In the busy city of London, congestion charges are one of the ugly facts of life. If you want to drive downtown, you need to pay a hefty toll for the privilege. As it turns out, some diplomatic missions have decided they’re above such things, much to the ire of local government officials.
Transport for London (TfL) is the agency responsible for congestion charges. It’s had enough of foreign embassies ignoring the matter, and it’s decided to take action. The first step has been to publicly shame the worst offenders, and I’m sorry to say that the United States is at the top of the list.
The US Embassy in London has racked up a full £14,645,025 in congestion charges, which comes out to a lofty $18.6 million US dollars at the current exchange rate. That’s enough to top out the list of offenders, ahead of the Embassy of Japan, which owes $12.8 million. India comes in third place, with the Office of the High Commissioner owing $10.8 million.
This isn’t a trifling matter as far as the Brits are concerned. The agency is rattling the can for these countries to pay up. With the total bill now exceeding $182 million USD, it’s pushing for legal action in the International Court of Justice. “We and the UK Government are clear that the Congestion Charge is a charge for a service and not a tax,” states the agency. “This means that diplomats are not exempt for paying it.”
If you have any idea how mad they are, the next sentence will leave you with no doubt. “The majority of embassies in London do pay the charge, but there remains a stubborn minority who refuse to do so, despite our representations through diplomatic channels,” says the agency. For the polite and proper British, that kind of harsh language is seldom heard outside of a football riot.
Big Money
The congestion charge isn’t cheap, for the record. The standard charge is £15 ($19 USD) for travel in the zone. It applies Monday to Friday from 7:00 AM to 6:00 PM, and from midday to 6:00 PM on weekends. Motorbikes and emergency service vehicles are exempt, among others. EVs and hydrogen fuel cell vehicles receive a 100% discount, but only until 25 December 2025. What a wonderful Christmas present that will be—cough up fifteen pounds, please!
If you thought that wasn’t punishing enough, driving in London actually gets worse. The Ultra Low Emission Zone applies across an even bigger swathe of London, and it comes with more brutal charges. In this region, there’s a £12.50 ($16 USD) charge that applies 24 hours a day, every day except Christmas. It applies to most petrol cars pre-2006, and most diesels pre-2015. It makes it incredibly expensive to drive older vehicles in greater London, an area home to over 9 million people.
We’re Not Gonna Take It
This is no new matter. In fact, many of the countries have been racking up charges for decades without paying. The current tally covers charges all the way back to the beginning of congestion charging back in 2003.
You might think that the US would pay up, given the special relationship between the two countries. However, the Embassy of the United States of America is quite insistent that it will not cough up a dime.
In fact, the embassy released a statement on the matter all the way back in 2005, in the typical passive-aggressive nature of diplomatic communications. “As the FCO is aware, the Embassy takes the view that Transport for London’s Congestion Charge is a tax that, under international law, should not be imposed on the United States Government, its diplomatic and consular agents, or its military force.” The US refutes the UK position that the congestion charge is a “charge for a service,” noting that “no specific service is rendered in exchange for payment.”
This argument is typically used by diplomats to avoid paying for parking, too. A report from 2016 indicated the the city of New York had $16 million of unpaid parking tickets on the books from UN officials. However, that article also notes that UK officials had paid their dues in this respect to the US. The money doesn’t seem to be flowing the other way.
The charges racked up by the US are likely so high because the embassy was formerly located in Grosvenor Square, right in the congestion charge zone. The embassy moved in 2018 to its new location in Nine Elms, London, outside the designated area. However, regular embassy business would still see US officials traveling into the congestion charge zone.
Not every country is so impertinent. Denmark and Sweden are reportedly fully paid up. As for my home country, the Australian High Commission has a bill of just £760 ($966 USD). The Autopian contacted the Australian High Commission for its position on the congestion charge and whether it intends to pay the bill. I was told that my proud home nation respects the charges and pays its bills on the regular every month.
Ultimately, don’t expect the US to pay up anytime soon. While the hotheads at Transport for London will be getting quite indignant about the matter, it’s unlikely to come up between the two countries given there are more pressing matters to deal with of late.
Image credits: TfL, Chan Lee via Unsplash License
Weren’t these charges put in place by that camel jockey mayor? As others have noted, they would be speaking German if it weren’t for the USA.
Did you take a wrong turn on your way to 4chan? Your comment crosses a line.
What the fuck.
Hey Autopian, could we get bit of moderation on this thread? It’s getting a little unpleasant.
