From 2017 to 2019, the “Portuguese” were more than three thousand: the warnings were ignored. Colladon: “It is useless to count the 2020 which has eliminated the attendance on the buses”
TREVISO. Every year a hole of unpaid fines ranging between 110 and 150,000 €. It is the open wound in the accounts of Mom, the transport company in the province of Treviso, left by thousands of users who, year after year, have not paid the penalties attached by the company’s control staff for non-payment of the ticket.
From 2017 to 2019, the “Portuguese” were more than 3000, and despite the calls from the transport company they never paid their bills. The data emerged in the aftermath of the case brought to light by our newspaper, namely the publication of the over 1100 names of Mom’s bad payers in 2017. A list published due to a computer error by the Province – it was later discovered -, but which has opened a glimpse into the reality of the unsolved and pirates of public transport.
That year the “Portuguese” who had left unpaid for 114 thousand € forcing the Province, the managing body of the transport company, to start a last desperate attempt to collect through roles. “But in the following years things have certainly not changed” reports the president Mom Giacomo Colladon, “we have another € 130,000 in unpaid fines in 2018 and even more in 2019”.
It is useless then to make the calculation in 2020 marked by a pandemic that has practically eliminated the number of travelers in circulation on the couriers and on the buses of urban transport.
“I said, and I repeat, that I would be in favor of publishing the names of those who insist on not paying the fines after reminders and reminders because” continues Colladon, “you don’t realize the extent of the damage they cause to the company and public thing. Every three years the unpaid fines would make it possible to buy a new bus to be put into circulation immediately ».
Mom points out that it is in fact “impossible to recover the stolen goods” due to the fact that many of the bad payers are now virtually unavailable. The investigators confirm: “Residences are often declared that in a short time change and the new ones are impossible to recover, and even if it were possible to do so, the bulletins sent to the new houses are irretrievably trashed”.
The company responsible for this kind of collection activity also raises its arms. Of course, non-payment is a chronic phenomenon. The local police are also well aware of this (first of all that of the capital) which put millions of euros in non-payments in their budgets. “This does not justify” urges Colladon, “fortunately, thanks to new control systems and boarding methods, over the years we have been able to stem the phenomenon, but more than 100,000 euros a year have been lost per year.” “No you pay, no you leave” was the slogan of the advertising campaign launched against the ticket thugs years ago, and there are those who would like to renew it.
FEDERICO DE WOLANSKI