A mysterious printed card with a warning for a Tauranga resident has left him and others puzzled after it was left on his car windscreen, accusing him of bad parking, and threatening to key his vehicle.

The size and appearance of a business card, on the front it reads: “You. Yes you. You park badly and you should feel bad. Stop. Use the bus, get a bike, or get lessons. Preferably all three.”

It was simply signed “sincerely, every other person on the road”.

On the back, it took on a more sinister tone, “Next time you will be keyed. Thank you.”

At a loss to understand what the card meant, and who was behind it, the driver posted photos of his parked car, an EV Nissan Leaf, to a Tauranga community group asking,

“Who’s the a...... giving these out? And can anyone figure out what the person thought was wrong with my parking?”

He checked that his car had not been keyed, he says.

“I would have been making a police report straight away if that did happen and checking what CCTV was available.

“You would have to be demented to think keying someone's car is a proportional response to bad parking.”

The owner of an EV was surprised to find a ‘calling card’ about his parking. He blanked out his licence plate in this supplied photo. Photo: Supplied/Stuff.

Some commenters thought anger over poor parking was a particular issue in Tauranga.

“It screams Tauranga behaviour,” says one.

Parking – or lack of parking – is the talk of Tauranga currently, as traffic congestion and construction have led to parking woes in the city, giving rise to tougher parking enforcement from privately contracted companies.

Members of the Reddit Tauranga group that the car owner consulted were keen to chime in with ideas about the card.

There was speculation that whoever left the card thought the driver was parked too close to the kerb and pavement, or not neatly between the lines, but many thought the parking was perfectly fine.

Others suggested that it was giving “cyclist vibes” or they could be “some anti-EV nutjob”, or even a “right-wing extremist”. Some said they had left similar notes, but tended to scribble them on a napkin, while this seemed “premeditated”.

While there was concern at the threat of “vigilante justice” in keying the vehicle, others found the font used on the card was the bigger crime, as it was so “90s”.

Tauranga wedding celebrant and MC Will Johnston has taken an interest in the city's parkers over the years, regularly posting some of the worst examples, "but as a light-hearted ribbing, not taking anything too seriously whereas this is moving into the weird zone”.

“I think bad parking is a New Zealand bad habit, but particularly prevalent in Tauranga due to the scarcity in parking compared to population,” says Johnston.

“Particularly in the Mount where people with expensive 4-wheel-drives, it's probably the only type of four-wheel driving they do when they bounce on the kerb.

“But we shouldn't take it too seriously, although there's a serious undertone of safety and courtesy to other drivers when parks are so scarce, but nothing deserves threats like this."

It’s not the first time Tauranga residents have received strange anonymous notes. In the last two years white supremacist leaflets have been dropped in letterboxes, which police said at the time did not meet the threshold for a criminal offence.

In response to Stuff’s query about people receiving notes about parking, a police spokesperson said that a potential charge here would be under the Summary Offences Act, Intimidation, which covers offences with intent to “frighten or intimidate any other person... threatens to injure... or to damage any of that person’s property.”

If convicted of such a charge, a person could face three months behind bars or a fine up to $2000.

A certain threshold would need to be reached to actually file a charge, police said, which would come down to the specific circumstance, the officer’s decision-making, and pursuant to the Solicitor General’s Prosecution Guidelines and the public interest.

“However, if someone is fearful for their safety following an incident like this we’d certainly advise them to contact their nearest police station for advice. Reporting something like this could also be helpful for police as there may have been similar instances, and it would help police work up a pattern of behaviour.”

-Annemarie Quill/RNZ.