By Jo Best, 5 September 2006 16:05
NEWS
Taking the car to York? Ditch coins for your parking and get out your mobile instead.
City of York council has signed up mobile operator O2 and parking payment company Verrus to let drivers pay for their parking via a mobile call or SMS.
Drivers will be able to call - and in the future send a text message - to a number given in car parks around the city. Users will need to call an 0870 number and enter their credit card details, car registration and a unique code for the car park to use the parking space.
Drivers will also be reminded when their time is nearly up by text and can then extend their session by dialling or texting the same number.
Parking attendants will also be getting in on the act, using BlackBerrys over GPRS to check up on drivers' account details in their area and ensure all drivers without pay-and-display tickets have used the mobile system.
The Verrus system already covers 130,000 parking spaces in North America and a number of UK councils are using phone payment, including Birmingham and Cheltenham. Westminster is also planning on trialling it from next month.
Other councils have adopted similar schemes, although York is hoping its scheme will fare better than some as it doesn't need pre-registration and allows remote top-ups.
Peter Evely, head of network at City of York council, said the system has streamlined parking operations. It means drivers don't have to run back to cars to top up parking sessions - or risk fines.
However, motorists will pay extra for their mobile service - a surcharge of 20p will be added to each parking fee over £2 and users will pay another 10p to be reminded by text when their parking period is about to expire.
Comments
There are 7 comments. Join the discussion
1. Mark Oliver
The most susseful mobile payment system in the world is TXT-a-Park in NZ which allows users to simply text a machine to receive a pay and display ticket with all charges going on there mobile phone account.
Upto 20% of users use TXT-a-Park which is also very popular with business
users so parking is paid by their company.
Schemes such as that being used in York have a less than 1% uptake in the Austrasian market.
CHS Parking supplies machines compatible with TXT-a-Park and Synergy International host the TXT-a-Park application.
2. Jonathan Mills
Very exciting and all that, but they've had a similar pay by SMS system in place in Talinn in Estonia for the last 5 years. Former Soviet Bloc republic or not, they appear to be somewhat ahead of York!
3. Richard Davies
What a load of rubbish...using technology just for the sake of it...I would rather just put a quid into the slot rather than risk my credit card details being stored in a potentially unsecure system. It seems like a lot of hassle just to park!
4. Bruce Sandeman
Sounds like a good idea, actually I think the York one is better than the NZ one as it does not require any tickets or machines. Although, I would feel very sorry for the traffic attendants having to type all the number plates into their Blackberries using those tiny little keys! What a painful job!
It would make more sense to have intelligent traffic cameras either portable with the attendant or in-situ monitoring all bays which then means that tickets could be issued only when necessary.....
just a thought....
5. anonymous
0870?... CreditCard? Crap!
Thought this was going to be about park-by-text.
I want to pull into a parking space, text PARK <unique space id> to 8xxxx, and go shopping.
Anyone listening?
Or do I have to invent it?
<number plate> also required in text if my mobile/car combination isn't already registered.
6. Richard
Why the "rip-off" 0870 Number?
It's high time that these expensive non-geographic numbers were scrapped.
It's high time that government and officials realised that these "rip-off" numbers cost ordinary people much more than calls to normal "national" numbers.
It's high time that they understood that so called "national rate 0870" and "local rate 0845" numbers are an obsolete concept - one apparently still pushed by "consultants," "advisors" and BT.
7. Geep
I use the 'Pay by Mobile' fairly often, it bills my work's CCard and I don't have to feed the meter at £2 an hour (Rip off for a car park that's pot holed and full of puddles when it rains, but that's another story)
My gripe is the way it charges.. if you arrive after 5pm (rates change at 6pm) it charges you £4 even if you only need 1 hour. The system presumes you want to stay in the park overnight, well until 5am according to the voice prompts.
I queried the charge, got a standard 'that's how it works' reply and further queries I get no response.
I suppose a small claims procedure plus a bit of publicity might be necessary!