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Waikawau boat ramp operates a licence plate recognition system (LPR) for launching, retrieving and parking. The LPR is based on your launch vehicle licence plate number, not your boat trailer licence plate number.

Waikawau boat ramp offers two options of paying for launching and retrieving at Waikawau, an annual membership or a boat ramp day pass (casual user). One of these options must be in place prior to launching or retrieving at Waikawau to avoid a $65 breach notice.

Ramp wardens and LPR cameras operate at Waikawau to monitor compliance.

Waikawau boat ramp operates a cashless system so cash is no longer accepted at Waikawau. There are no payment facilities at Waikawau, so all payments are required to be made online (either using your mobile device at the ramp, or a location where you can use wifi if you don’t have mobile data).

Annual memberships

There are two types of annual memberships sold, single vehicle or multiple vehicle memberships. Once paid, these memberships include free launching and retrieving, at the Waikawau boat ramp, for the launch vehicle(s) for 12 months from the date of purchase. Both single vehicle and multiple vehicle memberships allow you to change your registered vehicle(s) up to three times per year for people who buy/use a different car. After three changes, you will be required to purchase an additional membership or pay $15 for a Boat Ramp Day Pass.

Single vehicle memberships offer an immediate membership for one launch vehicle. Once registered and paid for, these memberships allow for one launch vehicle licence plate to be registered. No evidence of the registered owner of the vehicle is required. The single vehicle memberships cost $50 per annum. From 1 September 2025, in addition to the membership fee, a joining fee of $25 will apply to new members, or existing members who have let their membership lapse.

Multiple vehicle memberships are suitable for people who have two vehicles that they use to launch and retrieve, where both are registered to one party or one address. When applying for a multiple vehicle membership, you’ll need to upload the required documentation through the system, such as address proof (typically NZTA registration renewal or insurance documentation). This documentation is subject to WBRS approval, so please allow up to one week for the membership to be confirmed. With this type of membership, only one of the vehicles can be used each day, so if you intend to launch or retrieve on one day using both vehicles, then you will need to purchase 2 x single vehicle memberships. The multiple vehicle memberships cost $75 per annum. From 1 September 2025, in addition to the membership fee, a joining fee of $25 will apply to new members, or existing members who have let their membership lapse.

If you have multiple launch vehicles that you regularly use, but they are not registered to the same person or address (eg a company vehicle and a personal vehicle), then you can purchase multiple single vehicle memberships to cover multiple vehicles (without needing to supply any additional documentation). Each of these additional memberships will cost $50 per registration as noted above.

Payment options

Membership payments are made online and payment options include visa, mastercard and account to account (direct credit).

To apply for a membership, click on the link below to create a new individual account. After validating your email, log in, complete your profile details, and apply for a membership.

https://vpermit.com.au/wbr/

Note : The system only accepts unique email addresses, so if you have been a member before and your email address is already in the system, you may need to reset your password rather than set up a new account.

Change of vehicles

Once you are registered, if you need to make changes to the vehicle you have registered, you can login and click on “manage vehicles” on the active permit that you want to change the details on. As noted above, you can make up to three changes per year.

If you are having trouble, please email us on wbrs2000@gmail.com

Our licence plate recognition system is operated by a company called Stellar. Stellar is also responsible for the enforcement and Breach Notices. Our ramp wardens will continue to be at the ramp as often as they can, but they will be directing traffic and assisting people and will not be collecting any money.

Licence Plate Recognition system at Waikawau Boat Ramp

The change in the membership system using licence plate recognition based on tow vehicle registration was implemented in December 2024 for a number of reasons.

The lack of members that were willing to donate their time to become ramp wardens
The number of casual users that did not pay to launch unless there was someone there to collect the money
The abuse that was sometimes directed at our volunteer ramp wardens when they were on duty
It not being practical for us to use the boat trailer registration for licence plate recognition.

The primary reason for the change was to ensure that all people who launched or retrieved at Waikawau, contributed to the running costs of the ramp.

Since the reduction in the annual membership fee to $50, the number of members using the ramp increased significantly resulting in approx. 30% of users being casuals. Prior to the implementation of LPR, approximately 50% of casual users did not pay unless there was a ramp warden there to collect money. That meant that approx. 15% of users of the ramp did not pay. Yet they benefit from the facility which is maintained with funds from members and paying casual users. We did not think this is fair, particularly to our members. These non paying casuals also use up parking, add to the queues and to the wear and tear of the facility. Since the introduction of LPR, the non-paying casual users has more than halved.

Prior to the implementation of LPR, options to increase the compliance of casual users paying, largely involved increasing the time our wardens spent at the ramp. Our wardens generously give up their free time to assist with the smooth running of the ramp (including collecting money historically). Unfortunately, despite numerous pleas amongst our members for more wardens (via newsletters and AGMs), we have had minimal numbers volunteer to help.

A number of people suggested membership cards, barrier arms, padlocks, stickers in cars, continuing with trailer stickers etc. All of these membership methods required someone to be there to enforce or monitor them, and since our members didn’t put their hands up to assist as volunteer wardens, we moved to a fully automated system.

So, we moved to licence plate recognition on tow vehicles. A system that automates the collection of fees and takes away the responsibility of money collection from the wardens. Our wardens are now ambassadors at the ramp to assist with launching, parking and information and be there to enjoy the fishing community, rather than cop abuse from some regarding money collection.

Unfortunately, it wasn’t practical to use the boat trailer number plate for licence plate recognition for the following reasons:

Boat trailer number plates are only visible from the back. Cars, trucks etc need to have a front and rear number plate which makes plate capture more reliable.
Boat trailer number plates are often obscured or mounted in interesting locations which may make them unreadable to cameras.
Light boards used – light boards are generally removed from the boat prior to launching so would not be captured.
Most trailers display a registration plate, but if the trailer hasn’t been registered for several years then it is deregistered and the “registered user” of the plate is removed from NZTA making it difficult to track the user down

The licence plate recognition based on the tow vehicle does impact negatively on some of our members who use multiple vehicles for launching a single vessel and we apologise for that. However, we have had to do this to ensure that our ramp can continue to operate, even if we don’t have wardens in attendance. Unfortunately, we have had to restrict the number of vehicles members can register under their membership to ensure the less honest users don’t abuse the system.

Membership registration is done via QR codes, or by clicking on the link on our website. Payment methods include visa & mastercard (both debit and credit versions) and Account to Account payments (direct credit). There is no opportunity to pay by cash at the ramp.

Any user that doesn’t have their tow vehicle registered with us, or does not pay the $15 casual day pass fee, prior to launching / retrieving may be issued with a $65 breach notice. The breach notice will be managed by a third party. Waikawau Boat Ramp will not benefit from the breach notice revenue generated as this will go to the third party.