I gave my kid my car, and he got a huge speeding ticket.

[mahina]

Poll question: I gave my kid my car, and he got a huge speeding ticket.

He's a good kid, not spoiled, it's an old car, and he works hard at school and at work. Mostly.

But he got tagged going 80 in a 55. The safety of himself and others and trust in his judgement are my two big concerns.

Should I

[wildeyed]

1. Ground him for a loooong time.

Make him pay the ticket. Make him take a some sort of safe driver education course, preferable one where they show lots of gory pics of what happens to reckless young drivers. Make it clear, in writing, that if he so much as gets a parking ticket, car is gone the same day.

I am so glad mine don't drive yet. Too scary.

[mahina]

2. Good idea.

Especially the drivers ed part- and the written agreement part.

Thanks!
( I thought I was done with this kind of stuff! )

[elleng]

3. If he's really a good kid

he'll learn from the consequences of his own actions, that is, the huge speeding ticket.

You might clip 'accident' stories, and leave them around.

[mahina]

4. Well-

better than I was, that's for sure. But it still chills me how fast he was going, how incredibly reckless that was. Other lives and all.

Thanks for your suggestion, I will use it. Aloha.

[GreenEyedLefty]

5. Take the keys for a while, make him pay for the ticket

and the extra insurance. He'll realize soon enough that points on the driving record translate to astronomical insurance rates. Add that to the cost of gasoline and it'll be a nice reality check.

[SmokingJacket]

6. I would take the car away. Period.

I would have established ahead of time that a speeding ticket or any drug or alcohol use (in or out of the car) would mean losing the car.

80 in a 55 is dangerous and you're right to be concerned.

[InkAddict]

10. As he accumulates the money for the ticket, change it into

pennies; when the fine is complete, dump the pennines and make him handroll them.
Hand counting that many pennies is tedious and filthy work and will probably take longer than just an evening.

Oh, add in the amount for going to the penny weigh-station to return it into paper cash because it's your car.

[mwooldri]

7. Haven't they taken away his license for that?

Here in NC if you're ticketed doing 15 over the speed limit it's pretty much automatically grounds for surrendering your drivers license. That's 25 over limit. My wife apparently was caught doing 82 in a 65 zone, and it went to court. She got lawyered up admittedly and it got thrown out of court.

If he's facing these kind of penalties then that's surely enough. If it's a fine then he needs to pay it for sure, and maybe invest in some GPS tracking equipment (which he needs to pay for) that in future if he is caught doing speeding again and he really didn't then he can prove to the courts that he didn't. The mere idea that something's looking over him might be enough to temper future behaviour.

Just an idea, Mark.

[elleng]

8. THANKS

for the photo!

Hope everything is OK now!

[Sabriel]

9. And that's the time he was verified speeding

How many other times was he that reckless?

I'd say cool him off for a while.

I don't envy you. I'm not looking forward to this headache in 6 (ack!) years.

[seabeyond]

11. i have gotten speeding tickets all my life. especially first year

hadnt learned to talk out of or see them before they saw me.

depends on the road. if it was 80 on a freeway and speed was 55, not so much.

if it was a road i would be concerned about, in town, ya.... more concerned.

regardless he would be paying for ticket.

if he was not paying for insurance, i would shift the burden, or at least increase to him. my kids will pay their own insurance though, already