Parking meter... Forgot to pay ?

[Saturn]

Parked somewhere along Galle road on Monday and clean forgot to pay for parking. It had one of those electronic parking meters. I'm just wondering if I should  do anything. I contacted the support number for tenaga and they seem clueless. They said to visit their office.

 

Does anyone have recommendations? Thanks.

 

[zeem35]

Did u get a parking violation ticket?

if yes, every hour from the violation was sighted x Rs.60.

 

how to pay a fine?

calculate your total and get a parking ticket from those electronic machines.

eg: 5 hours x Rs.60 = 300.

 

automatically the system cancels your fine. But keep a copy of both incase something goes wrong.

 

After 24hours, every passing day Rs.1080 per day upto 14 days.

After 14days, Rs.15,000 Per month

 

The rates are for Cars/Van category 

 

[Saturn]

Thanks for replying. No I didn't get any ticket. 

[Saturn]

Is there a way to check if there's a pending fine or anything required to be paid?

[peugeot407]

Just forget it.

[zeem35]

10 hours ago, Saturn said:

Is there a way to check if there's a pending fine or anything required to be paid?

Afaik no. There is an Android app apparently to pay your parking tickets so you dont have to walk to a machine.

[JayZ]

If you did not get a parking violation ticket, no need to worry. 

Ticket is usually tucked in to the wiper so unlikely to blow by wind. Unless someone passing by took it, which again is unlikely. 

[invisibleuser]

If you didn't receive a parking violation ticket, simply forget it.  I've visited their office few months back and they asked me to pay Rs. 1080 + 60 x no of hours for previous day. Something around 1600. Had a heavy argument with them and agreed to pay 60 x no of hours for previous day. In my case I've tried to pay the fine in same day, but machine didn't accept my notes. I've tried to contact one of their representative about the thing and Customer-care also didn't answer to my calls. Since I had the call log, they accepted to reduce the fine. But again I didn't see any system or manual update about my payment. Just put paid seal on the parking violation ticket.

[Sampath Gunasekera]

Is this  legal????  

[Crosswind]

From what I understand, this is illegal because of 2 reasons.

1. The machine does not return a balance money. It does not accept coins and you have no option but to pay 40 rupees or more for a parking fee of 30. In some countries that may be legal but in Sri Lanka, we have the consumer protection act to cover the consumer from exactly this type of behaviour

2. The fine should only be for the duration which you parked. Not for all the subsequent days.

Someone needs to challenge this in court. Unfortunately no one has the time and money to go thru the legal route in Sri Lanka.

 

[Crosswind]

... and here's a comment from a fairly famous lawyer who most of us know:

 

So, Azzam Ameen had brought to the forefront a problem faced by many in Colombo over the last few months. Tenaga Carparks pvt Ltd on behalf of Colombo Municipal Council has been charging absurd late payment fees! Some have paid over 10000 rupees on the basis that late payments are payable from the time of offense until payment.

If there is such a by-law, then that by-law is absurd and should be challenged before Court for its validity. Any offense for which a penalty is imposed should be given a grace period to settle. Even a Court of Law which imposes a fine would give the offender time to pay the penalty. Traffic offenses have a 14 day grace period to settle. But according to "Tenaga" it is not so. The late fee is calculated until payment.

Secondly, By Law 11 (iv) of "Parking of Vehicles" Bylaw published in the gazette No. 2029/29 dated 26.07.2017 does not authorize the CMC or Tenaga to collect late fees in such a manner.

"Nondisplayofpermitorticket,parkingwithoutmakingtheduepaymentsorparkinginexcessofthetime therein permitted is considered as illegal and which shall be subject to late fee as mentioned in the Schedule II hereto."

"ඉහත 11(iii) අනුව අවසර පත්‍රය ප්‍රදර්ශනය නොකිරීම, ගාස්තු නොගෙවා ගාල් කර තැබීම හෝ අවසර ලබා ගත් කාලයට වඩා වැඩි කාලයක් ගාල් කර තැබීම නිත්‍යාණුකූල නොවන අතර එවැනි අවස්ථාවකදී මෙහි II වන උපලේඛනයේ සඳහන් පරිදි ප්‍රමාද ගාස්තුවකට යටත් වේ. "

the 2nd Schedule heading reads as follows :

"Late fees applicable for parking a motor vehicle in a street in an illegal manner" "නිත්‍යානුකූල නොවන පරිදි වීථියක ගාල් කර තැබූ වාහනයක් සඳහා අදාල ප්‍රමාද ගාස්තුව"

Obviously, the Regulation is contemplating of a vehicle which is parked on the street for a number of hours/days/months without payment. Not the duration between the offense and payment. What Tenaga and CMC are doing is absolutely illegal and unlawful. It should not be allowed and all the penalties that have been paid by the general public should be returned and refunded to the rightful claimants!

Rosy Senanayake, Madam Mayor, Once you are done sorting out your toilet issue, Please look into this and address it! The general public of Colombo elected you to take care of public issues! this is a serious one, your Council is worse than a පොළී මුදලාලි!

[kush]

What if you don't pay the fine

Then CMC will have to take you to courts where you defend the case just thinking aloud.

[Crosswind]

I believe the first person who's taken to courts by tenaga will solve the problem for everyone else, as long as he hires a good lawyer.

The case against tenaga is very very strong. 

[Sampath Gunasekera]

You can hit (two vehicles) and run - Need to pay just Rs.5000/= penalty 

You park one hour and go without paying - Need to pay more than Rs.10,000/=

As far as I know, even Department of Inland Revenue can charge late penalty for taxes up to maximum of 100% of the tax which was delayed. 

If you use a newly constructed building  without  Certificate of Confirmation (COFC) , you have to pay amount like Rs.250/day. (AFIK)

But here you have to pay a charge of Rs.1080/= for every single day keep adding.

Do CMC or . Tenaga  keep reserve same parking slot for the  suspect until he pays and come back? Don't they use same parking slot for other customers and earn money after the suspect left the parking lot ?

 

 

Edited May 18, 2018 by Sampath Gunasekera
Content added

[carbuddy]

And do not forget to check their new web site

http://www.tenagacarparks.com/

 

hak hak hak

[iRage]

3 hours ago, Crosswind said:

From what I understand, this is illegal because of 2 reasons.

1. The machine does not return a balance money. It does not accept coins and you have no option but to pay 40 rupees or more for a parking fee of 30. In some countries that may be legal but in Sri Lanka, we have the consumer protection act to cover the consumer from exactly this type of behaviour

2. The fine should only be for the duration which you parked. Not for all the subsequent days.

Someone needs to challenge this in court. Unfortunately no one has the time and money to go thru the legal route in Sri Lanka.

 

Exactly ! It is not like no one else can park there after that because the space is not available ! It shold be for the time parked and a % for punishment or even admin fee for having to collect the non-payment. In some countries the car gets booted for X number of hours and then gets impounded and then you just pay for the time the car was booted for, a charge for taking the car to the impound and an impound charge.

[matroska]

and then theres this update....

 

 

"Colombo Mayor Rosy Senanayake has instructed the Commissioner of the Colombo Municipality to suspend all fines charged through parking meters"

 

Edited May 18, 2018 by matroska

[Crosswind]

24 minutes ago, matroska said:

and then theres this update....

"Colombo Mayor Rosy Senanayake has instructed the Commissioner of the Colombo Municipality to suspend all fines charged through parking meters"

 

Yup. In fact Rosy's own FB post confirmed it just a while ago.