When drivers bring their cars into The Finer Details and ask to have all their windows tinted, owner Rob Westfall tells them the same thing.
“We tell them it’s illegal, so buyer beware,” Westfall said.
The Victoria auto detailing business will tint the front driver and passenger side windows, despite the fact that a run-in with a traffic cop could cost the owner a $109 fine. Inevitably, some customers return, ticket in hand, asking for the tint on the driver’s window to be removed.
But some people, not getting the hint, come back to have the film put right back on, willing to risk another fine for the sake of fashion.
It’s these drivers the Capital Regional District Integrated Road Safety Unit will target starting on Wednesday, when the unit launches a five-week blitz looking for illegal tinting.
Traffic officers are seeing an increase in such cases and suspect it might be a way for a driver to flout the tougher new distracted-driving laws, said Staff Sgt. James Anderson, the officer in charge of IRSU.
The fine in B.C. is $109 plus a written order to have tinting removed. Drivers who do not comply with the order could face a $595 fine and their vehicle could be immediately removed from the road until an inspection at the owner’s expense.
“In the last seven or eight years, I’ve done 150 driver’s side windows and only had 20 of them come back to get it removed,” Westfall said. “And probably 10 of those came back to put it back on.”
In a statement, Anderson said tinted windows could pose a safety risk if the car is in a crash.
Anderson said it is harder for the driver to be extracted from the vehicle quickly if trapped during a collision because the solar film prevents glass from breaking into tiny pieces by a shatter tool often used by firefighters.
“Drivers with dark tint have their visibility reduced significantly on dark rainy nights and are unable to make eye contact with other drivers, cyclists and pedestrians,” Anderson said.
Front-window tinting is illegal in B.C., Alberta, Saskatchewan and Nova Scotia, and in other provinces it’s regulated through a maximum allowable tint.
Westfall often sees drivers from out of province or from the U.S. who ask to have the tint removed from the front windows in order to pass a safety inspection in order for the car to be allowed on B.C. roads.
“I had a guy with three Porsches and he had to have the tint taken off to pass inspection,” Westfall said. After the inspection, the tint went right back on.
Andrew Kok, who owns Victoria-based Diversity Auto Films, said he will not put tint on the front two windows unless the owner has a doctor’s note that says the driver needs the film to protect from sun sensitivity.
“Other than that it’s a no-go,” Kok said.
