NYC Traffic Violations Bureau tickets.
If your ticket was written in Manhattan, Brooklyn, Queens, the Bronx or Staten Island, it does not go to a regular court. It goes to the TVB, and almost everything you have read about fighting a ticket does not apply.
What makes TVB different.
There is no prosecutor, so there is nobody to negotiate with
At a TVB hearing the regulations put the burden on the police officer, who has to prove each element of the charge by clear and convincing evidence. There is no district attorney in the room, and no party with authority to offer you a lesser charge.
The regulations allow exactly three pleas: guilty, guilty with an explanation, and not guilty. That is the entire menu. And guilty with an explanation only argues the fine down. You are still convicted, and the points still attach in full.
No reduction to a non moving violation
In the rest of New York State a moving violation is routinely reduced to a non moving violation with no points, because there is a prosecutor to do that with. In the five boroughs that option does not exist. You either beat the ticket you were written, or you are convicted of it.
An administrative law judge
TVB is a DMV tribunal, not a criminal court. The rules of evidence and the procedure are its own.
If the officer does not appear, the charge is often dismissed. Often, not always.
The rule says the charge shall be dismissed if the officer fails to appear without seven days notice, but it lists five excuses that prevent dismissal: a death in the officer's family, illness or injury, responding to a crime, a conflicting court appearance, or a police emergency.
And on serious charges, including speeding more than 30 over, the first no show gets the officer an adjournment rather than getting you a dismissal. Anyone who tells you an officer no show is an automatic win has not read the rule.
Losing a hearing can cost more than pleading guilty. The fixed fine schedule only applies if you plead guilty before your appearance date. Once you appear before a judge, the judge can impose any penalty the law allows, including a suspension. That is exactly why the decision to fight should be made on the facts of your ticket, not on principle.
Why the national services exclude New York City.
The largest national ticket service publishes a money back guarantee and then excludes all five boroughs from it. Their words: the guarantee does not apply to tickets contested at the New York City Traffic Violations Bureau.
That is not an oversight. TVB is harder, less negotiable and less predictable than a village court upstate, so a national platform running on volume and averages carves it out.
We did not carve it out. It is where we work.
The seven TVB locations.
What to do right now.
Do not plead guilty by paying online
That is final. There is no undoing it once the payment goes through.
Plead not guilty before the deadline on the ticket
This preserves your hearing. It does not commit you to fighting, and it does not cost anything.
Send us the ticket
We will tell you what the realistic outcome is before you pay us anything.
Your TVB ticket, reviewed today.
Free, no obligation, and an honest answer about whether it is worth fighting.