Car parking payment apps - aargh!

[HurdyGurdy19]

Vidibg Weston Super Mare for the day, and now needing to download YET ANOTHER sodding parking payment app. That now makes five different apps I've got on my phone.

And this one (MiPermit) won't even accept the payment. I've authenticated/approved it three times via my banking app, and it just gives an error.

Kind of committed to this car park now as the use ANPR, so if we leave and try another car park, we'll likely get a fine for not paying for parking.

Fuxake. If paying by app is the way forward, then why can't there just be one bloody app for all car parks.

Don't get me started.

Parking app only car
parks at beaches and other popular places where the signal is shit is in my room 101

And why are there sooo many different apps

And the fact that there's a surcharge. One place near me advertises £3 all day parking but it's app only so in actual fact it's £3.50. Feel like it's almost false advertising

Is there not a number you can call to sort it out?

The car parks near us have one hour free parking. Except the machine that dispenses the free tickets never works. So you have to go on the bastarding app and pay their 50p admin fee, so your parking isn't actually free anymore!

Don’t remind me of the furious argument Dh and l had in Baslow in the Peak District because there was NO FUCKiMG SIGNAL.

Couldn't even phone the helpline.

Just like printers they are 90’s technology.

@ArseInTheCoOpWindow we had exactly the same in Whitstable. Joke.

I absolutely despise the 'admin' fee on these fucking machines.

Who carries cash these days? So you have to use a card. Pooooooffff, your £1.50 an hour is suddenly £2. 🤬

Ah yes the “convenience surcharge”. It’s outrageous tbh.

I think I know the exact car park you're on about.... we had the same issue a few weeks back. I feel your pain!

There was a button on the App to contact them. Didn't work.

Fortunately my husband then downloaded the app and it worked with his Revolut card. Maybe the app has beef with my bank.

Anyway we did the obligatory walk down the pier and had an ice cream. The ice cream (Mr Whippy with a flake) was huge, and excellent value at £2.50. And actually not bad for a Mr Whippy type 😃

And the first word in my first post should have been "visiting". 😀

Well that's ridiculous. That's a stealth parking fee!

Yes!! The car parks in no signal areas. Enough to send me off the rails!

I feel your pain. If they insist on making us pay via an app, then make sure that is actually a possibility!

Haha I wonder if you've been to Pembrokeshire recently by any chance? Lesson learned there - always have at least a tenner in £1 coins in the car now.

New twist in Swansea recently though - if you take too long puzzling over which of the 6 possible tariffs (what time of year? Blue badge or not blue badge? Etc) or trying to find the right change, the sodding machine instructions default back to Welsh . Again.😬😬

When we lived back in the U.K. I was losing my fucking mind with the parking apps and the bloody lack of sodding phone signal. And add in an overseas phone which can’t find the app because it’s only able to be downloaded onto a U.K. ohone and I was driven to utter distraction. This is yet another part of technology which has made life properly WORSE than it was before for everyone apart from the people who own the car park. I HATE it.

Where I am they decided to roll these out in a basement carpark with zero phone service!

My bugbear with the one near me is it's priced in increments of 'up to 1 hour 45 mins, 2 hours 45 mins' etc.

But the app only lets you put in whole hours, so you always have to pay more! 😡

Our nearest shopping area have changed their pay machines (which took cash and card) to a bloody parking app and as a result the car park is now half empty all the time. Nobody can be arsed with it and my parents and grandparents just can't get their heads around it or don't own mobile phones! The shops directly around that parking area have all said they have lost customers as people just park the other side of town and can't be bothered to traipse all the way over. Last time I parked there someone came over and asked me about the parking and when I said it was app only she said "oh fuck that!" and drove off. Such a bad idea.

I absolutely loathe parking apps, why can’t they just let you pay with a card?? I don’t want to arse about downloading a sodding app and inputting my card details it gives me the absolute rage!

I think they’re really inaccessible too, what about anyone who doesn’t have/want a smart phone? It’s a ridiculous way to expect people to pay for parking when it’s typically a small amount, imagine if every shop wanted you to have an app to pay them, why is parking somehow different??

If you think paying by card is the answer, you should try Crickhowell and Brecon in mid-Wales. The phone signal is so poor that the flaming card reader cannot reliably connect to their banking systems. No app available, so if you don't have a pile of coins, you are absolutely screwed.

@candycane222 afraid I've never been to Pembrokeshire .., heard it's a lovely part of the country though

Same in the Lake District. I had a furious exchange with the tourism authority who explained it was nothing to do with them that almost every car park used a different app and that in many of them there was no signal so the app that you didn’t already have couldn’t be downloaded and the ones you did have didn’t work. Also happens in Yorkshire Dales national park. And of course it’s not possible to phone the helpline because THERE’S NO SIGNAL! Total lack of joined up thinking.

We always keep bags of coins in the car so that if they do take coins we use them.

We check out the car parks before we go anywhere and avoid app only and QR code ones, car park machines are often where phone thieves gather as the befuddled are sorting out their app payments. It's free parking where we live and retail park is free so its only on holiday that we might use pay car parks

Don’t remind me of the furious argument Dh and l had in Baslow in the Peak District because there was NO FUCKiMG SIGNAL.

Were you arguing about the best way out of the dilemma, or did you just turn on each other out of sheer frustration? (Which is probably what dh and I would do, tbf!)

Hear bloody hear!!!