Suffolk County, New York, and the county’s Traffic and Parking Violations Agency have agreed to pay up to $45 million to drivers who were charged a $30 fee on top of their red-light camera fines. The deal ends a lawsuit that has run since 2016, and claims are open now. Anyone who paid the fee since April 1, 2013 has until Tuesday, Dec. 8, 2026 to file, according to the official settlement website.
Who counts as a class member
The class is “all Persons or Entities who between April 1, 2013 and the present paid a $30” red-light camera administrative fee to the county or its violations agency, the settlement site says. That covers individuals and businesses alike, so a company whose fleet vehicle was caught on camera is in too. The test is whether the fee was paid.
The lawsuit is McGrath v. Suffolk County. It was filed in 2016 by Robert McGrath, a utility lineman, and it argued that the $30 charge, added to a $50 fine, broke state law. New York courts agreed that the fee was illegal, NBC New York reported in August. The county settled without admitting wrongdoing.
A driver who paid the $30 once is a class member, and so is a driver who paid it on several tickets. Each fee paid counts separately. What each person has to settle is how many fees they paid and on what dates, and whether the notice mailed to them carries a class member ID.
Every $30 fee paid since April 2013 is a separate item in the Suffolk claim, and the form is due Dec. 8. The Settlement & Refund Recovery System lays out the four-date rule for reading a settlement notice, so the Nov. 9 and Dec. 8 dates in the Suffolk notice do not get mixed up.
Get the four-date rule for the Suffolk notice with the Recovery System →
How much each fee could return
The settlement site says the defendants “will pay up to $45,000,000 for cash payments to Settlement Class Members who file Valid Claims.” That is a ceiling for the fund, not a promise to any one driver. David Raimondo, one of the class lawyers, told NBC New York that drivers who paid are expected to get $36 per ticket. Claim Depot, which tracks settlements, also lists up to $36 for each $30 fee and says the claims administrator sets the final amount once it knows how many claims came in.
The same listing shows attorneys’ fees of up to $12.5 million coming out of the settlement, and it says administration costs have not been set.
The dates that matter
Three dates sit close together. Anyone who wants to stay out of the settlement and keep the right to sue separately must send an exclusion request postmarked by Monday, Nov. 9. Objections to the deal are due by the same day. Claim forms are due online by Tuesday, Dec. 8, and the final approval hearing is set for 10 a.m. Eastern on that same Dec. 8.
Money moves after the judge signs off. Claim Depot says payments go out approximately 75 days after final approval, which would be around late February 2027 if the hearing goes ahead as scheduled. The settlement site does not publish a payment date, and the court has not yet granted final approval.
What the claim needs
The administrator is Kroll Settlement Administration. Claims can be filed online, or a printed form can be mailed to Kroll at P.O. Box 5324, New York, NY 10150-5324, according to Claim Depot. The form asks for the class member ID printed on the settlement notice. Anyone who threw the notice away can request an ID through the website’s contact form or by calling 833-447-6790. Claim Depot says payment can come by Zelle, PayPal, Venmo, prepaid debit card or paper check.
Suffolk’s lawyer in the case, Christopher Clayton, said the county was pleased to reach a resolution. County officials told NBC New York that everyone with a qualifying ticket would be contacted directly with instructions.
Filing the Suffolk claim before Dec. 8
The claim is free. It is filed on the settlement website, and the same site posts the notice, the dates and the contact form. No one has to be paid to file it.
Before sitting down to file, it helps to gather the class member ID from the notice, the ticket or violation numbers if any survive, and the approximate dates the fees were paid. Old bank or card statements showing a payment to Suffolk County can fill gaps when a ticket is gone. A list of every vehicle that drivers in the household registered in Suffolk since 2013 catches the tickets that were paid by a spouse or an adult child.
After filing, keep the confirmation. The next thing to watch is the final approval hearing on Dec. 8, and then the payment, which Claim Depot puts at about 75 days later.
Nov. 9 and Dec. 8 are not the same deadline
Mixing up the exclusion date and the claim date can cost a Suffolk driver the chance to file or the right to sue on their own. The Settlement & Refund Recovery System walks through a step-by-step filing walkthrough and a claim log and payment tracker, so each fee paid, each filing date and each expected payment sits in one place. It is a 50-page system with the tracker built in.
Set up a claim log for the Suffolk red-light payout with the Recovery System →
This article was produced with AI assistance and edited for accuracy against the sources linked above.
