Traffic fine checker

South Africa is running two traffic fine systems side by side, and which one you are dealing with changes everything: what your options are, how long you have, and what happens if you do nothing. Most people cannot tell which notice they are holding, and the advice they find online is usually written for the other one.

This checker identifies the notice, works out where you are in the process, and tells you which doors are still open.

It also settles a question that a great deal of published advice currently gets wrong. Demerit points are not in force. Not anywhere in the country, not even in Johannesburg and Tshwane where the rest of AARTO has run since its pilot began, and no start date has been set. The section below explains why so many articles say otherwise.

What this tool works out and who it is for

You answer four questions: what kind of notice you have, how many days ago you were given it, who was driving, and whether you want to dispute it.

The result names the system that governs the notice, places you in the process, tells you what you can still do and by when, and sets out what happens at the next stage if you do nothing. It is for anyone holding a fine they do not understand, anyone who has been ignoring one and has started to worry, and any business whose vehicles collect notices nobody is dealing with.

The two systems

AARTO, the Administrative Adjudication of Road Traffic Offences Act 46 of 1998, replaces the criminal process with an administrative one. There is no court at the start: since 1 July 2026 there is no longer an option to choose a court trial, and a refused representation can be taken to the AARTO Appeals Tribunal within 30 days, whose decision can then be taken to a magistrates' court within a further 30 days. The notice escalates on its own through fixed stages, and the sanction at the end is not a criminal conviction but a block on your licensing transactions.

The Criminal Procedure Act 51 of 1977 governs everywhere AARTO has not been proclaimed. A traffic fine there is a criminal charge. It ends in a court, and the sanction at the end of ignoring it is a warrant for your arrest.

Which one applies depends on where the infringement happened, not on where you live or where the vehicle is registered. AARTO ran only in Johannesburg and Tshwane from 2008 as a pilot. From 1 July 2026 it was extended to around sixty more municipalities, 62 in all, which is the position as at October 2026. No Western Cape municipality is in that phase. The province is to be included in a later phase, for which no date has been gazetted, so a fine issued in Cape Town today is still a Criminal Procedure Act matter.

How the AARTO process works

AARTO runs in three stages of 32 days each, and every stage closes an option.

Stage one: the infringement notice. You have 32 days. Pay within them and the fine is halved. You can instead nominate the person who was actually driving, make a written representation to the RTIA asking for the notice to be cancelled, or arrange to pay in instalments. All four options are open, and this is the only stage where the discount exists. A representation costs nothing to lodge; if it is refused a R100 fee is added and you may appeal to the Appeals Tribunal within 30 days, on a fee of R200, and the outcome notice tells you what you must pay and by when. Nomination is on form AARTO 07, a signed declaration, and closes once a courtesy letter is issued.

Stage two: the courtesy letter. If you do nothing, the RTIA must send a courtesy letter. The 50% discount falls away and a fee of R100 is added. You can still make a representation or arrange instalments, and you still have 32 days, but you are now paying full price plus the fee.

Stage three: the enforcement order. If you do nothing again, an enforcement order is issued. Another R100 is added. Critically, the right to make a representation falls away entirely at this point, and the order blocks licensing transactions on eNaTIS: no driving licence, no professional driving permit and no vehicle licence disc may be issued to you until it is dealt with. Most people discover their enforcement order at the licensing department, months later, when they cannot renew a disc.

Getting out of an enforcement order is harder than avoiding it. You are applying for revocation, on form AARTO 14, rather than making the representation that cost nothing to lodge three months earlier.

The demerit points question

Here is where almost everything you will read online is out of date.

Since 2019 one start date after another has been announced for the demerit points system, including in proclamations that never took effect. Each date was reported everywhere, and some are still being repeated as though they happened.

It did not. The proclamations that actually brought the amended AARTO Act into force, Proclamations 322 and 323 of 2026, took effect on 1 July 2026 and expressly excluded the sections that create demerit points, sections 24 to 28. Those sections have never been brought into operation anywhere in South Africa, and no start date has been gazetted.

So no fine you receive today can cost you a point, because there are no points to lose. When the system does start, regulation 20(6) of the AARTO Regulations, 2026 sets the disqualification threshold at 15 points rather than the 12 that older articles mention. As at October 2026 no start date has been set, and the dates reported have moved repeatedly since 2019, so treat any date you read as unconfirmed.

None of this makes the fines themselves less real. The 32-day stages, the discount, the courtesy letter, the enforcement order and the eNaTIS block are all fully operational in the municipalities where AARTO applies. Only the points are not.

