The seven day clock nobody mentions at the roadside

Almost every person who calls us after a Colorado DUI arrest believes they have one case. They have two, and the one they have not been told about is already running.

The criminal case is the one that looks serious. It has a courtroom, a judge, a prosecutor, and a first appearance a few weeks out. The administrative case is the one that takes your driving privileges, and it belongs to the Division of Motor Vehicles rather than to any court. It runs on a seven day clock that starts the moment the officer hands you a piece of paper.

What the officer actually gave you

If you tested at or above 0.08, or refused testing, the officer takes your physical licence and serves an Express Consent Affidavit and Notice of Revocation. People put it in a glovebox and forget it, because it does not look like a legal document. It is two things at once: notice that your licence is being revoked, and a temporary permit to drive for a short window.

Printed on that form is the right to request a hearing. You have seven days from service to exercise it, in person at a DMV driver services office. Not seven business days. Not seven days from your first court date. Seven days.

What happens if you miss it

Nothing dramatic. That is the problem. There is no hearing, no argument and no review. The revocation simply takes effect when the temporary permit expires, and the length depends on what happened at the roadside.

A first offense at or above 0.08 carries a nine month revocation, with early reinstatement available after thirty days on an ignition interlock restricted licence. A first refusal is worse: a full year, no early reinstatement, and an automatic persistent drunk driver designation that brings Level II therapy and a longer interlock requirement with it.

Why the hearing is worth having even if you lose it

A DMV hearing is not a trial. There is no jury, the hearing officer is an administrative official rather than a judge, and the standard of proof is a preponderance of the evidence. Plenty of these hearings do not end in a win.

They are still the most valuable thing that happens in the first two months of a DUI case, because we can subpoena the arresting officer and cross examine them under oath with no prosecutor in the room. That testimony is transcribed. It is taken months before anyone in the criminal case has committed to a written version of events, and it locks in the officer's account of the stop, the roadside manoeuvres and the testing procedure.

More than once, a suppression motion in county court has been built almost entirely on what an officer said at a DMV hearing that we technically lost.

The records that decide these cases

• Certification and maintenance history for the specific breath instrument used, which is kept on a schedule and does occasionally lapse.
• The twenty minute deprivation period, which body worn camera either shows or does not.
• The chain of custody for a blood draw, including who drew it, into what tubes, and how it was stored.
• The officer's own training record for standardised field sobriety testing, which sets the standard they are measured against.

What to do tonight

Find the form. Photograph both sides. Note the date of service, because that is day zero. Then call a lawyer today rather than tomorrow, because the request has to be made in person and offices keep office hours.

If you have already missed the seven days, the criminal case is still entirely live and still worth fighting properly. The revocation is not the conviction, and a great many cases that lose at the DMV end without a DUI conviction in court.

Reviewed September 2026. Statutes and figures mentioned here change; confirm the current text before relying on any of it. This is general information, not legal advice, and reading it does not create an attorney-client relationship.