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Ronan Condon
Absolute Fucking Champion
clan : n8z
posts : 816
site administrator
| wow, two updates in two weeks, i'm turning into an awful nerd. i decided to write this little piece in a futile effort to vent some of my frustration.
it all started on friday 13th, 2000, believe it or not, i should have known from the start. i was working at the time, waiting until the following february to come back to ul to finish my degree. i was heading to cork from dublin on a job when i got stopped for speeding just outside mitchelstown in cork. "murphy's law" of course, the only time i ever get done for speeding and i am caught doing 87mph, which is a "put off the road" offence in ireland, especially on your second provisional license. i managed to talk nice to the cop and rather than reporting me, he just gave me a ticket for 50 notes, the standard punishment, so i was delighted. "pay the said fine within 21 days or you will be prosecuted", says the culchie. grand so.
in ireland, you can pay a parking fine/tax fine anywhere, but a speeding fine has to be paid in the station it was issued from. i know this now, but didn't then. so i toddled into limerick garda station within the 21 days and paid my £50 fine.
"can i pay this here?"
"yes, no problem" was the reply.
three weeks later a summons arrived in my door to court for the non-payment of a speeding fine. i was there wondering what the fuck was going on so back i went into limerick garda station and asked the girl in the traffic office what the story was. it was a different girl this time, and she said "oh, that girl shouldnt have accepted the payment here, but if she did, she should have sent it on to mitchelstown. leave it with me, i'll send on the ticket and receipt of payment to mitchelstown and the court hearing will be cancelled".
i was there thinking, "ok, this is a bit fuckin gay but could be worse", so i left it at that, and went to call the prosecuting cop about a fortnight later, and he said to me "your court hearing was on today, and you weren't there." so i told him what happened in limerick and he said "well i never got anything from limerick. by the way, the judge was michael p*****, and you got disqualified from driving for 3 months, a 3-year endorsement on your license, and a £150 fine".
i nearly fuckin died, some shit what wasn't my fault was after happening and now i was in big trouble. michael p***** has the reputation for being a hard bastard judge, and he definitely showed it here. of course it makes me sick in my stomach at the fact that i had been "judged" and severely reprimanded by a man who is a raving alcoholic and left his wife and seven kids in the lurch for another woman. so i went home to talk to my da about it, and we went to a solicitor at home about an appeal. she told me that since i had paid the ticket, it was a mistake on the garda side, but seeing as i hadnt been in court, it looked bad for me. (even tho i was told i wouldn't have to go. it was a small mistake, but any fault of mine is miniscule compared to this bullshit). so anyway, the solicitor put the case through, and said that it would cost me the best part of 600 notes to appeal this. i said grand, i didnt give a shit, £600 is nothing compared to the increase in my insurance if i had an endorsement on my license. so i sat back to wait for the case.
the case came up on 14th november last, so off i went to court in my suit, with bunny and overlord in tow for moral support. this time the judge seemed to be reasonably sound. we stood waiting for my case to come up and eventually it was called. i was up there standing in front of the judge, half the garda siochana of fermoy, some normal people and the remainder were vicious scobers. all of them staring at me. it was like oliver "asking for more". so i told my story and the judge said "hang on a second, you paid the fine??". yeah i said and then the prosecuting cop tried to still get me nailed by saying i should have paid it in mitchelstown. the judge was having none of it and gave out about the whole thing. then the state prosecutor said he thinks it was a mistake on the part of the state, and the judge said, like out of a film, "this man was prosecuted in the wrong, case dismissed".
lickety splits, that was the end of it, fuckin deadly, clean license back, no endorsements, no shite. i thought. i had taken the car off the road while in college and since i have a job again now, i went to go through the motions of putting the car back on the road. there is a nasty little circle of things that have to be done now at this stage. as my 2nd provisional license is expired, i need to get my third. to get your third license, you have to have applied for your test and have received a letter back from the dept on it. (at least thats the impression they give you). you need to send a copy of your license to your insurer before they will send you out an insurance certificate. you need your insurance certificate to get a motor tax disc for your car. so obviously the letter from the dept is the main thing. i applied for the test in december because i need to do it again anyway, my insurance is riding me. i got a letter back from them and went into the tax office about 2 weeks ago.
