The traffic police have come up with a new trick to collect unpaid fines. As of April 2, they are not allowed to take the license or stop driving, but collect the blue driver’s license.
The method involves drawing up an act of infringement under Article 190 of the Road Traffic Act. The text says that the driver is obliged to pay the fine within one month. After 30 days, a penal decree for a fine of BGN 20 is issued, but in order to receive the blue coupon, in addition to them, the driver must pay his old debts.
Exactly 40,036 drivers have been fined for not paying fines in the last 2 years. For the same reason, in 2019 and 2020, a total of 9930 cars were stopped. This is how the Ministry of Interior answered Trud’s questions under the Access to Public Information Act.
The two coercive administrative measures under Art. 171 of the Road Traffic Act were crossed out by the Constitutional Court in March. The reason for the decision was the checks introduced in June last year for unpaid fines at the borders. However, the Ministry of Interior announced that they do not keep separate statistics for seized books and stopped cars at the border checkpoints.
According to lawyers, people against whom the police have imposed these measures at the border can successfully sue under the State and Municipal Liability for Damages Act, but in other cases they are unlikely to receive compensation.
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