Which has the higher fine: slippers or substandard helmet?

Erring rider finds out the hard way

To this day, motorcycle riders and pillions are still being caught for inappropriate attire when on a motorcycle. This is despiet the fact that authorities have been reminding riders to follow what’s prescribed in the helmet law.

If you're still not aware of what's required, simply check the regular posts of EDSA boss, Bong Nebrija, who uses social media to remind riders of what's required by law.

Just recently, another rider and his pillion learned their lesson the hard way. They were both caught wearing of slippers, while the pillion was only wearing a bicycle helmet.

No stranger to pleads or attempts at negotiation, the EDSA boss took a different approach to this particular apprehension. The rider and his pillion tried to negotiate their way out of a violation by offering to pay for the helmet fine. The EDSA boss agreed. To their surprise, the fine for wearing an unauthorized / substandard motorcycle helmet amounts to PhP3,000.

For comparison, not wearing a helmet at all gets you a PhP1,500 fine. Wearing slippers is just PhP500 (PhP1000 since both were wearing slippers).

Upon discovering his mistake, the rider instead pleaded to pay for the slippers violation instead.

Of course, they were fined for both violations, amounting to PhP4,000 total. Nebrija wanted to show the rider that it's cheaper to simply follow the law.

Cheap helmets cost more in the long run

Like what we’ve discussed in this story, 7 lazy excuses for not getting / wearing a proper helmet, some riders still think there's no need to spend for a proper and compliant motorcycle helmet. Most of them would rather buy the cheapest they can get, or, some will just wait for a hand-me-down helmet from their rider friends.

It's tempting to buy a cheap bicycle or substandard motorcycle helmet just in the range of PhP500. It saves you money on that day of purchase. But, like the rider and his pillion discovered, saving a few thousand when buying a helment then is now costing them a penalty of PhP3,000 now.

For that PhP3,000 penalty, they could’ve bought themselves a nice helmet, like a Zeus ZS-218 jet helmet, minus all the hassle of queuing to settle the penalty and claiming the driver’s license.