Mastodawn

mcc Jul 18, 2023

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.

Show thread

Mike Jul 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 thread

mcc Jul 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 thread

Mike Jul 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 thread

mcc

@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.