Dutch Traffic Fines (Verkeersboete): How the Wet Mulder Works

A traffic fine is the most common brush most people in the Netherlands ever have with the legal system, and the single most useful thing to know about one is also the most reassuring: an ordinary fine is an administrative matter, not a criminal one.

Dutch traffic enforcement runs on two separate tracks: most ordinary offences are administrative sanctions under the Wet Mulder (WAHV), collected by the CJIB with no criminal record, while serious conduct is prosecuted criminally under the Wegenverkeerswet 1994.

This page covers the first track in full: what a fine is, who has to pay it, what it costs, how to object, and what happens if it goes unpaid. Where an offence is serious enough to cross onto the criminal track, the driving ban and speeding fines pages take over.

Information last verified on 22 July 2026. This page provides general legal information about Netherlands law and does not constitute legal advice in an individual case.

What a Wet Mulder fine actually is

The everyday traffic fine has a formal name: an administrative sanction (administratieve sanctie) under the Wet administratiefrechtelijke handhaving verkeersvoorschriften, known to everyone as the Wet Mulder or the WAHV. It covers the routine offences, moderate speeding, a red light on camera, a phone in the hand, no seatbelt, and it sits entirely outside the criminal courts.

Each offence has a fixed code (feitcode) and a fixed amount (geldsom) set in the annex to the Act, the bijlage bij de WAHV. Artikel 4 WAHV requires the fine to be issued as a dated written decision (beschikking) that names the offence, the amount, and the date, time and place. There is no discretion in the amount: the feitcode decides it.

An ordinary traffic fine (verkeersboete) under the Wet Mulder is an administrative sanction, so it carries no criminal record and does not appear on a certificate of good conduct (Verklaring Omtrent het Gedrag).

The reason is structural. Artikel 2 lid 1 WAHV states that once an administrative sanction is imposed, criminal measures for the same conduct are excluded, so a Wet Mulder fine and a criminal prosecution can never both attach to one offence. The fine never enters the criminal record system at all.

There is also a ceiling on the amount. Artikel 2 lid 3 WAHV caps the geldsom for any single offence at the fine of the first category (geldboete van de eerste categorie), and in practice the annex tops out at EUR 524 in 2026. An offence serious enough to warrant more than that is not a Wet Mulder matter at all; it has crossed onto the criminal track.

Who has to pay: the registered keeper

With a camera fine, the person who pays is often not the person who was driving. Artikel 5 WAHV sets out a rule of keeper liability (kentekenaansprakelijkheid): where the offence is committed with a vehicle and the driver is not identified on the spot, the sanction is imposed on the person in whose name the vehicle was registered, the registered keeper (kentekenhouder). A speed-camera or red-light-camera fine therefore arrives addressed to the owner of the car, not to whoever was behind the wheel.

The keeper is not without defences. Artikel 8 WAHV allows the fine to be set aside where the keeper can show that the vehicle was used against their will and they could not reasonably have prevented it, that it had been let out under a short business hire naming the person who had it at the time, or that they had already sold it and hold a transfer certificate (vrijwaringsbewijs). Absent one of these, the keeper carries the fine even if someone else was driving.

What you actually pay: the amount plus EUR 9

Two numbers make up what lands in a person's account. The first is the geldsom fixed by the feitcode; the second is a flat administration charge (administratiekosten) of EUR 9 that the CJIB adds to every fine in 2026. The amount a person pays is the geldsom plus EUR 9.

The geldsom depends on the offence. These 2026 amounts, all for an ordinary car, come from the annex to the Wet Mulder:

Each figure is the geldsom alone. With the EUR 9 administratiekosten added, a fine for 10 km/h over inside the built-up area comes to EUR 104 in total in 2026. These amounts are re-set every year, so any figure should be read as the amount for its year; the next change is scheduled for 1 September 2026. How the full speeding scale works, band by band and road type by road type, is on the speeding fines page.

No points, and no licence loss from an ordinary fine

The Netherlands has no demerit-points licence system for ordinary fines, so an administrative traffic fine adds no points and cannot on its own suspend a licence. Drivers moving from a country with a points scheme often expect one here; there is none.

That does not make repeat offending free of consequence, but the mechanism is different. Serious or repeated conduct is dealt with on the criminal track through the prosecutor's sentencing guideline, which can add a driving ban, and a driver whose fitness is in doubt can be referred to the driver-fitness authority (Centraal Bureau Rijvaardigheidsbewijzen, CBR). Neither is a running points total, and neither flows from an ordinary Wet Mulder fine. The driving ban page covers both.

How to object to a fine

A Wet Mulder fine is challenged first by administrative objection to the public prosecutor (officier van justitie), and then, if needed, by appeal to the subdistrict court (kantonrechter). These are two distinct stages, and neither involves a criminal court.

The first stage is an objection (beroep) to the officier van justitie under artikel 6 WAHV. It must be lodged within the period stated on the beschikking, which is six weeks under artikel 6:7 van de Algemene wet bestuursrecht (Awb), and it costs nothing to bring. The officier van justitie reviews the fine and either cancels it, lowers it, or upholds it.

If the objection is refused, artikel 9 WAHV opens an appeal to the rechtbank, where the case is heard and decided by the kantonrechter. Artikel 9 lid 2 sets the grounds: that the offence was not committed, that the circumstances did not justify a sanction or justified a lower one, or that the officier van justitie wrongly failed to cancel the fine. This is the administrative mirror of an appeal, not a criminal trial.

One deadline sits on the authorities rather than on the driver. Artikel 4 lid 2 WAHV requires the fine to be made known within four months of the offence; only where the keeper's address had to be traced can it take longer, up to an absolute limit of five years.

The deposit rule (zekerheidstelling)

A rule that is widely misstated deserves care, because getting it wrong can cost a person the right to be heard. There is no requirement to pay the fine before objecting to the officier van justitie; that first stage is free.

The deposit applies only at the second stage. Artikel 11 lid 2 WAHV requires a person appealing to the kantonrechter to deposit security (zekerheidstelling) for the fine, but only when the sanction is EUR 225 or more (2026). Below EUR 225 no deposit is due.

Where it does apply and the deposit is not made within the set period, artikel 11 lid 4 lets the kantonrechter declare the appeal inadmissible (niet-ontvankelijk), so the deadline matters. The deposit is security for the eventual fine, not an additional charge.

What happens if a fine goes unpaid

Ignoring a Wet Mulder fine makes it grow, by fixed statutory steps. Artikel 23 lid 1 WAHV sets a payment period of two weeks once the fine is final. Miss it, and artikel 23 lid 3 raises the amount automatically by 50%.

If it is still unpaid after a reminder (aanmaning), artikel 25 lid 1 adds a second increase of 100% of the fine and the first increase. After that the CJIB can collect by writ (dwangbevel) under artikel 26, enforced like a court judgment through a bailiff (gerechtsdeurwaarder), with the bailiff's costs added on top.

The arithmetic is worth seeing. A EUR 100 fine left unpaid becomes EUR 150 after the first increase, and EUR 300 after the second, before the EUR 9 administratiekosten and any bailiff costs. Paying on time, or objecting on time, is always cheaper than letting the increases run.

Related pages

Speeding fines works through the full speeding scale, band by band and road type by road type, and shows where speeding leaves the Wet Mulder and becomes a criminal matter.

Driving ban covers the criminal driving ban (rijontzegging), the roadside seizure of a licence, and the separate CBR fitness track.

Driving laws in the Netherlands is the overview that sets the two enforcement tracks side by side.

Netherlands law sets out the wider legal structure around this section.