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You are here: Home / Archive / How the traffic police got my 600,000 VND

How the traffic police got my 600,000 VND

Wednesday, February 13, 2013 By kevmille

Well, it is the Year of the Snake now.  Today is Day 4 of the Tet New Year here in Vietnam.  I rode my motorbike to Bien Hoa outside of Saigon to see a friend.  I rode him back to Saigon during the early afternoon today.  At the outskirts of Saigon, I was passing a motorbike in the left lane when the traffic police flagged me down.  Yes. riding in the left lane even to pass is a traffic violation in Vietnam though you see many motorbikes doing this all the time.  This will be my 3rd left lane violation during my nearly 9 years in Vietnam (all of my 3 traffic violations were left lane violations).

I did not see the traffic police until he flagged me.  The traffic police had picked a very well hidden spot on the highway back to Saigon.  This being Tet, the traffic police aimed on making as much money as they can on “legal” traffic violations.  “Legal” here means, as you guessed it, none of the fines would actually go to the Vietnamese government.  There were already motorbikes that were stopped by the time I was flagged with the riders “negotiating” the fee that must be paid.

One of the first things I did was to see if the traffic policeman had a blue ID card.  Yep, he it had it which meant he could pull over cars, trucks and motorbikes to issue fines.  My Vietnamese friend initiating the negotiating and offered 200,000 VND.  The policeman refused since I did not have a license.  The policeman mentioned that he could take my motorbike for 10 days as means of leveraging, or blackmailing, to obtain a higher fee.  In the end 500,000 VND was offered but I accidentally put in and extra 100,000 VND in the pile of money, hence he got 600,000 VND.  All of this money went straight into his pocket.  My friend then drove my motorbike until we got back into the city.

My friend did research to see if the policeman charged us the right fee.  It turns out that the new fine for left lane violation was between 400,000 and 800,000 VND.  The police could also take the motorbike for 10 days.  I was a bit surprised that the Vietnamese government raised the traffic fines which in turn actually is helping the traffic police earn much more money.  Then again, maybe this is to be expected.

Hence I lost roughly $30 US today, well actually just $20 US since my friend covered part of it.  Next time I will try to STAY in the right lane unless I want to lose more money.  (^_^).  At least the traffic policeman was happy.   I suspect this particular traffic policeman could make at least $1000 US, or more, just today alone.  Just a guess though, no proof…

Happy New Year of the Snake (who just snatched some money from me).

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Filed Under: Archive Tagged With: bien hoa, motorbike, My Opinions, saigon, traffic police, vietnam

Reader Interactions

Comments

  1. Tung says

    Wednesday, February 13, 2013 at 10:46 pm

    You shouldn’t have bragged to me about hardly ever getting stopped the other day 😛

    • Kevin Miller says

      Thursday, February 14, 2013 at 7:56 am

      Yeah, kind of realized that now. 🙂 In retrospect, economy is not doing so good here still so I should have realized that. 🙂

  2. nguyenimproved14 says

    Friday, February 15, 2013 at 1:27 am

    that’s rough
    and pricey..500k’s steep.

    i thought they go easy on foreigners

    (or foreigner-looking riders)
    ps can u add my blog to your roll

    • Kevin Miller says

      Friday, February 15, 2013 at 1:02 pm

      In HCMC, yeah, but this was on the outskirts. Plus it was Tet, police were looking for money. Could not be avoided.

      Sure, tell me your blog.

      • Troy Nguyen says

        Saturday, February 16, 2013 at 1:19 am

        Yes those more cops need the extra for Tet I suppose :-/
        Thanks Kevin, getting on your blogroll will definitely give me a boost in traffic. My blog’s http://vietvlog.wordpress.com/.
        Mainly vids and media at the moment but I’ll be doing more writing in future.

        • Kevin Miller says

          Sunday, February 17, 2013 at 12:12 pm

          Yep. 🙂

          Added your blog to: https://saigonnezumi.com/bloggers-in-vietnam/ Please add my blog as well. 🙂

          Your blog is cool.

          • troy nguyen says

            Sunday, February 17, 2013 at 4:48 pm

            ok done. cheers!

          • Kevin Miller says

            Thursday, February 21, 2013 at 2:58 pm

            You got a really funny blog. I love it. 🙂

  3. Toan Le says

    Sunday, February 17, 2013 at 7:24 am

    You know, VN traffic police is very good at “hiding and flagging”. When I was kid, left-violation to bypass traffic and quickly back to right is legal. Who knows it’s illegal today OR the government changed law to collect more money.

    • Kevin Miller says

      Sunday, February 17, 2013 at 12:13 pm

      I heard it was legal if you you your signal lights. This policeman was shaddy.

      • Ba Nguyen says

        Tuesday, February 19, 2013 at 5:58 am

        Is there a book on Vietnam’s traffic laws that one can obtain to know exactly what’s legal and what’s not? I bet a lot of motorbike owners don’t know all the laws and when they get flagged down by a cop, their immediate reaction is to pay the bribe, I mean fine, to get it over with.

        • Kevin Miller says

          Thursday, February 21, 2013 at 2:57 pm

          Should be one in Vietnamese. I know there are online sources for these laws too. My friend checked to see if my fine was legal. It was.

          People get frustrated with the traffic police here.

  4. Andrew Chia says

    Tuesday, February 19, 2013 at 9:21 am

    Hi Kevin

    Just came across your blog today. Since you are in Vietnam for 9 years already, do you think you could help me to get a job in Vietnam?

    Thanks

    Regards

    • Kevin Miller says

      Thursday, February 21, 2013 at 2:57 pm

      Better if you come here and look around. Hard to find jobs these days.

  5. Ehuon says

    Monday, March 11, 2013 at 1:06 pm

    Traffic cops are hated everywhere, cause they only issue fines, and rarely do anything to help ppl. If they re on the road all day and did nothing, their bosses would get upset. I guess part of that fine would have to go to their boss.m

    • Kevin Miller says

      Monday, March 11, 2013 at 2:03 pm

      Agreed and now these guys may be able to carry firearms. Scary.

      http://tuoitrenews.vn/cmlink/tuoitrenews/society/traffic-cops-could-be-allowed-to-shoot-their-attackers-1.99840

  6. me says

    Friday, May 24, 2013 at 9:48 pm

    I never stopped for them when they were flagging me. Too much hassle.

    • Kevin Miller says

      Friday, May 24, 2013 at 10:50 pm

      Yeah, I should have done the same.

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