[Rights Remedy] Driver's license revocation due to excessive penalty points, 3 requirements for livelihood-based reduction — Is it only for drunk driving?

3-Line Summary

1. Livelihood-based mitigation is not a system exclusive to drunk driving. Annex 28 of the “Enforcement Rule of the Road Traffic Act” separately stipulates that cases where a license is revoked due to exceeding penalty points or cumulative points (e.g., 121 points or more in one year) are also grounds for mitigation.
2. There are three requirements. Driving must be an important means of supporting the family’s livelihood, there must be no history of revocation, 3 or more accidents involving personal injury, 3 or more suspensions, or previous mitigation within the last 5 years, and an objection must be filed with the Commissioner of the Provincial/Metropolitan Police Agency of the place of residence within 60 days from the date the disposition was received.
3. If mitigated, the revocation is changed to 110 penalty points, which means a 110-day suspension. If the objection is dismissed, an administrative appeal can be filed within 90 days from the date the result was notified.

Table of Contents

1. The Misconception That Livelihood-Based Mitigation Only Applies to Drunk Driving
2. Criteria for License Revocation Due to Exceeding Penalty Points: 121 Points in One Year
3. Three Requirements for Livelihood-Based Mitigation
4. Why I Re-checked the Number of Suspensions Using a Driver’s Career Certificate
5. Composition of Materials Proving the Means of Livelihood
6. Preparing the Objection to Driver’s License Disposition and the Statement of Explanation
7. Results of the Objection Deliberation Committee and the Meaning of a 110-Day Suspension
8. 90 Days for Administrative Appeal if the Objection is Dismissed
9. Practical Checklist for License Revocation Due to Exceeding Penalty Points
10. Services Provided by the Administrative Agent Office

1. The Misconception That Livelihood-Based Mitigation Only Applies to Drunk Driving

I am an administrative agent with an office in Songdo, Incheon. I would like to introduce an anecdote I encountered while working.

Can a driver who hasn’t had a single drop of alcohol still receive livelihood-based mitigation? On the 38th day after receiving the notice of license revocation, this was the first thing the person who called me asked. They said that most of the articles they found online were about “livelihood-based relief for drunk driving,” and they had even seen comments stating that there is no mitigation for cases where a license is revoked due to accumulated penalty points.

The caller was a woman in her late 20s who runs a side dish shop in Yeonsu-gu. She starts cooking at 5 AM and delivers side dishes and lunch boxes to two daycare centers and four offices using a compact refrigerated truck starting from 7 AM. She lived with her mother, who was resting after knee surgery, and her younger sibling’s university tuition for the junior year also came out of the shop’s sales.

After her license was revoked, she had been outsourcing the deliveries to a delivery agent for nearly six weeks. The monthly delivery fee exceeded half of the shop’s net profit. There were only two months left until the tuition deadline for the next semester.

The articles she read were not entirely wrong. They were just only half right.

2. License Revocation Criteria for Exceeding Penalty Points, 121 Points in 1 Year

The criteria for license revocation due to penalty points are outlined in Annex 28 of the “Enforcement Rule of the Road Traffic Act.” A license is revoked if the penalty points from a single violation/accident or the cumulative points over a certain period reach the following scores.

Looking at the driving record certificate I received via email, violations had accumulated like this over the past year:

• 3 Signal/Instruction Violations: 45 points (15 points per violation)
• 2 Speeding Violations (Exceeding 20km/h to 40km/h over the limit): 30 points (15 points per violation)
• 1 Center Line Intrusion: 30 points
• 1 Contact Accident caused by Signal Violation (1 minor injury): 20 points (15 points for signal violation + 5 points for minor injury)

The total was 125 points. Each one was just a single fine notice, but while spending the year rushing to meet delivery deadlines, the threshold was crossed.

If a license is revoked due to exceeding penalty points, according to Article 82, Paragraph 2, Item 7 of the “Road Traffic Act,” the license cannot be reissued for one year from the date of revocation. This one-year period was a time that translated directly into costs for their shop.

3. Three Requirements for Livelihood-based Mitigation

The ‘Mitigation of Disposition Standards’ section under the same Annex 28 divides the grounds for mitigation into two categories. One is for cases where a license is canceled or suspended due to drunk driving, and the other is for cases where a license is canceled due to exceeding penalty points or cumulative penalty points. The idea that livelihood-based mitigation is a system exclusively for drunk driving is a misunderstanding arising from only looking at the former category.

When breaking down the requirements applicable to cancellation due to exceeding penalty points, there are three:

① There must be grounds for mitigation Driving must be an important means of maintaining the livelihood of one’s family. In addition to livelihood, being engaged in traffic volunteer activities for more than 3 years as an exemplary driver at the time of the disposition, or receiving a commendation from a police chief or higher for apprehending a driver who caused a traffic accident and fled, also constitutes grounds for mitigation.

