Interesting encounter with the Policía Federal

Yesterday while driving the cuota back from Colima with my wife and daughter I was stopped by the Federal highway patrol for speeding. Two patrol cars with four cops altogether were running a radar gun in the stretch between the two lagoons and had me nailed easily. My daughter was chuckling slightly when the officer came to the window which had me smiling. I don't know if he picked up on the vibe but he just kind of smiled also. He knew that I knew why I was stopped and there'd be no phony claim of innocence or whining to be let off the hook He politely asked our destination and to see my license and tarjeta de circulacion.

My back was bothering me a bit so I asked to step out of my car. No problem, he said. Let's walk back to the patrol car and take care of this. While he organized his ticket book  to begin to write me up, he asked if I knew how fast I was going. I said no and he siad he clocked me at 135 and the limit is 110. He then asked if would I be respecting the limit for the remainder of our journey and I replied, absolutely. He then handed me my documents, offered me his hand and told me to have a safe journey, that I had a beautiful family and it would be a shame if we were to have an accident.

There not even the slightest indication or insinuation of a mordida and the whole encounter was as pleasant as one could expect when stopped for a traffic violation.

not every highway federale or transito is a bad cop. good story.

>>> tarjeta de circulacion

Is that your registration for a Mexican car?

sparks wrote:>>> tarjeta de circulacion

Is that your registration for a Mexican car?

Yes.

smint wrote:Yesterday while driving the cuota back from Colima with my wife and daughter I was stopped by the Federal highway patrol for speeding. Two patrol cars with four cops altogether were running a radar gun in the stretch between the two lagoons and had me nailed easily.

Nice encounter. I'm assuming you mean Laguna de Sayula, and the other one? It's almost impossible not to speed on that stretch after climbing out of Colima.

Rosa Venus wrote:

smint wrote:Yesterday while driving the cuota back from Colima with my wife and daughter I was stopped by the Federal highway patrol for speeding. Two patrol cars with four cops altogether were running a radar gun in the stretch between the two lagoons and had me nailed easily.

Nice encounter. I'm assuming you mean Laguna de Sayula, and the other one? It's almost impossible not to speed on that stretch after climbing out of Colima.

La de San Marcos. They pulled over at least 3 other vehicles while we were stopped. Two weeks ago I hit 160kph without noticing.

Nice to see good stories posted.

As they say in Mexico, " If you treat people like people, you will get treated like people"
gm

I have been stopped by the Feds., at least 5 times over the past 2 years for speeding, between Tepic and Mazatlan, never a ticket, always a smile, never a Mordida issue! When we were involved in an injury accident heading to Laredo New years eve, 2011, 3 people ended up in the hospital, and I thank gawd the Feds were on the scene, no ticket, no mordida, just took 5 hours for the insurance company to complete paperwork! In my book the Feds are great!

A similar incident happened to me many years ago in Ontario.
The OPP officer saw the 2 car seats in my vehicle and simply said "It would be a shame if your kids had to grow up without their father".
No ticket, just the BEST warning I could get.
Message received and understood.   

Smint, would you be so kind as to answer a few questions for a newbie?

I'd like to know how much your ticket was for, where did you have to go to pay it, and how long did it take?

lobita wrote:Smint, would you be so kind as to answer a few questions for a newbie?

I'd like to know how much your ticket was for, where did you have to go to pay it, and how long did it take?

They didn't give him a ticket,just a warning,that was the point of the OP.
If you get a ticket from a federale you can pay it at Bancomer.

Ah, I misunderstood then.

What about with a ticket from state police?

lobita wrote:Ah, I misunderstood then.

What about with a ticket from state police?

if it's fer traffic violations that would be transitos/vialidad in every state. what state do you wanna know about?
there are a few posts on this board about where to pay in chapala.

I meant generally, like if one is on a long-distance trip through Mexico. A friend told me that one *must* pay mordida if stopped by a state cop, unless you can afford to postpone your trip for hours or a day or more, while you physically paid the ticket in the office of whatever state you were in. Like, if you got a ticket from State Police in SLP, you'd have to find the office in San Luis Potosi (the city), wait until it was next open, and maneuver through whatever bureaucracy or delay was involved with paying the ticket, before you could continue your trip.

I just wondered if this is an accurate assessment, or if maybe there's an option for resolving speeding tickets that she doesn't know about. (So far we're doing pretty good at not getting ticketed at all, but I don't expect that luck to last forever.)

lobita:

It seems that you have chosen one of the most notorious areas in all of Mexico for targeted phony traffic infractions. San Luis Potosi is infamous on the various Mexico forums and from all the anecdotal evidence, the reputation is well earned!

Like the US States and I believe (?) the Provinces of Canada, each Mexican State has their own set of traffic laws and different ways of dealing with fines. So one can hardly expect a "one size fits all method or procedure" for dealing with infractions. Then you have the procedures with dealing with fines originating in individual cities, towns or villages.

Some time in the last year or so, there were postings on various forums that seemed to indicate a new increased fine schedule for speeding on Federal Highways but I don't remember the details.

Should you wish to do some research on the Internet re: your questions, I would caution you that there is a good deal of very dated and inaccurate information out there. For example, I recently read on one of the Mexico Auto Insurance websites that one didn't have to worry about speeding on the cuotas because the Federales didn't have radar. What a crock and that hasn't been the case for a number of years.

State Transito fines:
If during business hours, go to the local recaudadora snd pay within so many days and get a 50% reduction.
Otherwise forget it and it will show up when you pay your annual refrendo on your vehicle... with no discount.
Foreign plated vehicles...I guess just keep moving and forget about it.