Speeding ticket

A few years ago, I managed to run up two violations in a tiny town in Puglia. Notifications from the rental company came separately. One, a ztl, was never followed by a bill for the fine. The other, for a red light violation, was followed by an official notice from the municipality, with a means for paying by credit card. My conclusion was that moving violations were treated differently, but who knows? As for the Hertz Italy website, I once tried to make a complaint about their Palermo airport office agents’ dishonesty, and I had the same experience as you. Couldn’t make it work.

The service Transferwise (on the internet) has been recommended on this forum and seems to have relatively low fees. I haven't used it myself. Corrected typo in name of service.

Shelley, Normally you pay electronically. The ticket will have an IBAN (=International Bank Account Number) on it. For people with bank accounts in Europe, this is the normal way of paying bills, you can do it with electronic banking and it costs nothing.

I see you are in Canada. You need to ask your bank how much it costs to send money to an IBAN (not a bank draft). If it is too much, I am sure others will suggest services in Canada which are cheaper.

Thanks folks for your input. Will check with my bank about IBAN transfers.
Any others here in Canada with information on this matter would help.

Just like at home, most government agencies want to make it easy for you to pay them. They want your money! Most likely you will have the option to pay online with a credit card. Just use one that doesn't charge a foreign transaction fee.

If they don't have an online system to pay with credit card (which seems doubtful to me), and you must do a bank transfer, I would highly recommend Transferwise. I've used it a couple times and it's cheap, easy, secure and IMHO a no-brainer. Setting up a bank transfer (without using a service like Transferwise) will probably be stunningly expensive and a huge pain in the butt.

Thanks David. Unfortunately if you have not received one of these from Italy the whole notice is in Italian. I have a limited Italian vocabulary but will certainly find someone to translate it for me. I was able to figure out where this occurred and indeed we did use this side road from Cassino to Matera. Here's hoping the bill is easier to make out.

My bank (Chase) charges $45 for an outgoing international wire money transfer. That’s about average.
You might be able to save with a money transmitter like Moneygram or Western Union, but I don’t know if those are accepted means of payment by the municipality you were fined.
If they accept credit cards or PayPal, that would be best.

Post the Italian text of the docs your received and some of us can translate.

I had the same issue when I received a speeding ticket from a small town in Austria. They did not accept credit cards for payment. So I sent cash with Euros I keep on hand. I was skeptical about doing this but it worked. Was far cheaper than doing a wire transfer or any other method. Best wishes!

I don't remember the specifics, but someone posted about the fee he paid Transferwise, and I remember thinking it seemed quite reasonable compared to reported bank charges. The fee may have been in the $15-20 range.

Online tools make translations easily available (maybe not perfect, but almost always good enough to understand what you need to do).

Transferwise is crazy cheap. I highly recommend them. Fees depend on three factors: 1) the current exchange rate (they give you a good rate); 2) How much money you need to send; and 3) Your form of payment (eg from your bank account directly or via credit card).

For example, lets say you need to send 100 Euros to someone in Italy. The cost would be:
CAD$1.64 transfer fee (yes, all of $1.64)
CAD $1.75 (there's a 1.75% fee for paying by credit card - fee is less if using Debit or bank transfer)

at the current exchange rate, it looks like all of this would cost you a total of:
CAD $154.42 - that's all, to deliver 100 Euros to someone in Europe. In my experience, my transfer went through in less than 24 hours. I don't think you can beat these guys, they are awesome.

Check them out here: https://transferwise.com/us/

We’ve used Transferwise multiple times to pay our rent in Italy with no issues. Money is tyoically received the next day

Hello! I am trying to use transferwise but the field for 'Reference' is not long enough to include the Form number, plate number and name of local police as instructed on the form. Did anyone else have this issue or find a solution?

Never had that situation, but just use the numbers that seem the most relevant relating to your ticket.