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North Carolina Traffic Fines


A Short Introduction to North Carolina Traffic Fines

North Carolina traffic fines are some of the strictest in the entire country. Be prepared to pay hundreds of dollars in court costs and fines and to potentially lose your license over them. Still, panicking can only make the situation worse. Rather, find out as much information as you can about North Carolina traffic fines and remember that options are still available to you to fight your ticket in court or to try to negotiate a lower charge.

A Summary of North Carolina Traffic Fines

There’s a wide variety of North Carolina traffic fines that you may be punished with, but you’ll notice that with them all the majority of the money you pay won’t be as a North Carolina traffic fine but as court costs. In fact, the most commonly occurring court costs or statistical mode is $188, no small sum by any means. With that in mind, here’s a brief summary of North Carolina traffic fines:

• All lane violations: $30 fine + $188 court costs

• Ignoring stop signs and traffic lights: $25 fine + $188 court costs

• Going 10 miles per hour over the speed limit: $30 fine +188 court costs

• Going 15 miles per hour over the speed limit: $30 fine +188 court costs

• Going 20 miles per hour over the speed limit: $45 fine +190 court costs

Not also that individuals who pled guilty to 20 miles per hour lose their license. For this reason, most individuals are given the chance to negotiate with prosecutors to lower their crime to 15 miles per hour. Such individuals still have to pay their original North Carolina traffic fine, regardless of their plea deal.

The Disciplinary Point System

Yet no matter how severe your North Carolina traffic fine is, that may be the least important of your new troubles. That’s because each North Carolina traffic fine comes with a disciplinary point value that is added to your license, increasing the cost of your car insurance, sometimes by thousands of dollars over the course of a year.  

Besides acting as hidden North Carolina traffic fines, these points can help keep habitually unsafe drivers off the road. Get 12 points on your license over the course of three-years and you stand to lose your license for up to 60 days. Get 8 points during the next three years and it’s another suspension for up to an entire year.

For both these reasons, it is as important for drivers to watch closely the number of points on their license as to watch how big their North Carolina traffic fine is. Here is a brief summary of points values assigned to different traffic violations:

• Speeding in a 55 mile per hour or greater zone, provided your speed is less than 76 miles per hour: 2 points

• At fault damage worth less than $3000: 2 points

• At fault damage worth more than $3000: 3 points

• Speeding in excess of 75 miles per hour: 4 points

• Reckless driving: 4 points

• Ignoring stop signs and traffic lights: 2 points

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