mcc

Alright check out this fucking scam

So I need to park my rental car overnight until I return it tomorrow morning. Meter hours last until 9, so I need to pay the city's meter parking $1.80 for like half an hour until then. Fine.

But all the meter machines have been removed. Instead, you now use an "app".

The "app" has a "wallet". The "wallet" does not support adding money in increments of less than $20.

I don't own a car. This is, again, a rental.

I am never getting that other $18.20 back.

Jul 18, 2023 at 1:01amTusky
Show threadmccJul 18, 2023
Now you might think that I'm just an edge case and the city can't possibly be expected to support someone who needs to park once for half an hour and then literally never again. But consider that Toronto is actually a very frequent destination for tourists, many of them from entire other countries,
Show threadJon PotterJul 18, 2023

@mcc You can get a refund of the unused balance apparently.

https://passport.helpshift.com/hc/en/17-greenp/faq/1994-how-can-i-deactivate-my-green-p-account/

How can I deactivate my Green P Account? — GreenP Help Center

If you no longer wish to have a Green P Account but still have money in your wallet, you are able to have your money returned to your current

Show threadmccJul 18, 2023
@RettopNoj Thank you for this information
Show threadWildRikkuJul 18, 2023
@mcc I agree it's kind of a scam (I was recently upset about something similar) but I suspect it's because the parking fees themselves are actually... really low? Is that normal in big Canadian cities?
Show threadmccJul 18, 2023
@wildrikku $1.80 for 20 minutes implies something like $4-6 for an hour. Is this cheap? And this isn't like, the core of downtown or anything
Show threadWildRikkuJul 18, 2023
@mcc Ah, I took the half hour, that'd be less than 4 dollars an hour and yeah, I'd consider that normal in an average German city which is... a little suburb of Toronto. Parking in a random place in one of our four biggest cities is easily 10 bucks an hour (which is like 15 canadian dollars, as I just learned) and in other European countries it can be way more. But then again I really have no clue what parking and using cars costs in Canada.
Show threadMichaelJul 18, 2023
@wildrikku @mcc Happy to say that where I live (in Victoria, BC) you have to use an app, but you can pay the necessary amount using your credit card.
Show threadBruce IVJul 18, 2023
@mcc oh, that particular parking management company is ... ugh ... Parked once in one of their lots (with "24-hour security"), ended up coming back after hours and getting locked out (no on-site security) -- they did pay for our cab fare to the motel, as well as the overnight stay, but it was not a pleasant overall experience
Show threadocdtrekkieJul 18, 2023
@mcc That's wild. Our tollway system generally (strongly encourages) an account method with a minimum balance, but you can refund it all out when you close the account.
Show threadmccJul 18, 2023
@ocdtrekkie Hmm I wonder if I could do this with a "GreenP" account
Show threadocdtrekkieJul 18, 2023

@mcc The Internet says, allegedly yes, if you email them.

That is still an atrocious user experience for a single use situation though.

Show threadOwen NelsonJul 18, 2023
@mcc can you drive around for 30 minutes, or maybe just park and get away with it? Trying to think outside the bun.
Show threadmccJul 18, 2023
@onelson I could have sat in the car for 30 minutes, yes, especially because by the time I got the app downloaded and figured out 10 minutes had passed. However this was after I had just driven for quite a few hours nonstop so I decided to eat the charge and see if I can get something out of it later.
Show thread∴ esoterik ∴Jul 18, 2023
@onelson @mcc yeah realistically the chance of getting a ticket x cost of a ticket probably can't exceed $18.20 can it? anyway good luck getting your money back :/
Show threadAbraxas3d W5NYVJul 18, 2023
@mcc everything being an app, for basic services, gives me not-good feelings.
Show threadmccJul 18, 2023

@abraxas3d "Who'd own a car but not a cell phone, right?"

This seems like a setup for a case where a self-defending defendant shows up in traffic court arguing they couldn't pay the parking because they were parking to take their phone to the phone repair store

Show threadlambdageekJul 18, 2023
@mcc well if you are spending $20 for overnight parking either way, find a private garage. Show that rental car the night of its life.
Show threadmccJul 18, 2023
@lambdageek I thought about it. I also thought about petulantly sitting in the car for 20 minutes until 9 PM, since it took me nearly 10 minutes to get the app working anyway. But I had just driven a very long way and was tired >_>
Show threadstrangefour with the PleiadesJul 18, 2023
@mcc teh fuq? Well I can never park in Toronto. I don't put useless apps on my phone, also don't pay for internet on it so couldn't use the app anyway.
Show thread_Pear Jul 18, 2023
@mcc wowie 😵‍💫
Show threadbentosmile🍱Jul 18, 2023

@mcc that's super garbage. :/ all the meters here use apps now too, but you can just pay the amount with no ridiculous top-up bs. (Useful because it feels like they keep changing up the system or use different ones in different places aaaa)

But yeah. Ouch. :(

Show threadEllieJul 18, 2023
@mcc Rental cars are a scam. Take the train (and bus, and bike) instead.
Show threadmccJul 18, 2023
@ellie i strongly feel you might not have considered the range of places one might use a car to travel to
Show threadRobinJul 18, 2023
@mcc just wondering — and feel free to ignore this if it's a silly question and/or you've already gotten a frustrating amount of unhelpful replies to an already frustrating situation — wouldn't the rental let you park the car in their garage, essentially returning it early? or you had to keep it for the night for other reasons anyway?
Show threadmccJul 18, 2023

@robin Unless I managed to *really* confuse myself reading the website, the rental agency had already closed for the night by the time that I arrived back in town.

There was a time there were rental agencies in town with a key dropbox, but those seem to have all disappeared for some reason.

Show threadRobinJul 18, 2023
@mcc oh that sucks. We had to rent a car a little while ago and they had a drop box situation yeah. Maybe they're in cahoots with the scam app company.
Show threadmymJul 18, 2023
@mcc grats to them i guess on coming up with a worse scam than the one Chicago has
Show threadMikeJul 18, 2023
@mcc not that I doubt you, but where in the city are you? I haven’t noticed fewer meter machines. I actually use the app, but usually by reading the code stuck to the side of the meter machine.
Show threadmccJul 18, 2023
@mikemacleod huh. I don't see them anymore on College near Kensington market and they seem to have been gone for quite some time.
Show threadMikeJul 18, 2023

@mcc huh. I haven’t been that way since I moved east during the pandemic. Lots of meter machines out here. I wonder if they took some of them away from college when CafeTO was bigger during the pandemic?

Don’t get me wrong, I don’t doubt the capacity of our municipal government to screw over the citizenry, but this scheme honestly seems too clever for them.

Show threadmccJul 18, 2023
@mikemacleod I assume the $20 minimum was internally justified on the grounds that credit card pricing is bad and that removing the parking machines was justified on the grounds of high maintenance costs. Or maybe they didn't remove the machines, there are just fewer now, and I don't know where they are.
Show threadMister BeeJul 18, 2023
@mcc this is so stupid it would ruin my mood for the rest of the day 😭
Show threadPhilip Mallegol-HansenJul 18, 2023

@mcc How do you park if you don’t have an internet connected phone handy?

You just don’t?

Show threadmccJul 18, 2023
@philip great question
Show threadEnder2kJul 18, 2023

@philip

The last time we visited Stanley Park we ran into this issue...meters were down, not gonna install a random parking app...left Vancouver for home several hours earlier than planned since we couldn't park...

@mcc

Show threadKevin P. FlemingJul 18, 2023
@mcc NYC recently changed from one parking app to another, and wallet balances were not (and could not be) transferred.
Show threadmccJul 18, 2023
@kevin ggggggh