Q. How many points do I have to have before I am liable to be disqualified under the totting up provisions?

A. 12 within a 3 year period going from the date of the oldest offence to the date of latest offence.

Q. If I delay the court proceedings can I take it over the 3 year period?

A. NO. The time limit starts on the date of the oldest offence and runs to the date of offence. So if you have 9 points and the oldest was imposed on 12 September 2006. You are stopped for speeding today (28th July) it's todays date that counts not when it is dealt with in court so even if you delayed it until after 12 September at the time of the offence (28th July) you would have had 9 points.

Q. I think I was flashed by a speed camera a few weeks ago but I still haven't heard anything how long do I have to wait to see whether I get a speeding ticket

A. The Police have to issue a notice of intended prosecution to the registered owner of the car within 14 days so assuming the car is registered at your address you should have heard within 2 weeks. If you haven't then they are out of time.

Q. There are road works on the motorway and a temporary speed limit of 50 I was doing 70. I have been told that temporary speed limits don't count. Am I right.

A. No, you can still be fined and points imposed for exceeding temporary limits

Essex police today confirmed that they are investigating claims that thousands of speeding tickets issued are in fact invalid.

The reason for this is that the correct procedure was not followed invalidating the speeding tickets.

This opens the door for the speeding fines to be overturned and the points removed from the licence. This has proved too late for some motorists. We were contacted by Andy who said "I went to court because I had 9 points on my licence, stupidly I did not get a motoring solicitor to represent me. The magistrates gave me 4 points and disqualified me from driving for 6 months. This meant I lost my job as a delivery driver, this has had a huge effect on my family. It's all very well taking the points off my licence and refunding me the fine but that won't get my job back"

Motoring Solicitors have confirmed that applications could be made for compensation for loss of employment arising from this.

Should the procedure prove to be defective, the police could face a flood of claims from motorists who were convicted by magistrates of speeding since March 2007.

It would not apply to those motorists who were dealt with by post and paid the fine on receiving a Notice of Intended Prosecution by the police. Drivers who went on speed awareness courses would also not be covered.

Donna Veasey, a force spokesman, added: “We are currently looking into whether there is an issue with the Section 20 notices we have served. It should be stressed, even if this does prove to be an issue, it would only affect a proportion of cases where the person went to magistrates’ court since March 2007.”

This comes on the back of 2 other errors we discovered this week relating to thousands of speeding tickets in Dorset and Lancashire.

If you have been affected by this and want to make an application to have the points removed from your licence, speeding fine refunded or compensation apply at info@motoringlawyersonline.com and we will investigate your matter and advise you whether you have a claim.