Not only is that an out-and-out racist comment, it finishes with a horrible insult to the people of a country who sacrificed massively to stand up, alone, against nazism until Japan dragged the US into the fight.
Time for the feds to use motorcycles LOL
There’s a lot of frustration here that seems… a little misplaced.
A reminder here, these are diplomats we’re talking about. Which by all accounts are (typically) the gold standard in entitled douchebags. I’m sure the American Embassy could avoid some of these congestion charges, but likely have opted for “yeah we don’t give a shit, we’ll do what we want”. Which isn’t particularly diplomatic, but yeah, that’s not entirely shocking either.
“The US refutes the UK position that the congestion charge is a “charge for a service,” noting that “no specific service is rendered in exchange for payment.”
Next time I take a toll road or cross a toll bridge, I’m using this line when I decide to refuse payment.
Oh heck – for that matter, why should I pay to take a city bus or subway?
I mean they were going there anyway….
In this case, the embassy is saying that if it’s not a charge for a service (because of no service rendered), then it’s a tax. And embassies have a tax exoneration…
You probably don’t, so this argument would be useless.
It would also make for a funny bodycam video as a cop demonstrates once again, that the main impetus of “rule of law” isn’t justice or principle, but force.
Pretty sure the UK still owes us about a trillion bucks in Germany-repelling charges.
Exactly. And actually that debt is obviously not including the untold US Armed Forces members who died defending the Brits.
This shit seems to fall under the diplomatic immunity thing though to me. Basically the minor cost of freedom, everything considered?
So, same reason no nation should have to pay NYC for parking violations?
Whatever, the article is about US and Brits situation. Not about NY.
Germany had pretty much given up on bombing and invading the UK by the time we showed up. And I don’t know that we did much to help them with V1s and V2s.
It was a lot more than just “showing up”. During ww1, GB was nearly starved by German u-boats. It was only American intervention that saved them.
As for ww2, Hitler was mere weeks away from launching an invasion when lend-lease started convincing his generals otherwise.
It wasn’t just soldiers and tanks. It was shitloads of money and materiel.
Dumbass rhetoric. I expected better.
A) The UK has paid its’ “obligations” from WW2 with the final installment in 2006.
B) Operation Sea Lion was nowhere near feasible.
The UK wargamed the worse case scenario for themselves in ’74. No naval assets or coastal guns able to respond, perfect weather for the Germans, perfect barges that weren’t hacked-together river barges that would swamp easily in Channel weather.
The end result was literally tons of wet, freezing and dead nazis piled up at the cliffs of Dover.
As the Russians showed the Nazis literal “tons of wet, freezing and dead xxxx piled up” don’t matter as long as there are plenty more xxxx behind them.
The debt they paid back was for a loan given after the war ended to re-stabilize their economy. All the support and equipment given during the war were never considered debt because it was part of the war effort.
So yes, they are paid up on everything the US ever intended to collect.
A whole lot of british (and especially russian) victories were made with american steel and oil
You still owe us a trillion bucks in rebellion charges, so it evens out.
According to Wikipedia:
“The final payment of $83.3 million (£42.5 million), due on December 31, 2006 (repayment having been deferred in the allowed five years and during a sixth year not allowed), was made by Britain on December 29, 2006 (the last working day of the year). After this final payment, Britain’s Economic Secretary to the Treasury formally issued thanks to the U.S. for its wartime support.”
So no, the UK doesn’t still owe the US about a trillion bucks. It was paid off nearly 20 years ago.
I enjoy the comments below comparing this to the Boston Tea Party and American Revolutionary War – difference here is, the British are charging the fees in their own country. If the Americans or other diplomats don’t like that, they are free to go back where they came from.
I say the British should start booting the unpaid diplomats’ cars and then towing them if the tickets remain unpaid. The tube is still available for them to get around town the same as everyone else. Just like NYC should do with the UN officials’ cars.
I understand the congestion charges- sometimes drastic measures are needed to ease congestion- but to turn the mission environmental to penalize gas cars and older vehicles? To that I say Fuck Off and come get the money pussies.
Pretty sure this would fall under ‘diplomatic immunity’ that people hate so much in the US but can’t do anything about. So, yeah, basically all they can do is try to shame people into paying – aka, nothing.
Laughs in Revolutionary War
Didn’t we fight a war over unreasonable British “fees”? Good luck collecting.
