Paid parking scam
I had to go to a medical imaging lab, in the evening. We find one in the city that is open til 8 and according to their website they take walkins. Try to call to make sure they're actually open and still taking walkins tonight. they don't answer their phones after four.
It's in a part of town that I would not have expected to be charged parking and is many blocks away from any place you can park if you're not patronizing a particular business.
Roll up to a massive parking lot. It's kind of hidden from the road. There's a pay and display machine. I resign myself to my fate. It's 6pm and if I don't do this now it can't be done tonight.
The process begins by asking me for my license plate. I am sad because I know the reason is so that I cannot give my ticket to someone when I leave, a habit I have at pay-and-display medical buildings.
I begrudginly enter my license plate number into the machine. The machine now tells me that it will be $5 for an all day parking pass. Perfect. Exactly what I needed.
My payment options are: (1) cash: there is not enough in the pile of quarters i keep in the car because i have to pay for a whole day of parking (2) debit with tap: disabled on my debit card or (3) credit card without tap but also without authentication so magnetic strip i guess. i pay with my fucking credit card, i'm really not in a good place to think through the logic of payment options.
Inside the building. There's a small sign kindly telling me that I'm visiting the office that I am and have a requisition from a doctor I do not have to pay for parking. Everything makes perfect sense. Inside the fucking building.
Find the office. For some reason it's about two feet higher than the hallway and you walk up some stairs that are clearly retrofitted into this building that is less than five years old. It wouldn't have occured to me how unacceptably inaccessible the entry to this medical imaging office was except that there were signs posted everywhere letting you know to please press the intercom button if you're having trouble with the lift. The stairs I walked up, I noticed now is also a hybrid lift--it seems that all the steps get lifted into a flat position at the top. That's actually kind of cool but does it make any sense? Why is the office two feet higher than the hallway?
Give the receptionist the requisition form. She starts filling it out, and then after waiting for a couple minutes she tells us simply that we can be seen in the morning. Tell her that we'll go elsewhere because we're only here because they're the only one that's open right now. She says that they don't do x-rays after 4 pm. I wish I had had the foresight to call ahead and make sure they can do what I need.
Leave the office. I see a sign I didn't see when I came in. It's right next to the pay and display machine but it's positioned so that you can't read it if you're near the machine. It says "parking is enforced 8:00 AM to 6:00 PM".
I thought about that phrasing. They could have said that parking is free after six. They could have even gone as far as to program the machine so that it doesn't sell you all day parking at 5:58 PM. What they chose to put on the sign is very formal. It's words you put up when there's a law that says you have to a thing.
Most interesting though, to me at least, it seems to suggest that I'm still supposed to pay for parking after 6 PM.
Apr 15 · 3 weeks ago
3 Comments ↓
That's so shitty. I'm guessing that was a private lot? They can do pretty much whatever they want and outright rip you off.
I always try to find a city-owned spot because at least my money isn't entirely lining some company's pockets. It's not perfect, I know a lot of city-owned lots do a profit sharing with whatever company runs the machines. They're also pretty good about not letting you pay outside the enforcement hours, only charge for the actual time, etc.
Also extra frustrating about the facility not offering all services. That's the kind of thing that should be clearly listed on the website. Like how Walgreens lists pharmacy hours in addition to store hours.
🚀 lars_the_bear · Apr 16 at 06:39:
In my region it's the public health facilities that make brutal charges for parking, and the private ones that don't. I guess they think that if they're going to take £800 from you for an x-ray, they don't need to scalp you for parking as well.
I watched a Steve Leto (spelling may be wrong) video on youtube a while ago where he discussed a case where a private empty lot owner was issuing tickets to people who parked there (I don't think he even posted private property signs).
Another favorite of mine was a parking lot located in the downtown of a Western US city, charging people for parking until it turned out that they did not own the lot after operating for a decade or so.