Dekalb County Recorders Court

Typical government office. Dekalb county has to work on the customer service. You get the feeling that you are putting them out of their way.

Pretty dang bad service.
If you need help dealing with this Court Service, call Trentacosta & Associates P.C. at 404−368−9465.
or visit
& say you were referred by Unilocal

This review is more to help other people than it is to express anger or frustration. After a certain point I let go of those emotions. These are tips that will help you avoid certain bureaucratic pitfalls in dealing with the court and its employees.
So you’ve gotten a citation/​ticket, and instead of paying the fine online (or a court appearance is mandatory) you’ve opted to appear in court. This is my big guide of helpful tips that will put you really ahead of the game in getting your issue sorted out.
1.) Be on your game. This court has a massive caseload and is underfunded. They can and do make mistakes and unless you’re on top of things you will end up paying for them both in money and stress.
2.) It should go without saying but I saw a lot of younger people who need this advice: This is a court. This is not school. You don’t get to cop an attitude– you can and will go to jail. The system is hard enough to navigate on its own, being rude and abusive with the people who at least nominally want to help you is going to make things way worse for you.
3.) There are signs posted saying cell phones aren’t allowed in the building. This is not enforced. However, I highly recommend that unless you’re in a hallway you have your phone entirely off. If it goes off while court is in session they can take it away from you permanently AND throw you in jail for a few days.
4.) If you think you might have to pay the court when you go, bring the entire amount in cash. The only ATM at the court has massive fees (they go on a percentage basis and a flat rate.)
5.) ***IMPORTANT*** If you have already decided you’re going to fight the ticket and plead not guilty, you can file your not guilty plea ONLINE! This saves you a trip to the court and a very lengthy arraignment process (at least 2 hours of wasted time, likely.) Go to the court’s website and you will see a «Not Guilty Plea» link there. I’m not linking so Unilocal won’t filter this review.
6.) Should be obvious but in case you don’t know, for most citations you can simply pay your ticket online which will enter a guilty plea and close the issue. There are instructions on your ticket to do so. ***IMPORTANT*** Keep records of any payment you make to this court.
7.) Bring a pen, you’re going to need it. Bring headphones too because the line to pay is very long and there are sometimes screaming children.
8.) Parking is $ 3 but there is a lot that is literally across the street. A minor annoyance.
9.) Get there early. Consider this a rule of thumb, if you’re at least 20 minutes early to the listed time you will likely get a much better position and it could save you a lot of time as they work through each person’s case.

Just paid $ 412 on a speeding ticket, never felt this helpless in my life.
I recently ran into an obvious speed trap on Sheridan Road NE (please be careful, the cops lurk around the intersection between Sheridan and Briarcliff), several cars have already been pulled into the VTA station and given tickets.
I flew back to Boston and could not attend the court date given on ticket. A month later, another notice appeared at my permanent address, asking for $ 100 more than the original fine of $ 192, citing «Contempt of Court».
Now I called to explain that I could not have attended the court date but there was no one to answer but an automated machine with an authoritative voice telling me how to pay my fine.
I wrote an elaborate email about my circumstance and plea for another court date and possible reduction of the fine, but this is the response:
«The fine amount is $ 367.00 + $ 25.00 for court cost, no personal checks accepted. I am showing that you missed your court date; therefore there is no other choice but to pay and close. Thank you»
Apparently the new amount includes a $ 75 warrant fee, which I have no idea what it’s for. I talked to a traffic lawyer and he said «I don’t know, sometimes they just charge you that.»
Okay, I guess this is when I give up and just say, DeKalb County, you win, you have successfully extorted money from an innocent visitor.
Oh, they charged another $ 20 as «service fee» when I paid online. So the total is $ 412, a nice, welcoming gesture, from a county that is so desperate to increase its income that it has lost any respect for justice.
Thank you DeKalb County of Altanta, for setting a great example for the rest of country.

If you are going to need to be there I would advise giving yourself about a 90 minute window before arriving for your assigned time. Driving informational signage is third world at best. I luckily found the building by chance. Parking is limited, costs $ 3.00. Everyone I came in contact with who worked there was friendly, professional and helpful. Which is why i gave them 5 stars. It most likely isn’t a easy job. The facility is very dated, early 1970. Same layout as most of the other typical facilities in metro area that were built in that era. The entire space needs to be torn down and redone to accommodate one of our best counties in Georgia. The courtroom was small and there were a lot of people. The DA, Clerks, 9′ Officer, and Judge were very professional. Again 5 Stars. I was in and out under 1 hour. Prior to this I communicated via email with the recorders court and I found it very helpful.

