John Thorne hits out at Phone-and-Pay parking system

Phone and Pay provides cashless parking in a large number of public sector car parks across Somerset.

The company’s contract with Somerset County Council will expire in October, with a tendering process expected to begin shortly.

Councillor John Thorne, who represents the Blackdown and Neroche ward, said that he hoped any new provider would ensure their technology “would work on the first day”, claiming that there had been technical issues when Phone and Pay was introduced.

Cllr John Thorne. 

He made the comments at a policies and place scrutiny committee in Taunton on Tuesday (May 22), where councillors were provided with an update on parking enforcement and revenues generated.

Phone and Pay is currently used for all county council-owned on-street parking, and at numerous public car parks owned by the five district and borough councils in Somerset.

In 2017, more than 588,000 parking transactions were carried out through its mobile app, generating just over £2M of revenue for local government in Somerset.

Steve Deakin, the county council’s parking services manager, informed the committee that Phone and Pay’s current contract was “due to expire in October 2018” – meaning that a new provider could take its place.

Mr Thorne responded: “Can we make sure it works on the first day this time?”.

He said that there had been technical problems when Phone and Pay had been introduced, and went on to describe the service as “absolutely shocking”.

Mr Deakin responded: “It is paramount that whatever system we go with will be robust”.

Mr Deakin said that the parking enforcement service had been performing more effectively since the IT services and processing were brought in-house, rather than being handled remotely in Oldham.

Since the in-sourcing took place, there has been a rise in the number of hours worked by enforcement officers and in the number of penalty charge notices (PCNs) being issued over a 12-month period.

In the year to March 31, just over 50,000 PCNs were issued by the council’s enforcement teams.

The council collected more than £902,000 in penalties online, and a further £316,000 through an automated telephone system.

These efforts generated a surplus of £336,171 for the council – a rise of more than £142,000 on the previous year’s surplus.

All of the money generated has to be reinvested in car parking under the Road Traffic Regulation Act 1984, which states that “parking charges cannot be used for the sole purpose of raising revenue.”

Phone and Pay has been approached for a response to Mr Thorne’s comments.