A West End councillor has called for “old-fashioned” parking machines to be binned to make life easier for frustrated drivers.
Councillor Fraser Macpherson believes visitors to Ninewells Hospital will be fed up with the poor standard of parking meters on offer.
Mr Macpherson feels Indigo Parking, who operate the hospital car park, must get their act together and give patients more options than just cash payments.
The comments come after patients complained about having to find exact change to pay for parking.
The Liberal Democrat representative revealed he was also concerned by reports council ticket machines have been failing to accept debit card payments.
He said: “My view is that Indigo have to invest in new equipment. At Ninewells they have some quite old-fashioned equipment where you can’t use credit or debit cards.
“Indigo have said to me there is an issue with the strength of the mobile signal in the area, but my experience is that I have come across parking machines which accept debit and credit card payments in quite remote locations.”
Mr Macpherson’s comments come as drivers complain Dundee City Council parking machines have regularly failed to accept debit card payment.
Both payment machines in the city’s Yeaman Shore car park went down in recent months, forcing confused motorists to contact the council to ensure they did not receive parking tickets.
Drivers say Hunter Street car park, next to Dundee University, also failed to accept debit card payments earlier this week.
Mr Macpherson has now contacted Dundee City Council’s roads and transportation department to report the issues.
He said: “I’m a bit concerned to hear this because this is relatively new technology.
“I’m very keen to ensure people parking have as straightforward a way to pay as possible.
“The days when you need to have exact change to pay should be gone.
“The bottom line is that if we have this equipment then it has to be robust and working.”
A spokesman for Dundee City Council said: “We are not aware of any problems with parking meters at Yeaman Shore Car Park or Hunter Street Car Park.
“Occasionally there are intermittent network connection problems across the city which may cause issues to those paying by card.”
“Alternative methods of payment are available at parking meters. You can pay by cash and also through the automated payment system, RingGo.”
An Indigo spokeswoman said: “We can confirm the parking machines at Ninewells are all operational and we have not received any recent customer reports to suggest they are not working.”