Not even 1 star. Sub par, below the level of the earth service. Service not even suitable due to mice. How dare they waste hard earned tax payer dollars on the worst system? What a rip off. Try paying a simple parking ticket online. It does not appear. Went to pay mine before the 7 days to avoid higher rip off fees and system says tickets take longer than 7 days to appear, but yet they say to pay before 7 days. MR CEO OF Dekalb, what a way to try and get higher fees from customers? You set your system up to not show their tickets so you know people are way too busy to
drive to the worst place on earth to pay so they want to pay online and you design a system to deny them that right within 7 days so you collect more money after 7 days so you can waste it on the worst employees in the world and your cops really need to be trained on their ticketing manners. Please checkout the best county for business and tickets, and anything they actually care and do their job. IT IS COBB county.
You run the slowest, most inept, ill trained county from permits, to cops, to customer service and most of all the people that run your courts and collect your tickets. Please seek help

If I could give –10 000 000 stars for this place, I still wouldn’t be satisfied. I got a stop sign violation ticket at a notorious intersection. Surprise! I didn’t run it. It’s damn near impossible to run a stop sign making a right at a T-​intersection with trees blocking your view… unless you’re on a suicide mission which I’m not, I like life, but who’s listening? Anyway, I show up on my court date, plead not guilty and chose to fight it (yep!), and after I handed in my paperwork, I was told by the clerk to wait for my next court date in the mail. Surprise again! I get a failure to appear notice from the DMV… and they’re about to suspend my license, and there’s an automatic bench warrant for my arrest (they don’t tell you that one up front). WTF!!! No use in calling the recorders court, they don’t answer the phone, and they’re shameless about that. So I email them with everything that happened and ask for guidance on what steps I should take to prove I reported on my court date and what happened to all that paperwork I filled out? The reply: how much I owed them for the ticket I would now have to plead guilty to and pay for and the extra $ 100 that would resolve the failure to appear (paying that also serves as a guilty plea), cancel the warrant, and get a little receipt to take to the DMV to stop the suspension of my license. Nothing more, nothing less. No help, they didn’t care. I decided to go there to see if there was someone I could talk to. Something told me to take enough money, just in case. Thank God I did. According to the cashier, there is no one to talk to when the courthouse loses your paperwork or simply doesn’t record your appearance in the system. She gave me the blankest blank face I’ve ever witnessed. –_​– Annnnd, oh, since you’re at the courthouse, you’re getting arrested right here, right now if you don’t pay right here, right now. So there you have it folks, I lost $ 300 but I did gain an erroneous stop sign violation and a bonus failure to appear! Now I have to fix all of this which is just going to cost me more money and time dealing with this pathetic court system. Wish me luck, and if you ever end up reporting to that courthouse, see if you can get a copy of your paperwork or something to prove that you reported.

Well, without a doubt, this place is as bad as it gets.
Here’s a few tips for those of you who have the misfortune of receiving traffic tickets from overzealous cops in Dekalb County. (Mine was for making a right on red… whoops).
— As others have noted, bring cash. You’ll need $ 3 for parking. You’ll also need lots more than what you expect for your fine, should you wish to pay it. More on that in a second.
— Come early. I arrived at 1:30 for my 2pm slot. The line outside was already long, but I got into the courtroom and was seated in the third row. Those who arrived later had to wait much, much longer. Those who arrived much later were held outside of the courtroom for the next hearing: not fun.
— As others have said, don’t let your cell phone ring. Do turn it off. As noble as it is that they donate confiscated cell phones to a battered women’s shelter, I want to keep mine.
— If you see Judge Roderick Bridges sitting behind the bench, just bend over and spread ‘em because you’re about to be completely f$@&ed. The guy is on a huge power trip. I don’t have much experience within the legal system, but I have never seen a judge who is that much of an ass. The only words that I heard leave his mouth were «What do you plead?,» «It’s $xxx, can you pass debt?» and «See the cashier/​parole officer.» I saw so many people try to explain their charges and he couldn’t have cared less. It’s obvious that this smarmy jerk is pretty content with the job security of being voted into office by county executives.
— On that note, when you go downstairs to pay your fine, expect a 90-​minute line. You might wonder why it takes so long to reach the cashier. Here’s the reason… or at least one of them. When the judge tells you your fine, he doesn’t do the math for you. At the beginning of the hearing, you are informed of a $ 25 court fee for any guilty/​nolo plea. You might assume that the judge factors that into the total when he says, «it’s $ 219, can you pass debt?» But he doesn’t, and that explains why tons of people are running between the cashier and the ATM after reaching the end of the line.
— Do not ask the cashier for legal advice. That makes the line take even longer, and after watching dozens of people attempting this yesterday, I promise you won’t get any useful tidbits out of it.
This is not going to be a fun experience, not matter how you prepare for it. Just be ready to give five hours of your life to the bureaucratic nonsense. And seriously, Dekalb County: I hate you.

