“I was a victim of predatory towing,” said Kubler-Kielb, who paid the driver a fee and got her car back. “The driver was aggressive, offended me, insisted that my son was not with me and that I walked off. I think something very wrong is happening with all this towing.”
Of all the complaints pouring into the Montgomery County Office of Consumer Protection — credit card scams and overly persistent telemarketers, for instance — among the most common are those about towing companies that haul away cars with what some officials say is uncommon aggressiveness.
Towing companies haul away 30,000 to 40,000 vehicles a year, according to Montgomery officials, whose powers to regulate towing are limited by federal law.
At a County Council hearing Thursday to discuss towing and other consumer issues, county officials said too much towing can be a problem for local businesses.
“It’s bad for these shopping centers to get a reputation of a business district where you’re likely to be towed,” said council member Phil Andrews (D-Gaithersburg-Rockville).
Finding a choice parking spot in some parts of the region — try finding one in downtown Bethesda on a Friday night — has long been a competitive sport, and squeezing a car into a bumper-to-bumper-tight space is something of an art form.
To make sure that spaces turn over for their customers, some businesses hire towing companies to enforce parking rules. As a result, the phrase “parking for customers only” is often defined in the strictest possible way, and one-hour parking means a tow truck could be making its move in the 61st minute.
Many owners of shopping centers and apartment complexes hire towing companies to enforce parking regulations. Sometimes, the companies are paid a flat rate. Other times, they receive a commission for each vehicle towed, and that, local officials said, creates an incentive for them to be aggressive.
Some towing companies use spotters to monitor lots, officials said, calling in wreckers the moment there’s a violation.
This has led to a lot of unhappy people.
In Montgomery, Eric S. Friedman, the director of the Consumer Protection Office, said his agency received 162 complaints in 2011, reflecting a steady increase from 74 in 2007. Recently, the County Council approved a $10 increase, to $168, in the maximum rate for towing a car on private property, making it among the highest in the region.
“There are clearly abuses there, when they’re lying in wait, acting like hawks and swooping in,” Friedman said. “The business is just so lucrative, it motivates them to be aggressive.”
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