② There must be no grounds for exclusion If any of the following apply, you are not eligible for mitigation:

• A history of driver’s license revocation within the past 5 years
• 3 or more traffic accidents involving personal injury within the past 5 years
• A history of driver’s license suspension 3 or more times within the past 5 years
• A history of having a disposition mitigated through deliberation by the Objection Review Committee, administrative appeal, or administrative litigation within the past 5 years

③ An objection must be filed within the deadline An objection must be filed with the Commissioner of the Metropolitan/Provincial Police Agency having jurisdiction over your place of residence within 60 days from the date you received the administrative disposition. The Metropolitan/Provincial Police Commissioner may mitigate the disposition following deliberation and resolution by the Driver’s License Administrative Disposition Objection Review Committee.

For your information, the grounds for exclusion regarding drunk driving are different. These include a blood alcohol concentration exceeding 0.1%, accidents involving personal injury while drunk driving, refusal to take a breathalyzer test, fleeing, assaulting a police officer during an enforcement operation, 3 or more accidents involving personal injury within 5 years, and a history of drunk driving after June 30, 2001. In the case of a suspension due to drunk driving, if mitigation is granted, the number of days of suspension is reduced by half.

Even if the requirements are met, mitigation is subject to the Committee’s judgment. Since the legal clause states “may” rather than “shall,” mitigation is not automatic. Therefore, what you include in the objection form determines the outcome.

4. The Reason I Re-checked the Number of Suspensions Using the Driving Record Certificate

On the scheduled Tuesday afternoon, the client arrived after closing their shop early. At the beginning of the consultation, they spoke cautiously, “But I have received suspensions three times. That shouldn’t be allowed, right?”

Receiving three or more suspensions within 5 years is a ground for exclusion. If this were true, there would be no reason to file an objection. At this point, I decided to look at the records instead of relying on their memory.

What the client remembered as “three suspensions” was as follows:

1. A penalty point reduction education received 4 years ago when points were in the 30s.
2. A 40-day license suspension received 2 years ago with 40 penalty points.
3. Compliance education received during the same suspension period and the 20-day suspension reduction resulting from that education.

They were counting both the mail from the police station and the education notices from the Road Traffic Authority as suspensions. In the administrative disposition history of the Driving Record Certificate, the suspension disposition was recorded only once. Penalty point reduction education is a program that reduces penalty points by 20 when the points are under 40, so it is not a suspension disposition. Compliance education reduces a suspension period that has already been received, so it does not increase the number of suspensions.

I cross-checked the other grounds for exclusion one by one using the same certificate. There was no history of license revocation within 5 years, there was only one accident involving personal injury (this current contact accident), and there was no history of receiving reductions.

If this verification had not been done, the client would have simply let the remaining 22 days pass by. Grounds for exclusion must be verified through a Driving Record Certificate, not through one’s own memory.

5. Composition of Evidence Proving Livelihood

There were 22 days remaining. Calculating backward from the date, I set the filing date as the 49th day after the disposition. This is because filing right before the deadline leaves no room for supplementation.

A mere sentence stating “livelihood is difficult” is not enough to persuade the committee. What the committee looks at is how indispensable driving is to this family’s livelihood. Therefore, I structured the materials in three directions.

Evidence that driving is part of the work

• Business registration certificate and sales data submitted during the recent VAT filing (documents the client already possessed)
• Monthly transaction statements from six delivery clients
• Transaction confirmation letters written by the clients (delivery time, frequency, and volume)

Evidence of losses incurred from being unable to drive

• Receipts for delivery agency fees incurred during the 6 weeks following the license revocation
• Changes in sales and net profit during the same period

Evidence that this work supports the family’s livelihood

• Certified copy of Resident Registration and Family Relationship Certificate
• Receipts for mother’s surgery and medical expenses
• Tuition notices for the younger sibling

The most decisive piece of evidence among these was the delivery agency fee receipts. Documents describing the circumstances before the revocation serve as an argument that driving is necessary. Receipts for actual expenses incurred after the revocation demonstrate the financial loss caused by the inability to drive in monetary terms.

There was also a small anecdote. On the corner of a transaction confirmation letter received from a daycare center, there was a Post-it note that said, “Stir-fried anchovies are the most popular.” I peeled it off and returned it to the client before submission, and they smiled, saying they would stick that memo on the shop’s refrigerator.

6. Preparing the Objection to Driver’s License Disposition and the Statement of Explanation

In accordance with Article 95 of the “Enforcement Rule of the Road Traffic Act,” an objection must be submitted to the Commissioner of the Metropolitan/Provincial Police Agency by attaching the Driver’s License Disposition Notice to the Objection to Driver’s License Disposition (Form No. 87).

The most difficult part of the statement of explanation was how to handle the facts of the violations. All seven violations were instances where the client had already paid the fines. If we had made excuses for each one, the committee would have interpreted it as a lack of remorse. Therefore, we admitted the violations as they were and instead focused on why the violations were concentrated and how those reasons were eliminated.

Out of the seven violations, five occurred between 7:00 AM and 8:30 AM, a period when deliveries had to be completed before daycare center drop-off times. This pattern was evident in the records. In the statement of explanation, we included this fact along with the changes made to operations:

• Adjusted the start of cooking to 30 minutes earlier, moving the first delivery departure to 6:30 AM.
• Consulted with two daycare centers to delay delivery times by 15 minutes (reflected in the confirmation letters from clients).
• Changed the delivery route to use side streets instead of main roads with many traffic signals.