No free parking nearby and expect terribly line.
Old court.

OK, Alison B and Lynn M brought up some baaaad memories for me. I concur with everything they’ve said — from no one answering the phone to how bureaucratic the whole process is (stand in this line, no stand in this line, then stand in THAT line…) — and would also add that the reason I hate them most is the fact you cannot reschedule a court date (in my case, for a speeding ticket and lapsed registration) unless you are incarcerated, in the hospital, or on military duty. Seriously? My court date is two days before Christmas and I have to work (HAVE to work) and I can’t just get another court date?!
I learned the hard way that Dekalb Co is NOT a place you want to get a ticket. For that last reason, but also because (as the judge explained to us) for years, Dekalb didn’t follow up/​through with tickets. People just got off and in 2010 they decided to «remedy» that. There were people in court with me with outstanding tickets and warrants from as long as five years ago! It was packed to the gills and Diedre R is right about the timing of things… it’s a nutty system. I got there right before the court opened at 8am and was about 5^th in line (um, this was the second day I went as I showed up closer to 11am the first time and there was no chance I was getting to a judge that day). I ended up getting into the first hearing that day, thankfully.
The only reason that they get two stars, not one, is because I got lucky– my letter came in the mail saying I better show up or else (to summarize) and I did. And since I was a «recent» offender without all the crap some people had (I was amazed at how many people in court that day had multiple no insurance, no registration, etc charges! In GA, no insurance can send you to jail!). And the judge reduced the fine because I was ready, willing and able to pay cash immediately. Other people didn’t fare so well.
Just be warned: don’t get in trouble in Dekalb County but if you do, go to Recorder’s Court with cash and a lot of patience.

Wow– I have never seen so many legitimate 1 star bad reviews for a business and I concur with almost everything that others have written.
This place is bureaucracy at its worst: inadequate and severely limited parking options thanks to overfull paid lots, a dearth of directions at the building so you know what to do once you arrive, inefficient processing in the courtroom and somewhat surly service.
I had inadvertently failed to pay my car’s registration on time (oops!) and got pulled over by a cop near my neighborhood when I did not have my lights on at the tail end of dawn while heading to work one morning. He gave me a pass on the lights, but wrote me a ticket for my expired registration (one month late). The officer explained that I could simply pay it (at least $ 155 per the Dekalb County website but possibly as much as $ 300+ depending on how late you are to renew) or if I got the emissions test and registration taken care of right away and go to the Recorders Court on the date and time he assigned me, that the judge would likely drop the fine or at least reduce it significantly.
The very next day after I received the ticket, I took care of the emissions and registration renewal and saved the documents indicating these actions– this was important later!
In any case, back to the Recorders Court, once I finally made it inside for my 9 am appointment (no food or drinks allowed inside, even water bottles per the X Ray machine operator who made me throw away my freshly packed lunch which I had in my work bag for later) and upstairs to the correct courtroom, I found the room to be packed with 110+ people (yes, I counted!) in an area which seated about 90 on long hard wooden benches. The rest of us stood along the side walls of the courtroom, no real problem with this until the DA addressed everyone and they started playing ‘Courtroom Musical Chairs’. We spent almost 30 minutes getting lined up in various areas of the courtroom per the DA’s instructions:
*** «If you are less than 21 years old, come up here and sit in these first two rows»
*** «If you want to speak with the DA, sit over here and wait your turn»
*** «If you are going to plead Guilty or Nolo Contendere and are prepared to pay your fine immediately (which in many cases, you don’t even know exactly how much that will be until you are in front of the Judge), line up over here on the left hand side»
*** «If you are going to plead Not Guilty, line up over on the right hand side» ETC
Imagine 110 people all standing up at various times as instructed by the Sheriff, squeezing by others who are still on the benches waiting to hear where they are supposed to go now forming lines along the side where there is already spillover from too many people in the courtroom. Utter chaos and confusion.
Any way, I was a Nolo Contendere girl so when I finally got up to see the Clerk, presented my ticket and documentation that I had taken care of things immediately after receiving the ticket, I was dismissed with NO FINE! Wahoo! (and that is why I give them a one star upgrade!)
Summary:
1) Arrive early, be prepared to pay $ 3 cash to park in private lots near by the courthouse or you may not find legal parking at all!
2) Do not bring any food or drink in to the building — they will make you throw it away as you go through the metal detector at the entrance
3) Skip laptops and iPads– not allowed to be used even while waiting in the courtroom
4) The Sheriff is not kidding when he says «turn OFF your phone — not just put on vibrate» because if it rings or he sees you using it when the Judge is in on the bench, he will take it away!
5) Bring CASH to pay your fine– no CC or personal checks allowed!
Most importantly, RENEW YOUR CAR REGISTRATION ON TIME so you don’t have to spend 2 – 3 hours in Recorders Court! :)