EDIT: ICJ not ICC
At some point you have to stop complaining and start towing. Send them to an impound lot in Africa. Make your money back on unclaimed cars one vehicle at a time.
“As the FCO is aware, the Embassy takes the view that Transport for London’s Congestion Charge is a tax that, under international law, should not be imposed on the United States Government, its diplomatic and consular agents, or its military force.”
Which is diplospeak for STFU. And don’t bring it up again unless you want London to look like Baghdad circa 1991 or 2003.
Okay but what’s Uncle Adrian’s take on the matter?
I think the congestion charge and ULEZ are completely unnecessary charges on people who can least afford it – working people. Start by taxing company and diplomatic car parking spaces to the fucking moon, and making public transport better and cheaper to encourage people to use it more.
Adrian,the word tax here is the issue. To ensure a service is provided, I think all those cars would need to be valet parked, and that is the serviced being paid for. It is also really easy to just not give the car back until the fee for service is paid in full.
Where the tax comes in, is income tax on the poor sod parking all these cars.
Isn’t it a service to allow people to use London’s roads? Is it a service when you’re allowed to use a toll road? Sure, you could find some other way to get where you’re going, In London I guess that would be the Tube or a taxi. Is it a service to allow people to park somewhere? If not, can I park free?
Another Tea Party argument
Why is the icon for a camera a 100 year old medium format baffle camera? At least use a image of a DSLR camera or something from this century.
The English do like a certain element of whimsy in their law enforcement.
Hence South Yorkshire Police Operations Center being on Letsby Avenue.
I enjoy it in the same way I enjoy how check engine lights often depict a ’60s-era big block, complete with air cleaner on top.
It’s funny to see this on little cars, too. A Mirage will tell you to check its big-block instead of its 1.2 3cyl or whatever
I’ve been re-watching some Archer on Netflix lately.
Ray: “Oh no, I can’t; I’m out of….carburetor?”
Or the phone icon on your..um….phone is the handset from a 1960’s phone.
Sorta, handsets haven’t really changed, and you can buy a brand new IP phone for your business with the same sort of look.
Yeah, I mean it sure baffles me!
maybe ask Murilee Martin?
As usual, we’re number one!
As usual, PRC is catching up fast.
We’ll always be number 1 in my heart. 🙂
I remember NY Times articles about unpaid parking tickets from UN missions. At the time the chief offender was Peugeot 504 from one of the African kleptocracies.
It’s the same vibe with congestion charges, which I view as as a virtue signaling cash grab that has no apparent effect on road utilization although it does create new crimes. I believe there have several incidents with people using fake plates
If the stance of the non-payers (US, but many others, it seems) is that the charge is really a tax then it would be interesting to see how that case would go in an international court. Inside the US, there’s been some hullabaloo about fee vs tax in the past that hasn’t exactly made things crystal clear.
International court would be sure to issue the most strongly-worded letter of admonishment that is within their power to issue. There won’t even be a single mention of the word “please” this time.
I wonder what it would cost to issue refunds to the countries who have paid; could it be cheaper just to rename it a tax, write it off, and mail a bunch of checks to the “good neighbor” countries who played nice?
Of course it’s Denmark and Sweden. “Ooh, we’re soooo fiscally responsible!”
“You don’t even know what a write-off is!!!”
-Cosmo Kramer
Serious question – What does the money do? Do congestion charges actually make improvements that are measurable? or is this just another poor tax? I’ve been asking this question for years as they come to my neck of the woods as local governments struggle with the issues of overcrowding and traffic in the cottonwood canyons (Utah). Congestion charges are coming. But when I read the reports for the proposed fees that are coming, it seems all the fees do is pay for congestion fee support and enforcement. i.e. charging drivers to pay for the booth that charges drivers (seriously, they predict no net revenue). I understand the issues of supply and demand and the the real problem of overcrowding, but do fees even work? Is it a viable solution? And if yes, does it only affect those who can’t afford to just pay and ignore? When the money is collected, what is then used for? Does it make it easier for people to access the resource another way? or just punish you for being poor?
I did a case study on this with national parks and came to the conclusion that fees don’t actually change behavior and the resource remains strained. Timed entry is a solution and its one that affects rich and poor alike. Same with mandatory mass transit.
This whole thing reminds me of trying to pay your way off a doomed ship. Oh you’ll give me a bazillion dollars to take my spot on the lifeboat? Great, I can’t wait to sink with it.
