Threat of Agency Speeds Ticket Payments in Vegas

Collecting on past due parking tickets has improved in Las Vegas since the city sped up its method of collecting.

In the past, the gambling capital would send any citation 25 months past due to a collection agency. That approach changed in July, when a note that the debt would be turned over to an agency was included in a third notice sent six months after the payment was past due, according to city spokesperson Jace Radke.

“When the citation isn’t paid after nine months, it is put with a collection agency,” locally-based Credit Bureau Central, said Radke.

In the six months before the program was instituted, the city collected $1.505 million in parking ticket fees. In the first six months after the program was instituted, the city collected $1.582 million in fees. Since implementation of the program, the city has collected $239,630, Radke said.

Citation revenue collected for all of 2007 was nearly $2.9 million, a little less than the $3 million collected a year earlier, but ahead of the $2.8 million collected in 2005.

Las Vegas has some other approaches to collecting unpaid fines, including: the Department of Motor Vehicles places a hold on registrations 60 to 85 days before registration is due for anyone with an outstanding citation more than 30 days old; the city “boots” vehicles of owners with at least five outstanding citations or with at least $500 in outstanding fines.

The city does not use phone calls or online resources in attempts to collect the fines, Radke said.