Ballot and Bid or Both in the Crappy COE System

This Today letter offers a slightly clever compromise. Messy but at least a compromise, a way out of this COE policy if the minister 100% must stick to this vote-losing cash cow. He is from the military before so I bet is he square, stiff and stickler for the COE policy. Why change something that is there and risk it all when he can blame someone else who started the COE.

In this novel twist of the COE scam, those who cannot afford pay tens of thousands for it, can ballot to try their luck for God to drop a COE on their lap if they can wait. Those who can afford, and don't want to wait, can bid for it.

More. Car buyers bid for the COE themselves as car dealers are the ones who bid up COE to get the overpriced paper (the COE is the environmental cost price of a tree maybe in dollar terms) for their customers. If customers want cars, they surely bid lower as it is human nature to get a good deal. Car dealers bid on the other hand bid higher as it is in their interest to get a COE so that they can sell the car to their waiting customer. The COE is not the car dealer pay one what!

Hmmmm Wait tweak a teensy bit more. This idea has been going on for some time. When car buyers bid it themselves, it is not the 100th lowest bid that becomes the COE price, but it is pay-as-you bid for COE etc. So if there are 500 COE for that 2-weeks after some COE is up for ballot and the remaining 500 is up for bidding, the top 500 pay-as-you-bid COE gets the chance to drive a car out of the Leng Kee showroom. 501th bid didn't get it? Boo hoo hoo suck it up and take the free SMRT ride at offpeak hours.

I know this is a superb idea, an election winner. Transport minister, you got the balls or brains, or OMG both, to radically change the COE? Got? Got?



BTW how come WP so quiet on COE?

Towards fairer car ownership with COE balloting
From Hui Chi Shing
-


I agree with the writer, in “Balloting and bidding in one COE system” (July 2), that a “composite” Certificate of Entitlement system would give all households here a fair chance of car ownership.

The current bidding system has made car ownership unattainable for most Singaporeans, except for the well-off. It is frustrating to see that money has become the sole factor in determining who is entitled to own a car in Singapore.

The Land Transport Authority could consider allocating, for instance, half of the COE quota to a balloting system at a discounted price, such as 50 per cent off, and the rest to the bidding system.

The rich could opt for the latter if they want to get a car immediately. The general public with lower spending power could wait for their turn through the ballot.

To curb any potential abuse of the balloting system, these buyers must top up the difference between their COE ballot price and the COE bid price if they sell their cars within, say, two years.

The top-up could apply on a tiered percentage basis for the third year onwards and up to the fifth year, or even longer, until there is no incentive to make a quick profit from the system. This could help to ensure that only genuine buyers would submit a ballot entry.

Also, car dealers cannot enter the ballot, while other restrictions could be introduced to enhance the fairness of the system. These could include allowing only one ballot entry per household, which must be submitted by a holder of a valid Singapore driving licence.