It’s the same issue as traffic light or speed camera tickets in the US, they’re a flat fee, but without points on your license because there isn’t any proof of who was driving. The setups are super blatantly for revenue with poor signage, double fees sign, and a 10 mph limit drop at the cameras pole (looking at you Maryland). The poorest who get hit with a ticket or two can struggle immensely to pay, but the rich who pay out pocket change in comparison will ignore them because saving time is worth it to them. Restricted time access, or means based fees would be a far far better deterrent for nearly everyone in every circumstance.
“Congestion charges are coming. But when I read the reports for the proposed fees that are coming, it seems all the fees do is pay for congestion fee support and enforcement. i.e. charging drivers to pay for the booth that charges drivers (seriously, they predict no net revenue).”
I have the same issues with Fastrack “Lexus lanes”. Is there any real evidence these lanes reduce congestion or add to the public coffers or is it as I suspect simply a cash cow for private companies at the expense of the public good?
That would make an excellent Autopian expose’
I occasionally travel in areas with the ‘Lexus lanes’ and always choose to use them, they can save a bunch of time passing by the plebians stuck in traffic. The one time it didn’t was in DC because the particular one I was one ended just before the exit I needed, and the mess it created dumping traffic back onto the main road jammed up both roads. If I lived in an area with one I probably couldn’t afford to use one all the time.
So it reduces congestion for the rich at the expense of the non rich.
Typical.
Nah, it’s just another glaringly blatant separation between the rich and everyone else.
And letting private enterprise hijack public property for private gains.
It is sort of all of these.
It is to do with air quality as defined by many international bodies and public health authorities and mandated by central Government. The theory is that the money coming in should be used to improve public transport, the reality is that several things happen;
Firstly, more people comply than the financial model predicted so to improve public transport alternative funding has to be found.
Secondly, people make a huge fuss.
Thirdly, fewer people go to hospital with respiratory problems and global treaty’s are not broken.
The service charge is the cost of running a system that is outwith the control of the local authority.
I’m pretty sure I can make a comfortable raft out of a bazillion dollars.
Its all gold bars.
Fine, a submarine then. Can’t be worse than carbon fiber.
If they’re a net-neutral revenue generator, then it really only exists as a low-effort attempt by the local government to appear proactive or like they’re offering a viable solution.
So, congestion charges do work, if, and that’s the major operating word here, you offer serviceable mass transit into the congestion area that’s easily accessed from outside the zone. Mainly via train. As the traffic being targeted is not coming from inside the city (were people are less likly to drive already), but commuters or day trippers. And it’s just easier for them to take a train, as tends not to make any surprise lefts. A built out BRT might work too, but your trad bus is hard to convince unfamiliar traffic towards. Paris is currently the star pupil here. With London, the major criticism I’ve heard not rooted in 15 minute city shit, is that the zone pushes further out than their actual serviceable area. Which they’ll try to compensate for with a multiple hastily organized bus routes.
With your National Park example, it seems like the option was a.) go to park and pay b.) don’t go. People are already committed to the vacation, so cost won’t be a major limiting factor till your in to extraordinary fees. The premise of congestion/emissions pricing would be adding c.) have a bus bring you to key areas of the park, then putting resources there and then jacking up regular admission price. Like Acadia does with the Island Transporter.
The law under which the London congestion charge operates requires all income (after the costs of running the scheme are deducted) to be invested in London’s transport infrastructure, so road improvements and the bus, tube, tram, river-bus etc. network.
I disagree with claims that it punishes people for being poor. London is well served by public transport, and public transport isn’t viewed as being only for the poor in UK cities in the same way that it might be in the US. I have occasionally driven in London when there was no feasible alternative, but most people will avoid doing so if at all possible. Maybe the very rich will decide to pay it, so their chauffeur can deliver them direct to their destination, but for the rest of us the actual stress of driving and parking in London is a pretty big deterrent anyway, the congestion charge just helps persuade us towards using public transport in the marginal cases where driving might be ever so slightly more convenient.
Yeah, didn’t the British try something like this before? I am pretty sure it wasn’t a pretty little endeavor.
Enough money to give a family $250,000/yr for 48 years.
I volunteer my family.
Something something World War II something.
“Without the US, those congestion zone signs would be in German!” or something like that.
Just one 20-letter word with lots of Z’s and maybe an umlaut.
Only 20 letters? Those are rookie numbers!
