Border guards sometimes pay for car damage, minister says practice must end

Border guards sometimes have to pay for damage to service vehicles after Lithuania’s State Border Guard Service stopped insuring them under KASKO three years ago, LRT reported. Interior Minister Martynas Katelynas said he does not believe such a practice exists and promised to investigate.

A border guard was ordered to have almost 600 euros, or half his salary, deducted after damaging a service vehicle while on duty at Vilnius Airport, according to the chair of the Border Guards’ Trade Union, Rimantas Liepa.

Liepa said the officer hit a barrier while leaving a parking area after the vehicle’s warning sensors failed. The impact scratched and slightly dented the vehicle’s sill.

“If an officer deliberately, maliciously or with extreme carelessness drove the vehicle during working hours … that did not happen here,” Liepa said. He added that the officer was considering leaving the service because of the deduction.

Liepa said this was not the only case in which money had been deducted from a border guard’s pay. Trade unions say the policy makes some officers afraid to carry out their duties because the distinction between intentional and accidental damage can be unclear.

The State Border Guard Service said the decision to stop using KASKO insurance was made three years ago with the support of the trade unions. Insuring the service vehicles had cost about 500,000 euros a year, while repairs after damage cost about 24,000 euros last year, said service representative Giedrius Mišutis.

Of that 24,000 euros, officers paid 3,000 euros themselves. The previous year, vehicle repairs cost the service about 25,000 euros, including around 4,000 euros covered by officers.

Mišutis said officers were required to pay only when incidents resulted from carelessness. He said no one would demand payment if, for example, an officer driving through a forest hit a tree stump.

Katelynas said he was not aware of cases in which officers had been required to pay for vehicle repairs themselves. “I really do not believe it, and I do not want it to be so. If it is happening, this practice will have to end,” he said.

The service leadership said officers had become more careful since the policy was introduced and that the number of incidents involving damage to service vehicles had fallen.