10 ms·

Show HN: Ticket Titan - Fight Traffic Tickets

22 points by will_brown 11y ago

will_brown 11y ago
Demo Video: https://www.dropbox.com/s/uyk4ne4xb13y26i/tt.mp4?dl=0 https://www.dropbox.com/s/uyk4ne4xb13y26i/tt.mp4?dl=0
deleted 11y ago
[deleted]
GFK_of_xmaspast 11y ago
An easier and cheaper way to go is (a) stop texting and driving and (b) slow down, leadfoot.
- xaqfox 11y ago
  Police officers are not infallible.
  - tired_man 11y ago
    Which is why many people are installing their own dash cams.
- tertius 11y ago
  For the times that the ticket is the fault of the driver I would agree with you. But when I'm not at fault then I should fight the ticket. Because I really shouldn't have to.
alain94040 11y ago
Can we agree to only fight the tickets that we don't deserve?
- vkat 11y ago
  agreed
- will_brown 11y ago
  Of course. The idea is for clients to be able to input their ticket info and immediately see the legal fee of the available law firm(s) to fight the ticket. The user may choose to research the law firm(s) further or hire the law firm, but it is always the decision of the user whether or not to hire a law firm to fight their ticket.
  - tertius 11y ago
    Why would you hire a firm to fight a ticket? Send a letter and you'll get it auto-reduced, except if you want to get out of the ticket.
- thesis 11y ago
  No. We can't agree. Accidents for instance happen, and even if you're at fault it should be your choice to get a lawyer to help reduce your costs.
- IgorPartola 11y ago
  I suppose. But also can we agree to raise the ridiculous speed limits and actually enforce them? 55 and 65 mph is too low and nobody drives that slow. See https://www.reddit.com/r/todayilearned/comments/1npuah/til_that_in_2007_a_group_of_college_students/ https://www.reddit.com/r/todayilearned/comments/1npuah/til_t... In my mind if you are doing 110 in a 65, sure, you get a ticket. But I distinctly remember being in a car driving through Virginia (speed limit 70 mph) in a large number of cars all following each other all doing 72-75. It was a straight bit of road, everyone was mostly in the right lane (sign said to keep right unless to pass). Out of nowhere a state trooper pulls up on the left, passes, gets in front of our car and pulls over the guy in front of us. I should mention that the car in front of us was from out of state. Now, it is possible that that guy was getting pulled over for something other than speeding, but as anyone that's driven through VA can tell you, the state troopers there are very eager to give out speeding tickets, so chances are it was for speeding. Why did that guy arbitrarily get pulled over instead of our car, or any of the two dozen around us, all doing the same speed? Probably because it was a nice car with an out of state license plate. 75 mph is not an unreasonable speed on a straight road during daytime with good visibility and weather. It's basically left to the police to determine what the real speed limit is, which seems wrong. </rant>
  - hugenerd 11y ago
    Virginia is different than most states. http://jalopnik.com/what-every-driver-should-know-about-speeding-in-virgini-1669902845 http://jalopnik.com/what-every-driver-should-know-about-spee...
    - IgorPartola 11y ago
      Right. The real speed limit in VA is close to 80 mph (though you can get pulled over for doing less, presumably if "driving while black" [1]). So why aren't there signs that read "SPEED LIMIT 80"? Why is it up to the officer's discretion to decide if today it's 80, 78, 75, etc.? (I know why: federal government, funding, etc.) I am in no way against speed limits being enforced, I just don't like the idea of them being set by the officer's mood and zeal on any given day. I'd rather know what the speed limit really is rather than trying to guess it. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Driving_While_Black https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Driving_While_Black
- AUmrysh 11y ago
  There are some times where your guilt and the law are ambiguous, and so who's to say that you do or don't deserve a ticket? Also, you're welcome to pay your tickets and not fight them, often the cost of hiring a lawyer is more than the fine anyway. If you're asking the kind of people who have no consideration for others, and thus break parking and traffic laws, to be considerate to others, I think you're going to be sorely disappointed.
Marcus10110 11y ago
Instead, I want to build a tool that constantly scans your plate number for tickets and auto-pays them as soon as they show up to avoid late fees. ...Because I deserved every ticket I've ever received.
- will_brown 11y ago
  You would be going after the right market, 95% of people just pay their ticket ;) However, by lowering the barrier to legal representation it is our goal that TicketTitan may increase the percentage of people who fight. For example, did you know that in most states by paying a ticket you admit guilt of the violation, which often results in points on your license and insurance increases? Fighting a ticket in Court, even without a lawful defense, may result in dismissal, no conviction, no points, no school, and/or reduced fines.
  - thinkmoore 11y ago
    Or, as parent suggests, you could just take responsibility for your actions...
    - dajohnson89 11y ago
      Not every traffic ticket is fairly given.
      - cmurf 11y ago
