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Have A Happy Friday: He is….somewhere
Posted on January 29th, 2010 24 comments
From The London Times:A Well-Planned Retirement
Outside England’s Bristol Zoo there is a parking lot for 150 cars and 8 buses. For 25 years, its parking fees were managed by a very pleasant attendant. The fees were £1 for cars ($1.40), £5 for busses (about $7).
Then, one day, after 25 solid years of never missing a day of work, he just didn’t show up; so the Zoo Management called the City Council and asked it o send them another parking agent.
The Council did some research and replied that the parking lot was the Zoo’s own responsibility. The Zoo advised the Council that the attendant was a City employee. The City Council responded that the lot attendant had never been on the City pay role.
Meanwhile, sitting in his villa somewhere on the coast of Spain (or some such scenario), is a man who’d apparently had a ticket machine installed completely on his own; and then had simply begun to show up every day, commencing to collect and keep the parking fees, estimated at about $560 per day – for 25 years. Assuming 7 days a week, this amounts to just over $7 million dollars!
And no one even knows his name. Now that’s being entrepreneurial. Hank
24 responses to “Have A Happy Friday: He is….somewhere”
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Justin de la Chi(cago) January 29th, 2010 at 07:49
That is the most ridiculous and fantastic thing I have read for quite some time. You’d think there would be some pretty obvious accounting errors likely, but most people know how state funded entities are ran, thus it isn’t too surprising.
For 25 years too! My new hero.
J
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Brilliant!
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wow. All I could think was..does he pay his taxes? And if he did pay his taxes…wouldn’t anyone realize that he is making way too much as a parking attendant? I just keep thinking that this is so not legal. But if it is legal, then that’s awesome.
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Amanda Edmondson January 29th, 2010 at 10:54
We talked about this genius in my Personal Finance class last semester. The funny part is that the Zoo thought he was a City employee and never questioned him. If the Zoo or City is angry, it’s their own fault. I think this guy deserves his money; he never even took a sick day. What an entrepreneur!
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Alexandra Graves January 29th, 2010 at 12:34
Is this illegal? Even if it is it’s a great idea to make money. I can’t believe he did this for 25 years and no one knew. So odd!
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Colleen Cahill January 29th, 2010 at 13:10
Is this a true story?
I can’t believe this. After 25 years no one ever made the connection that neither the Zoo nor City was seeing money from this? When I first starting reading this story I thought it was going to be about some sweet old man who touched the lives of everyone he met… and so on and so forth. I am delightfully surprised. What a bad ass. I’m not sure if he is a true entrepreneur, but he certainly took a brilliant idea and succeeded in making a profit. Bravo! -
Nice idea, but Snopes:
http://www.snopes.com/crime/clever/carpark.asp -
Loïc Mazet January 29th, 2010 at 13:50
Awesome, just Awesome!!!!!This guy is a king.
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Jaideep Singh January 29th, 2010 at 15:25
Wow that guy has patience… a perfect con man… haha that was hilarious!
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Taylor Gelsosomo January 29th, 2010 at 15:51
That’s awesome! I can’t believe it went on for 25 years without anyone noticing! Plus the fact that one knows his name or can figure out who it was. This man is a genius and I’m sure he’s enjoying his new life!
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Brian Corley January 29th, 2010 at 17:08
Awesome. Wish he was my grandpa.
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Michael Evans January 29th, 2010 at 22:23
How on earth could he work there for 25 years and no one bother to know his name?
I’m not surprised he never missed a day. If I were collecting $560 dollars a day by literally just showing up and taking my money, nothing short of a coma would stop me.
Not sure I admire his morals, but you gotta hand it to him: he’s a smart guy.
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Courtney M. Cronk January 29th, 2010 at 23:32
um, can u say GENIUS?!?! no one knows his name, or ever even noticed that he didnt work for the zoo….that is so odd. This guy must have kept his “scam” a secret, because you know if he told some one his plan of action, some one would have spilled the beans.
genius, entrepreneurial, rich, and can keep a secret. not bad characteristics!
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Damon Ward January 30th, 2010 at 02:48
True or not, this is extremely clever and very funny. If it did happen to be true it would be interesting to know how he kept his secret hidden for such a long time.
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Kyle Egbert January 30th, 2010 at 15:59
I kinda want to be that man.
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Karlis Jansons January 30th, 2010 at 22:01
This is definitely illegal in the States. A man tried doing something similar in New York. He opened up a closed parking garage and started operating it. The cops soon after arrested him and charged him on multiple charges.
http://gothamist.com/2009/12/19/man_busted_charging_drivers_to_park.php
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Adi Muley January 31st, 2010 at 18:40
Wow!! This man is a genius. He collected so much money by just using his brain. He is so clever. Who would have thought of such an idea?!
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Meiqi Zhao January 31st, 2010 at 22:16
I hesitate the new’s credibility. Does he need to pay some money back to the Zoo or City Council organization?
But I also heard some similar news before. Some beggers in China also can build a beautiful apartment by the income from collecting garbages.
That also lead me to think that entreprenurs need to pay attention on areas that are always ignored by people. Big chances may be there. -
David Hyman January 31st, 2010 at 22:31
This is just proves that no one really pays attention to the small things. It surprises me that this man was able to do this for 25 years and no one even think about if it is legit or not. If I were him, I would have bumped the price up a euro or so every couple of years!!
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Casey Piquette February 1st, 2010 at 12:25
That is crazy! He is a lucky/smart guy. I would imagine with the turnover that a zoo has, by the 5th year on the job, most of the workers around him were new and didn’t really know the difference.
Pretty smart guy!
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This is a great idea! Its strange that nobody caught on till he did not show up one day! I think thats a smart man! I wonder if he ever showed back up?
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Blake Bronowicki February 1st, 2010 at 18:40
Wow is all I have to say. This guy was a clever entrepreneur that knew his way around the system. He designed a parking ticket machine on his own and collected money through his creativity. Now, the guy is sitting somewhere retired with a lot of money from putting together something so small that made him so much money. What a very clver guy and I was going to ask the same question too. Is what he did illegal? Because if this guy was making this much money, there has to be ome way it was regulated, apparently not.
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Steve Maniago February 2nd, 2010 at 10:37
This story is amazing. How could the Zoo or the government not realize an individual collecting all that money for so many years? Congrats to him
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Mahmood Alrawi February 2nd, 2010 at 23:25
haha, this is awesome!
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