KEY POINTS:
Parking tickets issued to drivers using fake licence plates in Auckland may be claiming victims as far south as Dunedin - and police and councils say the problem could be as hard to control as it is to detect.
Retired Dunedin man George Morris discovered he had $460
in parking fines, apparently incurred last June in Auckland, a city he said he had not visited in 30 years.
Manukau City Council parking and road operations manager Liz Hogan said the council believed the ticket was issued to a vehicle with fake licence plates.
The council received complaints about two or three mismatches a day, and recently got an email from Auckland police indicating vehicle identity theft, including fake plates, was a serious problem.
An Auckland police officer targeting registration plates recently found 10 fake plates in two days, said the operations manager for road policing support, Inspector Carey Griffiths, of Wellington.
Most, he believed, were obtained overseas.
But the extent of the problem has not been established.
Mr Griffiths had not seen evidence of fake plates being used in criminal activities.
Southern district road policing manager Inspector Andrew Burns said police knew plates could be bought through the internet, but not many had been seen in the South.
Since 1998 New Zealand plates had contained a silver fern hologram image.
Offenders would receive a $200 infringement fine, Mr Burns said.
Dunedin City Council parking services team leader Daphne Griffen said her team had not encountered fake licence plates.
Unlike their Manukau counterparts, Dunedin parking wardens take photographs of cars when they issue tickets to help identify the offences and the vehicles.
Ms Hogan said giving Manukau City parking wardens access to a registration database could help to reduce the rates of tickets being issued to the wrong vehicle owner, but the cost was prohibitive.
Legitimately replacing registration plates costs $14.25, and identification is required.
Cadbury worker John Malcolmson reported a similar problem with a Manukau parking infringement he supposedly incurred when he was finishing a night shift in Dunedin.
And Otago Daily Times editor Murray Kirkness this month received a $60 traffic infringement notice from the Papakura District Council. He will apply to have the fine waived. Otago Daily Times, staff reporter