This place is a great example of how broken governmental agencies in the US are. I got a speeding ticket about a month ago and every day since then I have been trying to use the online payment system to, you know, pay for it. My citation number had an E before it, and every time that I typed this whole number into the look-​up system for online payment, it would tell me that the ticket could not be found and to call this number: 404−508−0368. If you ever have the pleasure of calling this number you will find that about 19 out of every 20 calls you make to it will return a busy signal (which on a side note IF YOU ARE TRYING TO CALL THE RECORDERS COURT JUST KEEP HANGING UP AND REDIALING, YOU WILL GET THROUGH THE BUSY SIGNAL SOONER OR LATER).
Once I finally got through I was put on hold for upwards of 40 minutes and when I finally talked to an operator I may as well have been talking to Darth Vader or Saddam Hussein or anybody else whose entire existence is 95% evil with just a 5% splash of humanity. She informed me that I could now look it up but I needed to take the E off of the beginning (SO FOR THOSE OF YOU THAT CANT LOOK UP YOUR TICKETS, TAKE THE LETTER OFF OF THE BEGINNING OF THE NUMBER WHEN USING THE LOOK UP SYSTEM).
PHEW I thought. I finally had my ticket pulled up on the online system, and after a few tries the SQL database actually WORKED and returned my fine amount and a link to «Pay Now.» Upon clicking on the «Pay Now» button, I was redirected to another governmental payment site that promptly displayed «There is an error processing your request. Please call customer service at ###-###-####.» FFS I thought.
I then had to bombard the original number with another 25 calls to get through because, as I can tell, that is the only way to get the IVR payment system’s phone number (FOR THOSE OF YOU THAT NEED THE # TO THE PHONE PAYMENT SYSTEM: 404−371−3272). I called the phone payment system, and after trying my citation number WITH the E and not getting results, I tried it again without the E. I was put on hold (yes thats right, on hold by an AUTOMATED FREAKING SYSTEM) while they tried to look up my citation number, and after 5 minutes it politely said «Your citation cannot be retrieved at this time. Please try again later. Thank you. Goodbye.»
ARGHHHHHHHHHH I thought. And so I tried it one more time…
AND IT WORKED! HOLY FREAKING COW SOMETHING IN THIS COURT SYSTEM WORKED!!! HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA IM SO HAPPY!!!
I paid my ticket over the phone after 2+ hours of trying to navigate this bass-​ackwards court. Like I said earlier, if you need a textbook reference for how terribly our government is failing /​breaking down, you don’t have to look any further than the Dekalb County Recorders Court at 3630 Camp Circle in Decatur, Georgia.
To summarize everything about this place in a list:
–The employees of this place have spawned either directly from Satan or are simply close relatives
–The «Kiosks» that the website informs you that you can pay at located within the court are BROKEN with no signs of getting fixed (when I asked some bacon about it he pretty much laughed and said they hadn’t worked in a while)
–The line to pay your citation in the actual court takes 1.5+ hours on a good day, so make sure you bring a book
–The SQL database that all the court records are kept in is showing some SERIOUS signs of fault and null values, hence why the online citation look up system repeatedly returns SQL errors.
–The phone number that is given to everyone is tied up 99% of the time, and only a serious lambasting of phone calls will get you through the busy signal
–Once you get through the busy signal you will be informed that you have another 45 minutes to wait for an operator (Satan) to work as hard as they can to get you off the phone as quickly as they can
–The phone payment system (separate from the actual court phone number) is broken and doesn’t work most of the time
–The online payment system is broken and doesn’t work 100% of the time
FOR THOSE OF YOU TRYING TO PAY A TICKET WITHOUT HAVING TO VISIT THIS FORSAKEN HELL HOLE
–When entering your citation number on either the website or the phone payment line make sure you take the letter off the beginning of your citation number (if there is a letter there)
–Do not go to the court assuming that you can use the «quick-​pay» kiosks, they do not work
–The phone number for the phone payment line is, once again, 404−371−3272. This is the only way I found of paying that is in a semi-​non-​broken state.
To anyone that has to go to this place; I am so sorry and I wish you the best of luck.