        Exactly. See Chicago's photo red light debacle. And that's a case where otherwise I'd support the idea because running red lights kills and maims people with a much higher incidence than say speeding on the highway. The two speeding tickets I've gotten: one was deserved, but I still fought it for a minimal (standard) plea bargain reduction. The other, the cop flat out lied twice. He said he used pace method, yet was never going the speed I was (he came upon me like a bullet and I wasn't speeding); but then the ticket had the radar box checked, and I said I wouldn't sign it until he corrected it. He said he wasn't going to change the ticket and if I didn't sign it he'd take me to jail. Small podunk town in Kansas just randomly pulling people over to make money. Modern day highwayman.
joshmn 11y ago
What were the reasons for using WordPress to power this? Not saying it's wrong by any means, but I'd be interested in hearing the table's discussion :) Edit: please explain downvotes. I'm not sure why my curiosity that directly relates to the discussion of the OP would be anything but relevant, productive, and supportive.
andegre 11y ago
Only Florida shows up for states (for me at least)
- deleted 11y ago
  [deleted]
kevin 11y ago
Let me start with some disclosure: We funded a company to do exactly this. I won’t mention them here as a courtesy to you, but know that I will have some bias as I go through this. When I advise startups about landing pages, I usually refer to some teachings from Call to Action. http://www.amazon.com/Call-Action-Formulas-Improve-Results/dp/078521965X http://www.amazon.com/Call-Action-Formulas-Improve-Results/d... The examples in the book are fairly outdated, but the lessons are sound. The one I’ll talk about here has to do with the questions visitors need to have answered before they’ll proceed to clicking a call to action. - What is it? - Is this right for me? - Is it legit? - What’s the catch? / How much does it cost? - Who else is using this? - Can I get help? Different users have different configurations of those questions they need to have answered before they move forward down your conversion funnel. Great landing pages answer all of them efficiently. You’re missing a number of answers to those questions on your site. Some can be found on your FAQ, but I think you need to front load more of them. The number one problem for me and the reason why I’ll use our portfolio startup’s site over yours is that this doesn’t look professional. When it comes to legal issues / fines, trusting you to get the job done and keeping me from getting into more trouble is what I need to feel to hand over my problem to you. Part of it is the design and that’s easily fixed with a nicer template at the least. Evidence of how many tickets you’ve successfully fought or won, or information that just fighting a ticket is worth doing because the courts don’t want to dedicate resources to fighting a parking ticket would be helpful. This FAQ question, however, made me cringe: http://www.tickettitan.com/faq/#law http://www.tickettitan.com/faq/#law There’s marketing speak mixed in with some defensiveness and some confusing reference to what feels like a conflict of interest. Thinking through it, I don’t think there is a conflict of interest, but the way you worded it makes me feel like there is. If it were me, I’d just remove the question. If you’re the only firm that gets the ticket info, then I’d remove from the interface what looks like an assignment of a firm to a ticket. It just raises questions that are distracting. This service should be an abstraction. Give us the ticket, we’ll take care of it. X % gets removed. If not, we pay the ticket automatically for you. Either way, this is how you stop worrying about this piece of paper. A lot of potential here, though. The name is great. It’s memorable. Build a brand that it deserves. Start with copy and then move to the design. Good luck and thanks for sharing!
- 11y ago
nickysielicki 11y ago
> What is a participating law firm? > Participating law firms are the law firms which register an account, advertise their fees, and may be hired through TicketTitan.com. Only licensed attorneys in good standing with their state bar(s) may register to be a participating law firm on TicketTitan.com. Law firms may register and advertise their fees for free, paying a very small flat processing fee to TicketTitan.com only when hired by a client. > *Currently, TicketTitan.com only allows one law firm per county to advertise their fees, but additional law firms may register and be placed on a waiting list. lol okay. So "firms" is really "first firm to register in your county". It's an absolutely fantastic idea but this tool is worthless to me until that isn't the case. Why are you doing this? Edit: Upon further reading, it's because one of the founders of OP's site runs a law firm named after this site which is conveniently one of the firms registered. What a racket!
- will_brown 11y ago
  >It's an absolutely fantastic idea but this tool is worthless to me until that isn't the case. Why are you doing this? Thanks, law is not an easy thing to scale. Not unlike most startups we are growing, eventually every jurisdiction be covered and by multiple law firms, but Rome wasn't built in a day. >Edit: Upon further reading, it's because one of the founders of OP's site runs a law firm named after this site which is conveniently one of the firms registered. What a racket! First, no I am OP and I do not have a law firm that is on TicketTitan, but another founder does. Do you consider Orbitz a racket? Was AirBnB a racket when it first started with only 1 listing, a air mattress in the founders apartment? Orbitz connected travelers with flights (but Orbitz was owned by the airlines), AirBnB offered an air mattress to sleep on in SF but that air mattress was in the apartment of the founder.

