Over R850 million worth of fines to be written off: report
Over R850 million worth of old fines will be written off in the City of Cape Town, according to JP Smith, the mayoral committee member for safety, security and social services.
Speaking to IOL, Smith said that a new accounting system implemented by the city identified the fines as being too old to collect – though he added that the city still had the highest collection rates in the country.
According to Smith, the biggest offenders of unpaid fines were taxi drivers.
Previous statistics released by the City of Cape Town showed that its Traffic Service issued nearly 44,937 fines to taxi operators in just over three months since the beginning of 2018 – equating to just under 15,000 fines a month, in addition to an average of 269 vehicle impounded each month.
Smith said that the main problem with collection is false or inaccurate residential information given by offenders, where the city simply cannot follow up on the fines, and does not have the budget to hire the necessary staff to do so.
The city issues around 180,000 fines a month, and reportedly has over R4.5 billion in unpaid fines on its books.
Read: Here’s how many traffic fines taxi drivers receive in a single month
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