I think you may have never gotten a traffic ticket before.
When you receive the actual citation from the officer, they either check "Criminal application" or "All Civil Infractions".
If he cites you for any criminal stuff, he will check off CRIMINAL APPLICATION and require you to go to court.
Then you will go to court to see the magistrates clerk and he/she will decide if a criminal complaint will be made against you.
If so, you are officially charged and you will probably go to a real court with a judge with "commonwealth vs xxx" or so.
If not, you are not charged.
I went to the hearing and no criminal complaint was made for me as he just simply said "did you pay your old fine? <yes> did you reinstate your license? <yes> okay, no criminal complaint issued'.