22 points by will_brown 11y ago

will_brown 11y ago

Demo Video: https://www.dropbox.com/s/uyk4ne4xb13y26i/tt.mp4?dl=0 https://www.dropbox.com/s/uyk4ne4xb13y26i/tt.mp4?dl=0

deleted 11y ago

[deleted]

GFK_of_xmaspast 11y ago

An easier and cheaper way to go is (a) stop texting and driving and (b) slow down, leadfoot.

xaqfox 11y ago
Police officers are not infallible.
- tired_man 11y ago
  Which is why many people are installing their own dash cams.
tertius 11y ago
For the times that the ticket is the fault of the driver I would agree with you. But when I'm not at fault then I should fight the ticket. Because I really shouldn't have to.

alain94040 11y ago

Can we agree to only fight the tickets that we don't deserve?

vkat 11y ago
agreed
will_brown 11y ago
Of course. The idea is for clients to be able to input their ticket info and immediately see the legal fee of the available law firm(s) to fight the ticket. The user may choose to research the law firm(s) further or hire the law firm, but it is always the decision of the user whether or not to hire a law firm to fight their ticket.
- tertius 11y ago
  Why would you hire a firm to fight a ticket? Send a letter and you'll get it auto-reduced, except if you want to get out of the ticket.
thesis 11y ago
No. We can't agree. Accidents for instance happen, and even if you're at fault it should be your choice to get a lawyer to help reduce your costs.
IgorPartola 11y ago
I suppose. But also can we agree to raise the ridiculous speed limits and actually enforce them? 55 and 65 mph is too low and nobody drives that slow. See https://www.reddit.com/r/todayilearned/comments/1npuah/til_that_in_2007_a_group_of_college_students/ https://www.reddit.com/r/todayilearned/comments/1npuah/til_t... In my mind if you are doing 110 in a 65, sure, you get a ticket. But I distinctly remember being in a car driving through Virginia (speed limit 70 mph) in a large number of cars all following each other all doing 72-75. It was a straight bit of road, everyone was mostly in the right lane (sign said to keep right unless to pass). Out of nowhere a state trooper pulls up on the left, passes, gets in front of our car and pulls over the guy in front of us. I should mention that the car in front of us was from out of state. Now, it is possible that that guy was getting pulled over for something other than speeding, but as anyone that's driven through VA can tell you, the state troopers there are very eager to give out speeding tickets, so chances are it was for speeding. Why did that guy arbitrarily get pulled over instead of our car, or any of the two dozen around us, all doing the same speed? Probably because it was a nice car with an out of state license plate. 75 mph is not an unreasonable speed on a straight road during daytime with good visibility and weather. It's basically left to the police to determine what the real speed limit is, which seems wrong. </rant>
- hugenerd 11y ago
  Virginia is different than most states. http://jalopnik.com/what-every-driver-should-know-about-speeding-in-virgini-1669902845 http://jalopnik.com/what-every-driver-should-know-about-spee...
  - IgorPartola 11y ago
    Right. The real speed limit in VA is close to 80 mph (though you can get pulled over for doing less, presumably if "driving while black" [1]). So why aren't there signs that read "SPEED LIMIT 80"? Why is it up to the officer's discretion to decide if today it's 80, 78, 75, etc.? (I know why: federal government, funding, etc.) I am in no way against speed limits being enforced, I just don't like the idea of them being set by the officer's mood and zeal on any given day. I'd rather know what the speed limit really is rather than trying to guess it. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Driving_While_Black https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Driving_While_Black
AUmrysh 11y ago
There are some times where your guilt and the law are ambiguous, and so who's to say that you do or don't deserve a ticket? Also, you're welcome to pay your tickets and not fight them, often the cost of hiring a lawyer is more than the fine anyway. If you're asking the kind of people who have no consideration for others, and thus break parking and traffic laws, to be considerate to others, I think you're going to be sorely disappointed.

Marcus10110 11y ago

Instead, I want to build a tool that constantly scans your plate number for tickets and auto-pays them as soon as they show up to avoid late fees. ...Because I deserved every ticket I've ever received.

will_brown 11y ago
You would be going after the right market, 95% of people just pay their ticket ;) However, by lowering the barrier to legal representation it is our goal that TicketTitan may increase the percentage of people who fight. For example, did you know that in most states by paying a ticket you admit guilt of the violation, which often results in points on your license and insurance increases? Fighting a ticket in Court, even without a lawful defense, may result in dismissal, no conviction, no points, no school, and/or reduced fines.
- thinkmoore 11y ago
  Or, as parent suggests, you could just take responsibility for your actions...
  - dajohnson89 11y ago
    Not every traffic ticket is fairly given.
    - cmurf 11y ago
      Exactly. See Chicago's photo red light debacle. And that's a case where otherwise I'd support the idea because running red lights kills and maims people with a much higher incidence than say speeding on the highway. The two speeding tickets I've gotten: one was deserved, but I still fought it for a minimal (standard) plea bargain reduction. The other, the cop flat out lied twice. He said he used pace method, yet was never going the speed I was (he came upon me like a bullet and I wasn't speeding); but then the ticket had the radar box checked, and I said I wouldn't sign it until he corrected it. He said he wasn't going to change the ticket and if I didn't sign it he'd take me to jail. Small podunk town in Kansas just randomly pulling people over to make money. Modern day highwayman.

