Points and Bans

12 points on your licence: is a six-month ban automatic?

Written and reviewed by a practising criminal barrister · Law stated as at 27 August 2026

How the counting actually works

Two dates matter, and most people use the wrong one.

Points are added together when the offences were committed within three years of each other. It is the offence dates that count, not the dates you were convicted or the dates the points appeared on your record. Because a camera case can take months to reach a decision, people regularly think they are safe when they are not, and occasionally the reverse.

So the question is never “how many points are on my licence?”. It is: taking the offence I have just committed, which earlier offences were committed within the three years before it?

Three years, four years, and why both numbers are right

An endorsement stays on your driving record for four years, usually from the date of the offence. But it only counts towards totting for three.

That fourth year is the source of a great deal of confusion. Points you can still see on your record may be too old to put you over twelve. They will still be visible to insurers, and they are still relevant to what the court knows about you, but they are not part of the sum.

Drink and drug driving endorsements are different again: those stay on the record for eleven years from conviction. The three-year totting window is unaffected.

How long the ban is

A previous disqualification only counts here if it was for a fixed period of 56 days or more and it was imposed within the three years immediately before the latest offence was committed. A short ban, or an older one, does not lengthen the minimum.

These are minimums. The court can go longer, though on ordinary totting facts it usually does not.

The mistake that closes the door

If your case arrives as a Single Justice Procedure Notice and you tick the box to plead guilty and let a magistrate deal with it on the papers, you have not lost the ability to argue exceptional hardship — the court has to give you the chance to make representations before it disqualifies. But that chance arrives as another letter, and if that letter is not answered, the ban can be imposed without you.

Exceptional hardship is evidence given on oath. There is no way to give sworn evidence by post. If you are at or near twelve points, ask to attend court from the outset rather than waiting to be asked.

Does the ban wipe the points?

A totting-up ban does. Once you have been disqualified for totting, the points that took you there are not counted against you again, and you start from zero.

This is where a lot of published advice goes wrong, so it is worth being precise: it is the totting disqualification that clears the points, not disqualification in general. A ban imposed for the offence itself — a drink driving disqualification, or a discretionary ban for a bad piece of driving — does not wipe anything. The points stay, and they keep counting for their three years.

The separate “56 days or more” rule you may have read about is not about wiping points at all. It is the rule above, about whether an earlier ban makes the next totting disqualification twelve months rather than six.

If you passed your test in the last two years

A different and harsher rule applies, and it catches people who have never heard of it.

For two years after passing your first driving test, reaching six points means your licence is revoked. You go back to a provisional licence and have to pass both the theory and the practical test again before you can drive on your own.

The critical part: this is not a court decision. The DVLA revokes the licence because the law requires it once the points are recorded. Exceptional hardship cannot prevent it, because there is no court discretion for it to operate on. A magistrate who would gladly have helped you has no power to.

Two offences of three points each will do it. So will a single offence carrying six, which is why a section 172 conviction for not naming the driver is so serious for a new driver.

Exceptional hardship, briefly

The court is not asking whether a ban would be hard. Almost every ban is hard. It is asking whether the hardship would be exceptional, and the guidance is explicit that losing your job is not by itself enough.

What tends to matter is hardship falling on other people: employees who would lose work, dependants, someone you care for who has no other way of getting to hospital. That is covered properly in how magistrates actually decide exceptional hardship.

One thing to know now: you cannot run the same circumstances twice within three years. If you succeed on an argument, that argument is spent for three years. It is a reason to put the whole case forward the first time rather than holding something back.

Common questions

Do penalty points expire?

They stop counting towards a totting ban three years after the offence, and they come off the driving record after four years, or eleven for drink and drug offences. The two periods are different and both are right.

Can I ask for a shorter ban instead of six months?

Yes. If exceptional hardship is established the court can impose a shorter disqualification rather than none at all, and in practice that is a common outcome.

Does a totting ban clear my points?

Yes. Points taken into account for a totting disqualification are not counted again. A disqualification imposed for the offence itself, such as drink driving, does not clear them.

Can I argue exceptional hardship more than once?

You can, but not on the same circumstances within three years of the last time they were used to reduce or avoid a ban. New circumstances can be relied on.

Do fixed penalty points count?

Yes. Points accepted on a fixed penalty count towards the twelve in exactly the same way as points imposed by a court.

I am at nine points. What should I do differently?

Treat the next notice as a court matter rather than a ticket, keep every offence date written down, and if a further allegation arrives, ask to attend court rather than replying by post.