Payment of €500 fire brigade fee ‘very slow’

Dublin Fire Brigade has admitted payment of a new €500 call-out fee introduced in January is “very slow” with just 44 invoices paid, out of the 305 issued.

The call-out charge was introduced on Jan 16, with a fee of €500 applied for the first hour and an hourly rate of €485 for the second and subsequent hours, with Dublin City Council claiming it was being introduced to maintain services on tighter budgets.

Yesterday, Clare Crosbie, a senior staff officer overseeing the issuing of charge notices, said of the rate of payment: “It would be considered to be very slow.”