joshmn 11y ago

What were the reasons for using WordPress to power this? Not saying it's wrong by any means, but I'd be interested in hearing the table's discussion :) Edit: please explain downvotes. I'm not sure why my curiosity that directly relates to the discussion of the OP would be anything but relevant, productive, and supportive.

andegre 11y ago

Only Florida shows up for states (for me at least)

deleted 11y ago
[deleted]

kevin 11y ago

Let me start with some disclosure: We funded a company to do exactly this. I won’t mention them here as a courtesy to you, but know that I will have some bias as I go through this. When I advise startups about landing pages, I usually refer to some teachings from Call to Action. http://www.amazon.com/Call-Action-Formulas-Improve-Results/dp/078521965X http://www.amazon.com/Call-Action-Formulas-Improve-Results/d... The examples in the book are fairly outdated, but the lessons are sound. The one I’ll talk about here has to do with the questions visitors need to have answered before they’ll proceed to clicking a call to action. - What is it? - Is this right for me? - Is it legit? - What’s the catch? / How much does it cost? - Who else is using this? - Can I get help? Different users have different configurations of those questions they need to have answered before they move forward down your conversion funnel. Great landing pages answer all of them efficiently. You’re missing a number of answers to those questions on your site. Some can be found on your FAQ, but I think you need to front load more of them. The number one problem for me and the reason why I’ll use our portfolio startup’s site over yours is that this doesn’t look professional. When it comes to legal issues / fines, trusting you to get the job done and keeping me from getting into more trouble is what I need to feel to hand over my problem to you. Part of it is the design and that’s easily fixed with a nicer template at the least. Evidence of how many tickets you’ve successfully fought or won, or information that just fighting a ticket is worth doing because the courts don’t want to dedicate resources to fighting a parking ticket would be helpful. This FAQ question, however, made me cringe: http://www.tickettitan.com/faq/#law http://www.tickettitan.com/faq/#law There’s marketing speak mixed in with some defensiveness and some confusing reference to what feels like a conflict of interest. Thinking through it, I don’t think there is a conflict of interest, but the way you worded it makes me feel like there is. If it were me, I’d just remove the question. If you’re the only firm that gets the ticket info, then I’d remove from the interface what looks like an assignment of a firm to a ticket. It just raises questions that are distracting. This service should be an abstraction. Give us the ticket, we’ll take care of it. X % gets removed. If not, we pay the ticket automatically for you. Either way, this is how you stop worrying about this piece of paper. A lot of potential here, though. The name is great. It’s memorable. Build a brand that it deserves. Start with copy and then move to the design. Good luck and thanks for sharing!

11y ago

nickysielicki 11y ago

> What is a participating law firm? > Participating law firms are the law firms which register an account, advertise their fees, and may be hired through TicketTitan.com. Only licensed attorneys in good standing with their state bar(s) may register to be a participating law firm on TicketTitan.com. Law firms may register and advertise their fees for free, paying a very small flat processing fee to TicketTitan.com only when hired by a client. > *Currently, TicketTitan.com only allows one law firm per county to advertise their fees, but additional law firms may register and be placed on a waiting list. lol okay. So "firms" is really "first firm to register in your county". It's an absolutely fantastic idea but this tool is worthless to me until that isn't the case. Why are you doing this? Edit: Upon further reading, it's because one of the founders of OP's site runs a law firm named after this site which is conveniently one of the firms registered. What a racket!

will_brown 11y ago
>It's an absolutely fantastic idea but this tool is worthless to me until that isn't the case. Why are you doing this? Thanks, law is not an easy thing to scale. Not unlike most startups we are growing, eventually every jurisdiction be covered and by multiple law firms, but Rome wasn't built in a day. >Edit: Upon further reading, it's because one of the founders of OP's site runs a law firm named after this site which is conveniently one of the firms registered. What a racket! First, no I am OP and I do not have a law firm that is on TicketTitan, but another founder does. Do you consider Orbitz a racket? Was AirBnB a racket when it first started with only 1 listing, a air mattress in the founders apartment? Orbitz connected travelers with flights (but Orbitz was owned by the airlines), AirBnB offered an air mattress to sleep on in SF but that air mattress was in the apartment of the founder.