Parking Goes touchless

Worldwide trends in parking seem to have taken a dramatic turn over the last few months. Though, the leading parking equipment suppliers did speak of touchless and ticketless parking, post Covid interests from most parking lot owners seem to be touchless. In the current scenario, the “touch” factor has created much fear. The Parking sector is also facing an unprecedented situation with new hygiene requirements to be followed by the drivers, car owners, parking solution providers and the facility providers.

“This is a unique solution from SKIDATA. No other parking provider in the world which can offer this right now. SKIDATA will continue to bring out more innovative solutions for our customers.” Nimish Sonawala, Head Solutions & Presales -APAC and MD – INDIA.

The new normal in parking is to go for touchless parking – and Skidata, the industry leader in parking management solutions and one of the largest companies in the world and in India in this space, has led the way again by developing a number of different ways that cities, smart cities, airports and shopping malls can go completely automated and completely touchless. TrafficInfraTech was taken through the touchless entry process and multiple options for touchless payments.

As the driver or parker drives up to the barrier, the parking column next to the driver can either automatically issue a ticket or it would do so by just waving his or hand in front of the column. The ticket can be removed without pressing any buttons and the customer can drive into the parking lot.

When the car approaches the Exit Payment booth, the parker shows his ticket to a reader on his own and pays cashless with nearly all digital wallets, credit cards, debit cards or PayTM on a terminal mounted safely at the booth window. Once the transaction is complete, he can leave the parking lot without touching any part of the parking equipment or hand over any money or card to anyone else. This payment process can be replicated in a central kiosk as well.

The completely new payment option is that which allows the parker to pay the parking fee by scanning QR code on ticket with own mobile phone. The ticket is taken the same way as shown above, but the payment does not require the customer to interact with anyone or any machine. It does not require the customer to wait in any lines or wait for someone else to finish making their payments. After taking the printed ticket from the Entry Column the customer scans the ticket using his or her own smart phone camera. The customer will have the ability to pay online with multiple digital payment options. Absolutely no interactions required with anyone or anything which does not belong to you. The parking lot owner will not need to invest in any hardware any app to be pushed or any additional capital expenditures. Just a service payment for every transaction..

This exit process can also work for the parker with an Exit booth with table top scanner mounted at the window on the outside. The paid ticket can be scanned at the Exit column before car leaves the parking lot.