Uniform federal catalog of facts for traffic offenses
The German nationwide event catalog for Road Traffic Offenses ( BT-KAT-OWI ) is a nationwide valid catalog of penalties for road traffic offenses unified. It came into force on January 1, 2002. At the moment, it is the most important tool for punishing traffic offenses for the police officers in the federal states and the employees of the municipal fine authorities.
The more than 400-page BT-KAT-OWI was created by the Kraftfahrt-Bundesamt (KBA) in order to standardize the punishment of traffic offenses throughout Germany. It was enacted by individual federal states in each federal state. The KBA is responsible for updating the BT-KAT-OWI.
As a legal source, the BT-KAT-OWI has the status of an administrative regulation and thus ranks behind the (Federal) Law on Administrative Offenses (OWiG) and the federal fine catalog ordinance (BKatV), which means that the regulations of the BT-KAT-OWI are allowed do not contradict the content of the higher-ranking norms. But the handling of the regulations of the BT-KAT-OWI by the law enforcement officers of the police and local authorities must not run counter to the regulations of the two higher-ranking sources of law.
The 13th edition of the BT-KAT-OWI came into force on April 18, 2020.
Contained areas of law
The BT-KAT-OWI contains violations for the following areas of law
- Road traffic regulations
- Driving license regulation
- Road Traffic Licensing Regulations
- Road Traffic Act for violations related to alcohol and other drugs
- Holiday travel regulations for violations e.g. B. against the Sunday driving ban
- Hazardous goods ordinance for road, rail and inland waterway transport
- Mobility Aid Ordinance for violations in connection with electronic mobility aids
- Vehicle registration regulation
Application problems
The catalog of offenses often does not correspond to the applicable regulations because new editions are less common than changes to its legal basis. In addition, there are always editorial errors when incorporating the changes, which can only be corrected in the subsequent new edition.
The large size of the document can lead to misuse, for example if the present case is classified incorrectly. Issues of demarcation between the different types of offense can have an impact on the legal consequences of the offense and thus on the person affected by the punitive measure. For example, it is of decisive importance whether a warning fee can be issued as a result or whether a fine is due for the violation, which is often associated with the entry of points in the register of fitness to drive of the Federal Motor Transport Authority . Further uncertainties can arise with the correct classification of such administrative offenses that are committed by pedestrians and cyclists or with the use of the possibility of lawfully increasing a warning fee provided in the catalog because of a determined intentional commission of the offense in question or because of unusual circumstances of the offense to reduce.
The foreword of the BT-Kat-OWI contains specifications for the use of the BT-KAT-OWI such as B. the increase in fines or the classification of several offenses committed at the same time (unity / majority of offenses).
Web links
- Uniform federal catalog of facts on the homepage of the Federal Motor Transport Authority (as of June 7, 2020)
- Kraftfahrt-Bundesamt : Federal Standard Catalog of Road Traffic Offenses Status: 01.11.2017 - 12th edition (pdf), status 23 July 2020
Individual evidence
- ↑ see proof of changes to the 11th edition ( PDF ( Memento of September 26, 2016 in the Internet Archive )), October 2016, contains many changes that were already in effect from May 1, 2014 - the publication date of the 10th edition
