Matthew Vella
How many times have you been tempted to leave a public car park attendant without a tip? Do you think twice about leaving a a 50c gratuity, or do you wave him off and tell him to find a real job?
The truth is, you can do just that. Because the law does not oblige you to pay attendants, and they themselves cannot ask for payment. In fact, they lose their licence if they demand any remuneration.
And all the gratuities paid to attendants do not go into the government’s coffers or for the upkeep of the car parks. Attendants are licensed by the Transport Authority (ADT), but they receive no form of payment whatsoever. They survive entirely on gratuities.
Put simply, parking attendants are self-employed entrepreneurs whose licence merely entitles them to collect gratuities from motorists who use public car parks.

Thanks for nothing
As long as no standard prices are affixed by the ADT, what stops motorists from withholding gratuities?
There are apocryphal tales of motorists who had their €0.10 gratuity thrown back into their face, or being pursued right up to the car park exit. If you had to wait for the traffic to ease up before making a safe exit, it could be an agonising thirty seconds having the parking attendant hollering at your window.
People tip waiters or porters because they feel their service is worthy of a gratuity. Whether it is customary, obligatory, or merely etiquette, it is accepted that bad service and rude servers don’t get tipped.
So what good reason exists to tip parking attendants? The law clearly lays down their duties, namely ensuring the orderly flow of cars, and prevent theft and damage to the cars. It seems logical to assume that you pay them a gratuity for finding your car in one piece upon return.
But as an ADT pamphlet warns, neither the authority nor the attendants are responsible for theft or damage of property.

Good business
Tipping is often the frontline of survival for service workers. In the film Reservoir Dogs, Mr Pink the waitress a dollar and earns the rebuke of his fellow gang members.
Car parks, on the other hand, are good business. The turnover of cars every hour of the day will earn attendants a steady income which, without a VAT receipt issued to motorists, is possible tax-free. When motorists give attendants a 50-cent gratuity, a 100-car park may well earn attendants up to €50 a day.
Two years ago, the TV programme Doksa claimed that, according to then minister for roads Jesmond Mugliett, attendants could earn up to Lm38,000 a year.
Surprisingly, it turned out that the attendants were actually unionised. In a reaction slamming the programme’s “sensationalism”, the Union Haddiema Maghqudin said the attendants were registered with the Employment and Training Corporation and that they paid National Insurance contributions and taxes.
How much of their earnings are actually paid back in tax is another matter if their revenue cannot be matched with VAT receipts.
Compare that with makeshift private car parks. You can rent out a private area for parking purposes, but anyone who collects gratuities from motorists must issue them with a VAT receipt. Only the public attendants seem immune from the VAT authorities.
Detractors may be justified in saying they don’t want to pay any of their money to someone who probably is not reporting his income to the tax authorities. Consumers respond to fixed prices and receipts. In these days of credit-crunching, financial meltdowns and utility hikes, every cent counts – even for daily users of car parks.

mvella@mediatoday.com.mt

PRINT THIS ARTICLE