Kfz-Verkehrs- und Emissionsminderungsgebührenzone
Stupid
What a helpful, insightful and beneficial comment!
what I thought was a stupid comment is that without intervention from the US, German would be spoken in England, the UK has been busy protecting Europe since 1939, the US helped a lot with logistics after 12/8/2041, but it is not that the US alone liberated Europe. the Soviets themselves played a greater role in this
“[The] US helped a lot with logistics after 12/8/2041″
I’m glad we would be of greater assistance in the future. May I see your TARDIS?
“Soviets themselves played a greater role in this”
They did, after they conspired to dominate it.
Without US Lend/Lease aid, the USSR would very plausibly have sued for peace.
Sue for peace? The Germans were fighting a war of extermination.
If Stalin had offered to give a significant chunk of the Western USSR to Germany, I suspect they’d have taken it and refocused on the West. It’s not as if Germany was going to rampage all the way to the Pacific.
The rationale for the war was conquering enough territory in the East to provide space for a much more numerous German race. Exterminating “lesser” people that were living in that space was merely the byproduct of that goal.
“If Stalin had offered to give a significant chunk of the Western USSR to Germany, I suspect they’d have taken it. It’s not as if Germany was going to rampage all the way to the Pacific.”
Sure, just ask Neville Chamberlin how Peace in our Time worked out.
Besides their Japanese allies would certainly have been happy to take whatever territory scraps Germany passed on.
“Exterminating “lesser” people currently living in that space was merely the byproduct of that goal”
Ask Poland how that worked out for them.
This is getting pretty deep into the weeds, but Hitler gave away the strategy more than a decade before the war in his writings.
Peace in Our Time was a lie to anyone who had bothered to read them.
I simply don’t find it plausible that Germany and/or Japan (who was not even at war with the Soviets) ever had the objective of conquering the entire USSR by force. A negotiated peace before the US could ramp up production and manpower was their only chance.
I simply don’t find it plausible that Germany and/or Japan (who was not even at war with the Soviets) ever had the objective of conquering the entire USSR by force.
I think Stalingrad hints otherwise. Hitler was willing to sacrifice an entire army just to prove a point. His ego clearly wasn’t making rational decisions.
But perhaps you are right. The USSR was a huge territory and Germany had only so much manpower. Taking all of the USSR in one swoop wasn’t Maybe he’d have stopped at the Urals…for a while anyway.
I do wonder if Germany had behaved better in the conquered territories if they wouldn’t have gotten that manpower. A lot of those folks saw Germany as liberators from the hated Soviets. Unfortunately for them Germany saw them as subhuman slaves.
A negotiated peace before the US could ramp up production and manpower was their only chance.
It was GERMANY who declared war on the US, not the other way around. Japan hadn’t even asked for that. As I said Hitler’s ego was not making good decisions.
Methinks Chamberlain worked out pretty well. It bought the limeys enough time to gear up war production and training. Without it the Battle of Britain could have been lost.
It also gave Germany time to enough time to gear up war production too. And to train.
Stalin making peace with Germany after tanks crossed into USSR wouldn’t have happened. Stalin would send every man/boy from the Baltic to the Pacific to their death before he would make peace with the Germans, which frankly he got pretty close to. That dude really hated the Germans, and having a major Fascist power occupying your major food source wasn’t in the cards.
Unless, they coup’d Stalin and installed Molotov. Which some people did want to do. Molotov was pretty Fascist for the second most powerful man in the Popular Front against Fascist. Molotov-Ribbentrop pact was him going kinda rouge and he had alot of explaining to do when he got back to Moscow.
Desperate people do unexpected things, and there is precedent. The Bolsheviks bought peace with a huge amount of land at Brest-Litovsk in 1918.
Yeah, but in context of them entering the war under the Czar and the soviets having recently come to power in 1918, and where uninterested in continuing a war they believe they shouldn’t have been in. Also they were engaged in what would become the most violent civil war outside of China at the time. Soviet’s were in a vastly different place then WW1 that they aren’t really comparable.
I think they did in the end 1989/1991
Yeah but there’d be Autobahns everywhere else. And they’d finally drive on the correct side of the street.
The UK already has a German head of state. It wouldn’t be all that different!
Also we could have beer with breakfast without looking like a nation of functioning alcoholics.
A fancy, posh accent forgives many sins.
British yelling at Americans about unpaid taxes?
They better be careful before something gets dumped into a harbor somewhere….
With rising sea levels, I think we could find a viable way to pitch central London into the a harbor.
Its probably not wise to yell at someone who has nukes on their bases on your soil.
Good luck, the US laughs at the ICJ.