Notice Of Intended Prosecutions (NIPS) Known As S172 Notices
If your car is involved in an incident or is seen on camera to have committed an offence, the law requires that the police must send the registered keeper a Notice Of Intended Prosecution within 14 days of the incident. Failure to complete the form correctly and within the specified time carries a minimum penalty of 6 points, plus a fine.
This is often a higher penalty than the original offence that you may have committed. If you do not update the DVLA with your new home address when you move or do not alter the address where you keep your car, it is not their fault if the Notice goes to your old address and you do not receive it. The most complicated messy cases that we receive in this area of law as where Notices were not received and matters are dealt with in the absence of the registered keeper which, in one case, led to a person having their licence revoked for 4 years without knowing.
There are ways to deal with such matters, but you will need expert help. If you do send the response but for some reason the police do not receive the reply (lost in the post for example) you may have a defence to this matter and will need to seek advice. If your car is registered in your company name, then you still need to be aware of who was driving any vehicle at any time, or you be given a financial penalty and in some cases Directors may have their personal driving licences endorsed.