FOX on Tech: Paying Your Parking Meter By Phone

One major city may be about to lose a bit of cash on parking tickets, as they give folks a new, easier way to pay their way.

FOX News Radio’s Jessica Rosenthal reports your phone may be taking the place of the meter maid:

San Francisco’s introduced parking meters that you can pay using your phone, and you get a text message within five minutes of it expiring.  There’s two ways to pay: one with an app, the other with something called “near-field communication,” which comes on only the smartest of phones.

(Rose) “It allows you to tap your phone against the decal to share the info with that decal and the phone, so it can launch the payment process.”

But when MTA Spokesman Paul Rose demonstrated, the meter still said expired.

(Rose) “The information’s relayed to PCO’s when they go by and check the meter that it’s already been paid for by pay-by-phone.”

City residents say it’ll save them a lot in parking tickets.

(Resident) “Because you do lose track of the time, and you’re running back and it’s already expired, you have got a ticket on there.”

In San Francisco, Jessica Rosenthal, FOX News Radio.