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Foreigners fail to pay charge
Page 12
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Overseas drivers are finding it easy to dodge London's congestion
charge. David Harris reports.
THOUSANDS OF foreign drivers are dodging the congestion charge in London because they are very difficult to catch, according to Transport for London (TfL).
Up to £10m is now outstanding, but because the congestion monitoring system records only number plates, TfL does not know what proportion of evaders are CVs.
The European debt collecting agency Intrum Justitia has been axed by TfL because it found foreign drivers so difficult to pursue.
Since the charge was introduced in February 2003 no less than 65,534 foreign registered vehicles have incurred penalty charges, but fewer than 2,000 have paid up.
The Germans are the worst offenders, with 19,751 failing to pay the charge. Germans are all but immune from the charge because the country's law does not allow debt collectors to trace debtors via their number plates.
France poses a different problem: the charge imposed by the country's licensing agency makes it uneconomic to pursue defaulters.