Bail surety in simple terms is an amount of money that is paid which stands as guarantee that you will return to court on each and every date, you are required to do so, for purposes of your case to continue until your case is finalized. Should you fail, you could loose the amount surety paid.

Simply put – The money stands in your place for you, while you outside.

Bail is paid as a form of surety that the accused person will return on a set date to court in continuation of the case. If the accused person fails to return to court on the set date a warrant for his arrest will be issued. The accused will then be arrested on the warrant and brought before the court. Ordinarily bail is provisionally forfeited on the day the accused failed to appear at court. The case is then remanded for a period of 2 weeks to give the accused an opportunity to come back to court and provide a reasonable excuse for why his bail should not be finally forfeited to the state.

Upon failure to again appear in the two week period, the bail is then finally forfeited to the state. The warrant for arrest will stay active and await the arrest of the accused.

There are countless reasons why an accused would not be able to appear at court on a set date. The court needs to be satisfied that the accused has a bonafide reason as to why he/she failed to appear and that it was not due to any fault on the side of the accused. If the court has been provided with such a reason, the court may re-instate the bail of the accused and cancel the warrant for arrest.

Failure to provide the court with a valid reason explaining the absence of the accused on a given court date could result in the bail being finally forfeited to the state and the accused being kept in custody pending the finalization of his case.

People often ask if they can get their bail money back. The answer is yes – once the case has been finalized. Once your matter is concluded and the case finalized, the bail ends and you can then claim the bail money back from the clerk of the court. There is one proviso – that the bail has not been revoked and declared forfeited to the state at some earlier stage

A case is finalized, for purposes of claiming your bail money back, when the case was withdrawn, removed from the roll, there has been a verdict of guilty or not guilty. In case of a guilty verdict the case is finalized when sentence has been passed.