Brussels regional parking collection agency Parking.brussels has finally been granted the authority to collect fines from owners of cars with foreign number plates, which account for 15% of violating vehicles. “The aim is clear: to ensure equal treatment for all motorists,” said Floris Tack, managing director of Parking.brussels. “Every user of public space must comply with the same rules in a fair and consistent manner.” Collecting fines on foreign vehicles has been complicated in recent years because “due to the lack of bilateral agreements with
numerous countries, the procedures were lengthy, costly and often inefficient,” Parking.brussels said. This meant that for years, millions of euros in parking fines for foreign vehicles went unpaid. Now, Parking.brussels is engaging a specialist debt collection agency to tackle these offences. “This will allow us to treat motorists equally,” the organisation said. Figures from the office of mobility minister Elke Van den Brandt showed that the collection rate on 301,289 fines for foreign cars in 2023 was only 9.74%, falling to 9.07% of the 431,573
fines issued in 2024. In 2023, this meant that €9.3 million went uncollected. In 2024, the figure was €15.8 million. “Of the total number of parking fines issued in Brussels, 15% were for foreign number plates,” said Sara Jasmes, spokesperson for Parking.brussels. In June 2024, Parking.brussels temporarily adjusted its enforcement methods to ensure “the responsible use of public funds”. From then onwards, foreign number plates were no longer checked by parking attendants on foot, but breaches were still recorded by scanning vehicles. In this way,
Parking.brussels said it was able to focus its resources on “procedures that had a real impact”. To tackle the problem structurally, the agency also launched a public procurement process to appoint a specialist service provider for international debt recovery. That company has been operational since November 2025 and “has shown very encouraging results”, Parking.brussels said. “In the first quarter of 2026 alone, as much was recovered abroad as in the whole of 2025,” Jasmes said. “The results enable a more efficient and balanced management of
cases involving vehicles registered in other countries.” The specialist company can work with the parking agency for four years, after which Parking.brussels must issue a new public contract. In the meantime, parking wardens on foot can once again give parking tickets to foreign-registered cars. “Furthermore, the federal government also has agreements with the Netherlands and France to exchange data. That makes everything much easier,” said Jasmes. “Previously, we often had to deal with legal proceedings abroad. That was very costly. Now a specialist company handles
that. “This concerns, among other things, cars with number plates from Switzerland, Italy, Spain and Bulgaria. The fact that only 10% of parking fines for vehicles with foreign number plates are paid really needs to change now.”
Brussels, Parking.brussels, parking fines, foreign number plates, debt collection, mobility minister Elke Van den Brandt, international debt recovery