QuestionQUESTION: If a notice sent by a Fl.tow co. to a vehicle owner is returned to the tow co.unsigned and undelivered because the vehicle owner was incapacitated for whatever reason and the tow co. knew of the vehicle owners current pending address, but failed to resend the notice to the current address of the owner that the tow co. had knowledge of, would the tow co. be held liable to the owner of the vehicle for storage fee's, any sales proceeds or the contents of the vehicle if it was subsequently sold to a third party?
ANSWER: I wish this was not the case working in a town with 2 major Universities, yet each towing company MUST send the notice to the information on file with DMV. The registered owner, lien holders and insurance companies "ALL PARTIES WITH AN INTEREST IN THE VEHICLE" As in our case, we use a company (add123)to get the registered owners information, they also send the registered letters for the company.
Someone may have moved and not changed their address with DMV, yet the insurance company will have the correct address or a lien holder. They can let you know when they receive their copy of the same letter.
If you know you are not going to be at your 'home' for a extended time, leave a notarized letter or send one to a person you trust to claim your vehicle. You also should contact DMV and give them your current address, in FL you can do this on line.
I've been asked this same question by someone who's car was towed by law enforcements request. They were arrested before they had a chance to turn themselves in on their own to serve 30 days. Most people don't really want the jail as an address... His Mother was trying to get the paper work for her to pick the car up, well, some jails you can't take paper work in to be signed. The mother had to go through his lawyer to get the paper work signed. Since the lawyer already had his power of attorney, he was kind enough to write the release form and able to sign it, after speaking with 'his client'.
This would fall under the 'legal' experts, yet I'll add this here. If you move and are 'trying' to work things out with a spouse. Work on it as hard as you can, YET CHANGE YOUR MAILING ADDRESS to a Post Office Box or where ever you are staying, you can always change it back, but never trust anyone else to get your mail!
Sorry about your car and maybe the towing company will work something out with you if the car hasn't been sold at an auction. We try to when people are up front and honest with us: They still have to stay in touch with us and let us know when they plan on getting the vehicle. We only tow by the owner or police request, so we don't have as many unclaimed vehicles, yet we do have a few and a lot of work goes into getting rid of them. It sounds like the towing company did every thing by the book. The only thing they could have done was break company rules and held the vehicle without sending any letters. Many companies now use computer programs, after 72 hours
the letters are sent. The program even sends the VIN & other information to a newspaper to run the ad for the auction. In this case even if a worker or owner knows you, your vehicle is just a VIN to a computer.... Again, sorry.
Good Luck,
Lisa
---------- FOLLOW-UP ----------
QUESTION: Thank you for your reply. My follow up questions are as follows:
1] In the 4th paragraph of your answer you stated "some jails you can't take paperwork in to be signed".
My question:
If you knew the person was in jail or the hospital could you mail the certified letter to the jail or the hospital and let the person sign for it and have it returned to the tow co.?
I would think it would be plainly obvious to the tow truck driver on a police ordered tow when he picked up the vehicle whether the owner got arrested or not or there was an accident or the cops would notify the tow driver of such and or the tow co. was notified of the owners arrest or hospitalization due to an accident by relatives/friends trying to assist the owner. So if the tow co. has knowledge of the owners current address shouldn't the tow co. still make a good faith effort and have a duty to attempt to get the notice to the vehicle owner? So the owner who probably doesn't know what his legal rights are and that he/she has a right to contest the validity of the tow or to preserve whatever personal property he/she may have in the vehicle or preserve any monetary interests he/she may have in the vehicle? Which information is contained in the notice. What sense does it make to mail a notice to a address you know the person will not receive it?, and knowing were the person can receive the notice, but the tow co. fails to mail it to the address they know the person could receive it at? Additionally, if there is no bank liens on the vehicle and it is bought and paid for and therefore nobody else for the tow co. to notify other than the vehicle owner, who obviously can't go and pick up his mail, wouldn't it be more of a reason to resend the notice via U.S. Mail to the owners current address just to cover your own back to show that you [the tow co.] at least made a diligent good faith effort to get the notice to the vehicle owner? Whether this owner is in jail or in the hospital due to an accident? It is not whether a tow co. knows the owner or not to give notice, it is whether the tow co. owner knows or has knowledge of the owners current address that gives rise to the notice requirements and if the notice is returned unsigned and undelivered and the tow co. has knowledge of the owners whereabouts then the tow co. should make a good faith effort to get the notice to the vehicle owner,if the tow co. fails to do so, the storage charges must be forfeited.
My last question is related to personal property in the vehicle:
Would you or do you know of tow companies who routinely withhold personal property contained within a towed vehicle until and unless the owner pays the tow co. all charges due?
Say a person could not afford to pay the tow/storage/mileage and miscellaneous fee's, and everything he/she owned was in the vehicle and you had no use for the personal property. The person/owner makes a request to you for the return of his/her personal property. Would you withhold it from the person?, and then destroy or discard the personal property into a dumpster when you sold the vehicle to a third party? If a tow co. did that, what do you think of the tow co. that would do so? Is that routine for a tow co.? I appreciate your previous answer and also any answer you give to this one also. Thank you for your time.
AnswerSince we don't to any tow-a-ways, we do try to work with the vehicle owner. On a police tow all we are told is the driver is going to jail. Most of the time it's for a DUI and they are out in 8 hours. If we talk to the person (if allowed) we let them know what they will need to do to get the vehicle out of impound.
1st - Towing companies send a 'Good Faith Notice' normally through the local law enforcement, the information sent back to them is the information on the vehicles registration from DMV. This is why we say get a release form signed for someone else to be able to pick up the vehicle. While this may not seem fair, it is the law. I'm not sure a hospital or jail would sign for a registered letter for anyone, I don't think so, that is why you let a third person to sign for you.
2nd - Up until the day of the auction a towing company MUST release your personal property to you. (Allow you or someone with a notarized letter and photo ID) It's not legal to hold a tag or personal property until the bill is paid. Check under our web-site for this info www.TallahasseeTowing.com All of this is listed along with the Florida Statue number.
If you'd like to mark your question as private and tell me what has happened in your case, I may be able to help you in some way.
Where is the car now????
Lisa