I was supposed to have court on Monday, July 5^th for a ticket I got for following too closely a little over a month ago. I show up at 1:30, afraid to be late, and see that they don’t open until 2pm. Wait around with the growing crowd outside the door until right around 2pm when an officer comes up to us and tells us that there is no court that day due to the holiday. I’m thinking, oh really, well don’t you think you could have let me know that? mailed me something? I don’t even live in Dekalb county. He then says that most likely, all of our charges will be dismissed, but it will depend on the judge, so we need to call or come by tomorrow to find out for sure. No way in hell I’m driving all the way back out to Decatur just for traffic court. Barhopping, maybe. Traffic court? no way. So I’ve been calling every day since Monday trying to find out whether or not I owe them anything, and have yet to get ahold of a human being. I sent them an email Tuesday and also have yet to hear back. Get your sh*t together, Dekalb!

Today, I make my second visit to Recorders Court, to face the judge because they moved my court date from Nov 08 to Mar 09 due to overbooking.
First, let me tell you, everyone has to be at court at 2pm, so don’t go running up to the door thinkin OMG I’m late, because by the time you get into the building its 2:30pm anyways… well today, I figure get there about 2:30 and I’ll at least avoid the mile long line to get into the building.
That worked, what I didnt expect was that since the courtroom was now overfull, I got to stand in line in the staircase while the Sherriff told everyone that came in after me to just wait in the staircase line with me
Finally someone of authority suggested that they move us out of the staircase (and a potential fire hazard) to the courtroom where they are doing Animal Court. I didnt know a such thing existed, but ok… so we go in and sit for about 20 mins when the tribunal clerk says «if you have a speeding ticket… blah blah blah… and if you have a moving violation we are going to reduce it to a non-​moving violation… blah blah blah… so me thinking, I have a „no proof of tag“ that has to be a moving violation… right…so I raise my hand, she tells me… there’s no questions… either you are going to pay the fine or not… so I say… well how much is the fine… once again she says. no questions… are u payin the fine or not… YES OR NO. Now I’m dumbfounded and just kinda stand there not beleiving that she won’t let me ask her if I have a moving violotion offense or not… and btw… how much is that fine that I’m agreeing to pay.
Well since I was speechless, she infomed me to have a seat until the judge called me. Well he finally did, after I signed a paper saying I was guilty (I am… arent I) and I approach the bench… polietly ask the judge if I can ask him a question… he says that I can… I then proceed to ask him…“is having no proof of tag consider a moving violation». He says… dont worry about it sweetheart (SWEETHEART???)…I’m going to dismiss the charge. OMG… now I am dumbfounded as that has never happened… and I’ve gotten tickets all over this great country of ours.
Words to the wise… Never just pay the fine… sometimes the judge will call u sweetheart and drop the charges. BTW… the fine would have been $ 188. SWEETHEART… IMO he was harsher on the people with the «dangerous» «unprovoked» attack dogs than he was on us traffic violators… but he could have gotten tougher, I was the first person he saw after he got done with the animal violators.
I got there about 2:30pm and was at the bar drinking Texas Margaritas by 4:00pm telling everyone how the charges got dropped!!! YIPEE

Today I finally head to court to face the big man, well in my case WO-​MAN about my 3 citations.
I arrive for my hearing at 2:00 to a line that is literally a mile long, from here I knew this wasn’t going to be a very good afternoon. But I did meet a cutie in line and had a nice conversation about cars with so I became optimistic.
I FINALLY get in the front door to have an officer yell at me because instead of putting my purse in the bin and then on the conveyor belt, I should have just placed it on the conveyor belt.
I get upstairs and say my goodbye to the cutie =(and I sit in the courtroom waiting for the judge from 2:00 until 5:00!!! WTF? How is this possible? I can’t wrap my mind around their system. I mean if they are going to subject us to 3 hour waits, hard seats and a freezing room, could they at least provide coffee?
The lesson I learned from today is slow down so that I won’t have to deal with this rude bunch of…(you fill in the blank)