As if it wasn’t bad enough that the city won’t accept late payment for parking tickets, it’ll also tow your vehicle over the same unpaid tickets.

Last week we reported that parking tickets older than 75 days cannot be paid on the city’s website or at Toronto’s ticket payment counters, and that it keeps a bushel basket over the candle by doing zero to inform the public.

We figured it out after trying (and trying and trying) to pay two late tickets online; only after repeatedly striking out did we end up on the phone with a guy from the city who told us that if we didn’t know, “that’s your problem.”

Tickets older than 75 days can be paid only at a Service Ontario office, when renewing a licence plate sticker. And the transportation ministry has clarified that Service Ontario offices will also accept late ticket payments at any time from anyone who cares to wait in the daunting lineups.

After our column about the tickets, several readers sent us notes saying the same bushel basket is also obscuring the fact that anyone with three or more tickets could have their car seized over it.

Peter Winter sent us a note saying he found out the hard way. “On my way to work I went in to get my vehicle, but I had no vehicle to drive.

“I soon learned of a rule/huge amount of information that anyone who parks in Toronto should know. If you have three tickets after 75 days, the can tow your vehicle after the third.”

Winter went on to say it cost him $282.50, “plus the cost of the ticket(s) and all the time and mental frustration that goes along with it.”

Bak Balouch emailed to say he also discovered in an unexpected way that a vehicle can be towed with three or more unpaid tickets.

“I learned this from an enforcement officer few weeks ago when I caught him right after he issued me a ticket,” said Balouch.

“I had six at that point. Four of them were past the 75-day period, so that means that they don’t allow you to pay after 75 days, but reserve the right to tow you.”

STATUS: It was news to us, so we went back to Susan Pape, who we dealt with on the unpaid ticket issue, for clarification. “Under current City bylaws, an illegally parked vehicle may be towed for any offence at any time,” she said. Think about that. Any time that paid parking runs out, a vehicle can be towed. Imagine if they actually did it. Pape went on to say that “generally speaking, towing enforcement is only done during rush hour periods or where vehicles are impeding other vehicles or pose a danger to vehicular or pedestrian traffic. With respect to Habitual Offender Towing, in early 2014, the City of Toronto, together with the Toronto Police Service, launched congestion-reducing parking regulations to improve traffic flow and compliance with the City parking regulation which included the Habitual Offender initiative . . . a program to deter illegal parking and to encourage payment of outstanding parking fees. Through this initiative, vehicles may be towed if the vehicle is parked illegally and the vehicle owner has three or more outstanding parking tickets for which no action has been taken (no trial request and no payment) and 120 days has elapsed from the last offence date. Vehicle owners are not required to pay their parking tickets to have their vehicle released from the storage pound but will have to pay towing and storage fees prior to release (up to $200 plus daily storage of up to $81). Vehicles displaying disability permits are excluded from towing, however they are subject to conventional collection including the use of collection agencies. Once towed, the Toronto Police Service Communications Centre at 416-808-2222 will direct vehicle owners to the location of their impounded car.” In 2016, about 7,000 vehicles were towed under these circumstances, said Pape, adding that the city outlines the rules on its website and held a press conference when the program began in January of 2014. That’s swell, but we suspect hardly anyone knows that. The city has not exactly shouted it from a rooftop, when it should.