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Car park fee evasion ‘rife’ but private operators lack options against offenders

SINGAPORE — Laws amended in July last year have allowed the Housing and Development Board (HDB) to go after motorists who dodge parking charges, but private car park operators still lack recourse for what one of them described as a rife problem.

The HDB can now go after motorists who evade parking charges by tailgating. Photo: Jason Quah / TODAY

The HDB can now go after motorists who evade parking charges by tailgating. Photo: Jason Quah / TODAY

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SINGAPORE — Laws amended in July last year have allowed the Housing and Development Board (HDB) to go after motorists who dodge parking charges, but private car park operators still lack recourse for what one of them described as a rife problem.

Metro Parking, which oversees more than 40 car parks here, told TODAY that it observed 4,100 tailgating incidents last month alone — which works out to about three cases a day at each of its car parks.

“This amounts to some S$14,000 lost in revenue (in a month),” said deputy general manager Jason Chin, whose company has its own system enabling video footage of possible tailgating incidents to be quickly reviewed.

Unlike the HDB, private carpark operators are not able to go after errant motorists to compel repayment or impose fines; they may only hire lawyers to pursue civil claims. “It then becomes too costly to chase down a claim, and the success rate of getting back these lost payments is only 2 per cent,” said Mr Chin.

Metro Parking sees up to 46,000 tailgating incidents a year, resulting in S$300,000 in lost revenue, he added.

The HDB said on Wednesday (Dec 27) it issued more than 6,000 parking offence notices to motorists who dodged parking charges by tailgating or bypassing Electronic Parking System gantries from July last year to Nov 15 this year.

The Parking Places Rules was amended in July 2016 to allow the HDB to fine parking-fee evaders and to haul repeat offenders to court.

Prior to the amendment, it could only try to claw back from errant motorists the parking fees owed.

The HDB said it took to court seven “recalcitrant” motorists who repeatedly tailgated to evade payment of parking charges.

In June this year, a woman was convicted and fined S$5,600 for seven counts of failing to pay parking charges totalling S$226.21, and one count of failing to provide the identity and address of the driver in those offences. The offences were committed at a Bedok North Avenue car park.

In another case, a man was fined S$4,200 in March for evading parking charges totalling S$11.56 on six occasions — between August and October 2016 — at a Bukit Batok East Avenue 3 carpark.

The penalties for evading car park fees are S$25 for motorcycles, S$50 for cars, and S$80 for heavy vehicles.

HDB announced on Wednesday a new Tailgating Detection System which it will roll out at selected car parks with Electronic Parking Systems (EPS) from the second half of next year, after a successful six-month trial at two car parks this year.

The cost of the new system is yet to be finalised, HDB said. The system uses sensors and cameras located at the exits of park parks, as well as video analytics to identify tailgating vehicles in real time.

In its report last July, the Auditor-General’s Office (AGO) had flagged HDB’s inadequate monitoring of car park operations and enforcement, and found significant levels of non-payment of car park charges in residential and industrial estates.

The AGO found 113,103 instances where vehicles were not charged parking fees after checking the records of five car parks at HDB’s industrial estates for the period of April 2014 to August 2015.

The vehicles had either an entry or exit record but not both, which meant an incomplete record was logged. As a result, the EPS was unable to charge parking fees estimated at S$159,000, the report said.

Test checks of the reports of 59 car parks in HDB residential estates from April 2015 to Sept 2015 revealed 2,501 instances where vehicles had exited the EPS car parks without paying on more than three occasions in a month. The AGO also found 243 instances of manipulation of the car park system by motorists to evade payment.

 

 

 

 

 

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