the problem with getting the license is you need to hand in your expired one, if you can't find it, it's "no problem", you just need a stamped form from the cops saying that you have lost it. i went into the cop station first, and asked the guy for the form. "ah jaysus now, where are dem tings", he says, rooting around the desk. he comes back ten minutes later and says "i cant find any forms, go up to the corporation office and get one and bring it back and i will stamp it for you".(this is limerick garda station. again). i went up and queued in the tax office, got a form, walked back to the garda station, stood waiting for 10 minutes, got seen, got the form, went back to the tax office to get my license. as with all govt offices, the tax office is a "take a ticket and wait" office, so after roughly 40 minutes of waiting, i got seen. now, i always used to be a bit cluck with things like forms, i would always wait til the last minute to get photos etc, but in recent times have strived to be "sorted" for things like that, and sorted i was, i had every little stupid thing on the checklist. as i said, queued for 40 minutes, went up to the girl, passed her over the stuff.
"sorry, this letter isnt good enough, the dept will send you out another one with an actual date on it." i asked her "look. this confirms that i have applied and paid for my test, whats the problem?". "sorry, nothing i can do, come back with the letter, she said."
grand. waited for the letter. got the letter. back in to town monday last. queued for an hour. got seen by a different guy, he asks me where my last license was so he can get reference numbers etc. i tell him clonmel, which is my home town and where all my licenses etc are issued. he comes back 15 minutes later and says "yeah i got though to clonmel, no problem, i can give you your license now."
.....(i was waiting for it, murphys fuckin law, nothing is ever that easy)
".....just one thing, there is an endorsement on that license, so i'll be stamping it on this one."
"ehhhh....no there isn't", i said to him and my jaw dropping through the floor. i explained there may have been one on it but it had since been appealed and thrown out of court. he said he would get their "legal expert" for me. i told her the same shit. she told me that if i got them a letter comfirming this, they could take it off. i said, fuck that this isn't my mistake, sorry sir there is nothing we can do, she said.
at this point, i'm kinda startin to get that "homer-simpson-leaving-ny-city"-click-blink thing in my left eye where i'm going to pull a gun and mow down everyone in the tax office. i leave and call cork district court. i am told to call the appeals office in cork city. i call the appeals office and explain it all to a girl there. "just a second", she says and puts me on hold. someone else picks up and i have to explain it all to her. she looks it up and confirms the appeal went through. tells me that the court notified cork motor tax office on the 22nd of november. i don't know which is worse, the fact that they told a motor tax office that is nowhere near where i live and isn't the office that issued my license, or the fact that cork motor tax office could pick up the fuckin phone and tell clonmel tax office. that click-blink in my eye is getting worse. but, the girl tells me to go back to the tax office and tell them to call blah-blah in cork.
i go back to the tax office. it's closed. i go home. i take another morning off work and go in to the tax office. i queue for an hour. i explain myself to the girl in there. she calls cork. she comes back and says "yes, the court document is being sent up by fax, can you come back in 15mins and i will do your license for you?". fuckin nice one, went outside and came back 15 minutes later. maybe almost smiling. "emmm....i still haven't got the fax, the girl in cork, emm....cant find it". yes, that's exactly what she said. "can we post out your license to you?", she asked. "no, i need it today". "can you come back this afternoon?", she asked. i said "no, i want the license this morning". "please come back in an hour".
i come back an hour later, she gives me the license. i am waiting now on a simple insurance cert to tax my car and drive it away.
this is the part of the story where i blow up and scream insults about the absolute bullshit that your taxes are paying for, and other such rants. but to be honest i am too tired after all this, and if it didn't happen to me, i would think it was made up. but it's not.
now....the social services office, thats another story.....
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