Thus, instead of making promises about future prevention plans, we submitted the already implemented changes as evidence. Since the changed delivery times were written in the confirmation letters from the clients, this part was read as a fact rather than a mere claim.

Our office prepared the objection and the statement of explanation, and we completed the filing service by submitting them to the Incheon Metropolitan Police Agency on the 49th day after the disposition.

7. The Results of the Objection Review Committee and the Meaning of a 110-Day Suspension

The Objection Review Committee consists of seven members, including the chairperson. Private members, such as police officers from the Metropolitan/Provincial Police Agency and transportation experts, participate in the deliberation.

About six weeks after filing, the notification of the results arrived. The revocation disposition was mitigated to a suspension disposition.

The mitigation criteria in Annex 28 are as follows: If it falls under a revocation disposition, the penalty points for the disposition are set at 110 points; if the revocation is due to exceeding penalty points, the cumulative points before the revocation and the penalty points for the disposition are both summed to 110 points. Since 1 penalty point equals 1 day of suspension, it results in a 110-day suspension.

The first thing the client asked about was the education program. They wanted to know if receiving the education would reduce the suspension period by 20 days, as it had two years ago. This time, it was not the case. Annex 28 stipulates that if a mitigation has already been granted through an Objection Review Committee or an administrative appeal, the suspension period is not further reduced; instead, upon completing the education, only the cumulative points are reduced by 20 points. Therefore, we decided to undergo the education to manage future cumulative points.

In this case, mitigation was granted because transaction records, actual losses, and updated operational records were all provided together. Even with the same requirements, the results may vary depending on the details of the violation and the evidence provided.

During the suspension period, we continued deliveries through a delivery agency, but it was a cost with a fixed end date. This was different from the situation two years ago, when it was impossible to retake the license exam for an entire year.

8. If an Objection is Dismissed, Administrative Appeal within 90 Days

If an objection has been dismissed, the next step is an administrative appeal. Article 94, Paragraph 3 of the 「Road Traffic Act」 stipulates that a person who has filed an objection may request an administrative appeal within 90 days from the date they are notified of the result. The period is not recalculated from the date of the original disposition.

It is also possible to request an administrative appeal directly without going through the objection process. In this case, the deadline is 90 days from the date the disposition was known, or 180 days from the date the disposition occurred. In an administrative appeal, livelihood circumstances and the proportionality of the disposition serve as the main axes of judgment.

There were two reasons for choosing the objection process first in this case. First, the structure where grounds for mitigation and grounds for exclusion are specified in the attached table aligned well with the committee’s deliberation. Second, even if dismissed, a new 90-day period is granted from the date of notification, leaving an opportunity for an administrative appeal. The process of proceeding to an administrative appeal after an objection was dismissed in a drunk driving case was covered in the post Administrative Appeal Procedure After Dismissal of Objection for Drunk Driving License Revocation.

9. Practical Checklist for License Revocation Due to Excessive Penalty Points

If your license has been revoked due to accumulated penalty points, check the following in order:

1. Confirm the date of the disposition via the decision notice and mark the 60-day deadline on your calendar.
2. Obtain a Driving Record Certificate and check the number of revocations/suspensions within the last 5 years, the number of accidents involving personal injury, and any history of leniency. Do not confuse education history with suspension dispositions.
3. Gather materials proving that driving is a vital means of livelihood (business/employment documents, costs incurred due to inability to drive, documents regarding dependents).
4. Document the reasons why violations accumulated and any changes already made to operations.
5. If an objection is dismissed, review the possibility of an administrative appeal within 90 days from the date of notification.

Requirements and judgments vary by case, so individual verification is required.

10. Administrative Agent Office Services

Hwang Yunsang Administrative Agent (Administrative Scrivener) Office provides document preparation and filing services for objections to driver’s license revocation or suspension and statements of explanation. We cross-check the reasons for exclusion using your driving record certificate and assist in organizing evidence to prove your livelihood. If an objection is dismissed, we proceed to assist with the preparation and filing of administrative appeal requests and applications for suspension of execution (stay), including the drafting of supplementary documents.

By checking how many days remain after the license revocation, we can identify the possible courses of action. If you are struggling with license revocation due to excessive penalty points in Incheon or Songdo, please check the date you received the disposition notice.

This content has been reconstructed for better understanding and is not related to any specific person or incident.

We are an administrative agent (administrative scrivener) office located in Songdo, Incheon (POSCO Tower Songdo). We handle administrative appeals, licensing/reporting services, immigration for foreigners (visas/residency), and regular administrative management. We provide document preparation and filing services for objections and administrative appeal documents regarding driver’s license revocation or suspension. If you are curious about a similar situation, please feel free to contact us.

• Address: Room 2697, POSCO Tower Songdo, 165 Convensia-daero, Yeonsu-gu, Incheon
• Phone: 010-3374-2687
• Website: www.hwangadmin.com