Fixed penalty warning system to start Monday

KAY-MARIE FLETCH­ER

Se­nior Re­porter

kay-marie.fletch­[email protected]

Mo­torists will ben­e­fit from a new grace pe­ri­od start­ing Mon­day be­fore fac­ing fines for mi­nor ve­hi­cle de­fects, Trans­port and Avi­a­tion Min­is­ter Eli Za­k­our has con­firmed.

The fixed penal­ty warn­ing sys­tem was in­tro­duced through the Mo­tor Ve­hi­cles and Road Traf­fic Amend­ment Bill, passed in the House of Rep­re­sen­ta­tives on Jan­u­ary 16, 2026, and in the Sen­ate on Jan­u­ary 20, 2026. The bill was as­sent­ed on Jan­u­ary 29 and will of­fi­cial­ly come in­to ef­fect this Mon­day.

The new sys­tem comes af­ter pub­lic up­roar ear­li­er this year when sev­er­al traf­fic fines were dou­bled. Un­der the rules, dri­vers stopped by po­lice, trans­port of­fi­cers, or traf­fic war­dens will now have three to sev­en days to cor­rect mi­nor de­fects be­fore penal­ties ap­ply.

Re­spond­ing to an ur­gent ques­tion in the Sen­ate yes­ter­day, Za­k­our ex­plained that the warn­ing may be hand­ed di­rect­ly to the dri­ver or af­fixed to the ve­hi­cle if the dri­ver is ab­sent.

“The con­sta­ble—po­lice, traf­fic war­den, or trans­port of­fi­cer—shall is­sue a fixed penal­ty warn­ing. In cir­cum­stances where the dri­ver is present, the warn­ing may be hand­ed di­rect­ly to the dri­ver. Where the dri­ver is not present, the warn­ing may be af­fixed to a vis­i­ble part of the ve­hi­cle, en­sur­ing that the mo­torist is prop­er­ly no­ti­fied of the in­frac­tion. Once a fixed penal­ty warn­ing is is­sued or af­fixed, the re­spon­si­bil­i­ty for the vi­o­la­tion rests with the dri­ver or, where nec­es­sary, the reg­is­tered own­er of the ve­hi­cle,” he said.

Za­k­our added that the warn­ing will de­tail the vi­o­la­tion, the steps to rem­e­dy it, the time­frame for com­pli­ance, and the lo­ca­tion where the dri­ver or own­er must re­port to pro­vide proof of cor­rec­tion. Dri­vers will have ei­ther a three-day or sev­en-day win­dow de­pend­ing on the type of vi­o­la­tion to re­pair the de­fect.

Once the re­quire­ments are met, a Cer­tifi­cate of Com­pli­ance will be is­sued. If the de­fect is not cor­rect­ed with­in the spec­i­fied pe­ri­od, the warn­ing will au­to­mat­i­cal­ly con­vert in­to a fixed penal­ty no­tice, mak­ing the dri­ver or own­er li­able to pay the pre­scribed fine.

“Up­on sat­is­fac­to­ry ver­i­fi­ca­tion, the dri­ver-own­er will be is­sued a Cer­tifi­cate of Com­pli­ance. That con­firms the re­quire­ments of the fixed penal­ty warn­ing have been met and dis­charges the dri­ver and own­er from any fur­ther li­a­bil­i­ty in re­spect of the vi­o­la­tion. How­ev­er, if the dri­ver-own­er fails to rem­e­dy the de­fect or fails to re­port with­in the time­frame, the fixed penal­ty warn­ing au­to­mat­i­cal­ly con­verts to a fixed penal­ty no­tice. In those cir­cum­stances, the dri­ver-own­er be­comes li­able to pay the pre­scribed fine,” Za­k­our ex­plained.

The min­is­ter as­sured that all stake­hold­ers have been briefed, and pub­lic no­tices will be is­sued na­tion­wide to en­sure mo­torists are aware of the new sys­tem. In case of tech­ni­cal dif­fi­cul­ties, a com­pli­ance book­let list­ing more than 300 fixed penal­ties will be dis­trib­uted to rel­e­vant lo­ca­tions.

“In the event of a sys­tem is­sue or in the ab­sence of a fixed penal­ty de­vice, the Min­istry has print­ed over 300 phys­i­cal fixed penal­ty warn­ing and Cer­tifi­cate of Com­pli­ance book­lets for dis­tri­b­u­tion across the na­tion. Sam­ples of these forms were ap­proved and will be pub­lished in the Trinidad and To­ba­go Gazette, along with elec­tron­ic ver­sions. Pub­lic no­tices will al­so ap­pear in dai­ly news­pa­pers and on so­cial me­dia to en­sure mo­torists are ful­ly in­formed,” Za­k­our said.

Mi­nor Ve­hi­cle Vi­o­la­tions El­i­gi­ble for Fixed Penal­ty Warn­ings

Sev­en-Day Grace Pe­ri­od:

Ve­hi­cle with de­fec­tive fit­tings (e.g., dam­aged/cracked wind­screen)

Per­mit­ting ex­cess sparks, smoke, or vis­i­ble vapour from the ve­hi­cle

Use of a noisy ve­hi­cle

Three-Day Grace Pe­ri­od:

No iden­ti­fi­ca­tion lights for il­lu­mi­na­tion of ve­hi­cle marks at night

Num­ber of pas­sen­gers not dis­played on front door of taxi

Ab­sence of TARE and MGW (Max­i­mum Gross Weight) mark­ings

Ve­hi­cle with­out a si­lencer or fit­ted with cut-outs

Unau­tho­rised lights on front or rear of ve­hi­cle

Unau­tho­rised let­ters or fig­ures dis­played on ve­hi­cle

Ve­hi­cle with­out two head­lamps

Ve­hi­cle with­out park­ing lights

Ve­hi­cle with­out tail lights

Ab­sence of a “left-hand dri­ve” no­tice

Ve­hi­cle with­out a horn

Ve­hi­cle with­out re­flec­tive mir­rors

Ve­hi­cle with­out wind­screen wipers or with de­fec­tive wipers

Pub­lic ser­vice ve­hi­cle (taxi/bus) with­out a spare tyre

Place­ment of ad­ver­tise­ments on side win­dows of a taxi

This sys­tem is de­signed to give mo­torists a fair op­por­tu­ni­ty to cor­rect mi­nor in­frac­tions be­fore in­cur­ring penal­ties, while en­sur­ing road safe­ty com­pli­ance across the coun­try.