By François Biber

Tired of fighting, P.A. man pays red light ticket

Feb 2, 2015 | 3:21 PM

After months of back-and-forth with the City of Saskatoon, a Prince Albert man has decided to fight no more.

“I know I wasn’t at fault and they have to have a better system than that,” said Wolfgang Manicke, who’s spent the last few months of 2014 fighting a red light camera ticket he said he never received.

So instead of hiring a lawyer, Manicke decided to simply pay the $230 fine and be done with the whole mess.

City of Saskatoon records show Manicke was caught running a red light at Idylwyld Drive and 33rd Street on March 29. A glitch in the processing system saw the ticket mailed out Aug. 25. Once received, Manicke had until Oct. 10 to pay or choose to fight the ticket.

But the City doesn’t use registered mail. Sending tickets via registered mail requires the recipient to sign off on the letter once it’s delivered. But because the courts don’t require registered mail, the City sends tickets by regular post.

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On Oct. 27, Manicke said he received a conviction letter from Saskatchewan Government Insurance (SGI) threatening taking away his driver’s licence if he didn’t pay the red light camera ticket in Saskatoon, which came as a surprise because Manicke said he never received a ticket.

Despite speaking with the customer service department at city hall, Manicke was told he had to pay the ticket or lose his licence and that’s not sitting well.

“The city admitted there was a glitch in their system, but if there’s a glitch in my system in my business, it’s my fault and I pay it, you can’t make the customer pay for your glitch,” Manicke said. “Before you set something up you should make sure that it works — sometimes the mail service isn’t really good so I never received the ticket.”

“It should be sent through registered mail,” he said.

news@panow.com 

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