Ottawa’s parking spaces get NFC option

PayByPhone, an international provider of systems for parking and urban mobility payments, has announced Ottawa as the latest major North American city to implement its popular cell phone payment method for parking. PayByPhone parking allows drivers to pay for and extend their parking time using a mobile app, online, or calling a local phone number. Ottawa is the first Canadian city to incorporate near field communication (NFC) and QR code features for its parking payments.
April 30, 2012 Read time: 2 mins
5350 PayByPhone, an international provider of systems for parking and urban mobility payments, has announced Ottawa as the latest major North American city to implement its popular cell phone payment method for parking. PayByPhone parking allows drivers to pay for and extend their parking time using a mobile app, online, or calling a local phone number. Ottawa is the first Canadian city to incorporate near field communication (NFC) and QR code features for its parking payments.

“We’re pleased to be the first Canadian city to offer a NFC option to PayByPhone users,” said Ottawa Mayor Jim Watson. “The City of Ottawa is always looking at ways to provide better service to our residents, and PayByPhone is another way we’re doing that.”

Every Pay & Display machine in Ottawa has a PayByPhone sticker with instructions on how use the system. Embedded in that sticker is an NFC tag with the location number of the Pay & Display machine. Once signed up, customers who have an NFC compatible smartphone simply wave it over the logo on the sticker and the PayByPhone app or mobile web page is launched. The system recognises the user, identifies the parking location, and the customer enters the amount of time desired. An optional text message is sent five minutes before the parking session ends, and if needed, allows additional time to be purchased via the phone.

Drivers without NFC capable phones can still use the service by manually launching the app or simply calling the local number. The signs also contain QR codes for a mobile web transaction.
Parking & Access Control

For more information on companies in this article

Related Content

  • Enforcement comes in many guises
    June 22, 2016
    Colin Sowman looks at some enforcement case studies from around the world. It is a sad fact of life that unenforced laws are not adhered to by a sometimes sizable proportion of the public and once enforcement is seen to be lacking, some drivers can take this to extremes and authorities must decide how to regain control.
    Read More
  • Texas, Oklahoma move to interoperable tolling
    April 25, 2013
    Electronic toll systems in Texas and Oklahoma could be interoperable as soon as 2014, according to toll authorities from both states. Moves to link tolling systems in Texas and Oklahoma will enable drivers with Texas tolling accounts or Oklahoma turnpike accounts to travel on the other state’s toll roads using their current toll tags. The tolls would be automatically billed to the out-of-state driver’s account. “Oklahoma Governor Mary Fallin said it would be good to have interoperability with other states,
    Read More
  • Pay by phone parking launched in Toronto
    December 21, 2016
    The Toronto Parking Authority has launched its Green P Mobile App payment option across all Toronto streets, enabling customers to pay for parking via their smartphone. The app also delivers reminders before parking sessions expire and gives customers the ability to extend their parking sessions remotely. For even further convenience, the Green P app now includes the option of using PayPal to pay for a parking session. The Green P app was first introduced in March 2015 to non-gated off-street park
    Read More
  • Data handling important for autonomous vehicles
    December 8, 2016
    Data handling is becoming an ever-greater part of transportation and never more so than with autonomous vehicles, as Andrew Bardin Williams hears from some big names.
    Read More

Highlighted Content