about once a month I think. We are always signing some data protection thing giving permission.
According to the Senior Traffic Commissioners statutory document No 6 a vocational licence holder caught using a hand held mobile in their own car but with no previous disciplinary history can expect a warning letter from DVLA informing him next offence will be reported to the TC
A second or subsequent offence will result in suspension of the vocational licence as well as the points/fine.
A TM or operator should report convictions for traffic offences to the TC along with reasons it happened and what they have done to stop it happening again - even when it is in the drivers own car. This is one of the Operator Licence undertakings.
Also - there was a public consultation earlier this year proposing to increase to 6 points and £150 for a vocational driver. I expect that’ll come in next year.
It is also interesting to see France has banned all hands free devices unless built into the vehicle - so no Bluetooth headsets etc
I thought it was also the vocational drivers responsibility to notify the traffic commissioner of any convictions.
