1300 extra 'ambulances' on NZ roads

The NZTA believes more than 1000 motorists are claiming their vehicles are ambulances to save on ACC fees. Photo / Hawkes Bay Today

More than 1300 New Zealand motorists are claiming their vehicles are ambulances to save on registration fees.

The ruse avoids paying hundreds of dollars in ACC levies. Previously, some motorists registered their cars as hearses to avoid the extra fees.

The annual licensing fee for a non-commercial ambulance is $59.52, which does not include a $198 ACC levy charged in the $287 fee for a petrol-powered private car and $417 for a diesel-powered car.

There are 214 legitimate non-commercial ambulances in the country but the New Zealand Transport Agency (NZTA) believes that a further 1309 are falsely registered and the offenders could face fines of up to $1000.

A non-commercial ambulance is typically owned by a company, kept on the work site and used to carry injured workers to hospital. ACC has exempted them from its fees.

NZTA spokesman Andy Knackstedt told NZPA the practice had been going on for decades and ironically when it got a bit of media coverage the idea got into people's heads.

However, every six months agency officials went through the register and identified vehicles believed to be incorrectly licensed.

Offenders were told they could be fined up to $1000 for filing false information - $5000 for a company - with the details passed on to police.

Police would determine whether the people would be fined or not, Mr Knackstedt said.

Offenders were effectively rorting ACC, he said.

"Years ago people used to try registering their vehicles as a hearse, but there's no longer any incentive to do that because a hearse now pays the same as anyone else.

"People occasionally try to license them as an agriculture vehicle. It's the same process for us."

The system relied on people correctly filling out the forms, and if they knowingly did otherwise they were committing an offence, he said.

"You can't require proof of how a vehicle is going to be used when the application is made. It's asking the agent to demonstrate how it is going to be used and then they can take it away and use it differently, and a lot of vehicles are licensed online."

The problem was particularly bad in Otago, where earlier this year 230 non-commercial ambulances were registered, nearly as many as in Auckland where there are 10 times as many people.

However, that number dropped to 91 in the latest figures after warning letters were sent out.

- NZPA