South Lakeland District Council (SLDC) has become the latest council to trial the PayByPhone parking service, enabling motorists to pay for parking by credit or debit card over their mobile phone.
The council is trialling the system at two of its busy car parks in the picturesque town of Bowness on the shores of Lake Windermere.
It comes after the neighbouring Lake District National Park Authority (LDNPA) introduced the PayByPhone service last summer in all of its car parks as an alternative to paying by cash at machines.
Both organisations are committed to cashless solutions and are working closely to introduce new technologies aimed at reducing reliance on traditional payment methods. The LDNPA for example, has recently introduced a two tier tariff structure, offering discounted parking fees to those electing to pay by phone rather than with cash at machines.
This is thought to be the first time an organisation in the UK has geared its tariff structure to favour the motorist electing to pay by phone.
Michael Keane, SLDC’S Assistant Director of Social Enterprises, said: “PayByPhone is an innovative way to take the hassle out of parking. People no longer have to search for change or worry about staying longer in the car park than they planned.
“They will be able to top up using their phone without returning to their car. So, only one transaction will sort out all their parking requirements. For the customer, simplicity is the ultimate aim.”
He added: “As operators, PayByPhone enables us to consider new initiatives such as a Cumbria-wide system with the long-term aim of car park users being able to pay for parking and visit car parks run by different operators across the district.”PayByPhone is provided by Verrus UK, part of the PayPoint group.
ENDS….
For further information on PayByPhone, please contact:
Robin Bevan – CEO, Verrus UK
rbevan@verrus.com
+ 44 (0) 776 993 3826
Or
Angela Tyreman - Sales Manager
atyreman@verrus.com
+44 (0) 774 316 7410
ABOUT VERRUS
PayByPhone currently services 23 parking operator clients. It has over 1.5m users and processes one transaction per second throughout the day. Clients include the City Councils of Birmingham, Westminster and York, amongst others.
ABOUT PAYPOINT
PayPoint is a leading specialist payments company with operations in the UK, Ireland, Romania, France, USA and Canada. It handles over £9.5 billion from over 550 million
transactions annually for more than 6,000 clients and merchants.
PayPoint processes consumer payments across a wide variety of markets (energy pre and post-payment, telecoms, housing, water, transport, e-commerce, parking and gaming) through its retail networks, internet and mobile phone channels:
Retail networks
The PayPoint branded retail network in the UK numbers over 22,000 terminals located in local shops (including Co-op, Spar, McColls, Costcutter, Sainsbury’s Local, One Stop, Londis and thousands of independents). Collect+, a joint venture with Yodel, formerly Home Delivery Network Limited, provides a parcel collection and drop off service at more than 3,400 PayPoint retailers. Its ATM network numbers more than 2,300 ‘LINK’ branded machines across the UK, mainly in the same sites as PayPoint terminals.
In Romania, the branded retail network numbers over 4,800 terminals located in local shops, processing cash bill payments for utilities and mobile phone top-ups. In Ireland, over 500 outlets in shops and credit unions process mobile top-ups and bill payments.
Internet
PayPoint.net is an internet payment service provider linking into all major UK acquiring banks to deliver secure online credit and debit card payments for over 5,600 web merchants. It offers a comprehensive set of products ranging from a transaction gateway through to a bureau service and FraudGuard, an advanced service to mitigate the risk of fraud.
PayByPhone
PayByPhone is a leading international provider of services to parking authorities allowing consumers to use their mobile phones to pay for their parking by credit or debit card. It has contracts in the UK, France, Canada and the USA.
PayPoint floated on the London Stock Exchange in September 2004. It is widely recognised for its leadership in prepayment systems, smart technology and consumer service.