What the Criminal Procedure Act notices are

A section 341 notice is the ordinary ticket: left on a windscreen, handed over at a roadblock, or posted to the registered owner after a camera infringement. It names an amount and a place to pay. It is not a summons and there is no court date on it. Ignoring it does not end the matter, because the state can issue a summons afterwards, and from that point you have a court appearance to worry about.

A section 56 notice is the serious one. It is a written notice to appear in court, and it names a court, a date and a time. If you do not appear, and no legal representative appears for you, the court can issue a warrant for your arrest. Paying is not the same as appearing. People are arrested every year over traffic matters they believed they had settled, because they paid an admission of guilt somewhere and never went to the court that was expecting them.

In both cases you can write to the senior public prosecutor at the court named on the notice and ask for the charge to be withdrawn. There is no fee and no form. It is discretionary, it is not an appeal, and it needs to be sent well before the court date rather than the day before.

Worked example

This example is illustrative. Sipho is caught by a camera in Johannesburg, where AARTO applies. The infringement notice is posted to him as the registered owner. He was not driving; his brother was. He puts the notice in a drawer.

At day 10 the tool would tell him he has 22 days left to pay at half price, and that he can instead nominate his brother on form AARTO 07, make a representation, or arrange instalments.

At day 40 he is in the courtesy letter stage. The discount is gone and R100 has been added. He can still make a representation, and nominating his brother is no longer available because nomination closes once a courtesy letter is issued. The fine is now his, as owner.

At day 100 an enforcement order has been issued. Another R100 is on the bill, the representation route is closed, and when he goes to renew his vehicle licence disc he will be turned away. His remaining route is an application to have the enforcement order revoked.

Nothing in any of that involves demerit points, a court, or a criminal record. Had the same camera caught him in Cape Town, every step would have been different: an ordinary ticket, then possibly a summons, then a court date he could not safely miss.

What the tool does not cover

It does not tell you whether the fine is valid, whether the camera was calibrated, or whether the notice was properly served, all of which are grounds people succeed on. It does not calculate the amount, which depends on the infringement and the schedule. It does not deal with reckless driving, which goes to court regardless of which system applies, or with drunk driving, which is never an administrative matter. Negligent driving is listed as an infringement in Schedule 3 to the 2026 regulations, but outside AARTO areas it is a criminal charge. And it does not cover fines issued to a driver who is not the registered owner in a hired or borrowed vehicle, where the rental company's own process usually intervenes first.

When to get advice

Get advice if you have a section 56 notice and cannot make the court date, if you have been arrested on a warrant arising from an unpaid fine, or if you are facing reckless driving, drunk driving, or a charge arising from a collision in which someone was hurt. Those are criminal matters with consequences well beyond the fine, and our criminal record expungement checker shows how long a conviction stays with you.

For a business, the cheapest hour you will spend is appointing a proxy and putting one person in charge of the notices. Fleet enforcement orders are almost always the result of nobody opening the post.

Legal Aid South Africa on 0800 110 110 does not generally take traffic matters, but our free legal help page sets out who does, including university law clinics.

Frequently asked questions

Can I be arrested for an unpaid AARTO fine?

No. AARTO is administrative, and its sanction is the enforcement order and the eNaTIS block, not arrest. Arrest arises under the Criminal Procedure Act, where a warrant follows a failure to appear in court on a section 56 notice.

Do fines prescribe if I ignore them long enough?

Do not plan around it. Under AARTO the process escalates rather than expiring: section 31(2) of the Act says the laws on prescription do not apply to its penalties and fees, and an enforcement order sits on the system until it is dealt with. Under the Criminal Procedure Act a prosecution can be affected by the passage of time, but a warrant already issued does not go away on its own, and you will usually discover it at a roadblock.

The fine is for a car I sold. What do I do?

Deal with it immediately, because the registered owner is the person the notice follows. If the change of ownership was never processed at the licensing department, the vehicle is still yours on the system whatever the sale agreement says. Produce the notification of change of ownership and the details of the buyer.

Is paying an admission of guilt the same as a conviction?

Under the Criminal Procedure Act, paying an admission of guilt fine can result in a conviction being entered against your name, which is why people are surprised to find a record when applying for a job or a visa. Under AARTO, paying an infringement notice is not a criminal conviction at all. This is one of the genuine advantages of the AARTO system, and one of the strongest reasons to know which notice you are holding.

Can my employer be held liable for my fines?

Where the vehicle is registered to the company, the company is the entity the notice goes to, which is why the proxy appointment exists. Whether the company then recovers the fine from the employee is a question for the employment contract, not for traffic law, and a deduction from wages needs the employee's written consent or a court order.