RingGo

RingGo is a pay by phone parking service currently offered in public car parks and on-street locations in the United Kingdom. The first major implementation (from June 2006) was for the First Great Western Railway. 60 stations were involved such as Taplow railway station. In February 2009, further stations were added, taking the total to 72 (although not offered at the Reading station Multi Storey Car Park due to a major investment in a chip coin system).

This implementation project by the First Group, was an early step in the fast growing trend away from the established paradigm of paying for parking using electro-mechanical machines which dispense paper tickets – the pay and display model.

Since then, several Network Rail, Chiltern Railways, South West Trains, First Capital Connect, National Express East Anglia, C2C, Transpennine Express, Arriva Trains Wales railway station car parks have implemented RingGo (August 2008, July 2008, December 2008, October 2009, March 2010, March 2010, March 2010 and March 2010 respectively).

The service is also offered in NCP operated and managed car parks since March 2010.

Various local authorities have rolled out RingGo, including: Bournemouth since July 2006, Hounslow since December 2006, Christchurch since Feb 2007, High Wycombe since May 7, Ealing in limited areas since May 7, Portsmouth since July 2007, Taunton since December 2007 Southwark since January 2008 North Cornwall since January 2008, Oxford since May 2008, Cherwell since May 2008, Hartlepool since June 2008, Stockton-on-Tees since June 2008, Middlesbrough since June 2008, Brent since July 2008, Poole since August 2008, Test Valley since August 2008 Havant since August 2008, Bristol since December 2008, West Devon since January 2009 Salisbury since Feb 2009, London Borough of Richmond upon Thames since March 2009 Wandsworth since March 2009, North Devon since May 2009, Reigate and Banstead since May 2009 Dover since June 2009 Torridge since June 2008, Suffolk Coastal since June 2008, Scarborough since June 2009, Trafford for Old Trafford Match Day parking, since August 2009, Allerdale since August 2009, Eastleigh since September 2009, Woking since September 2009, West Dorset since November 2009, London Borough of Redbridge since November 2009, Luton since November 2009, Shepway since December 2009, Canterbury since December 2009, Sheffield since January 2010, Teignbridge since January 2010, Dorset since February 2010, North Hertfordshire since March 2010, Epping Forest since March 2010, London Borough of Bromley since May 2010 and Cornwall since June 2010

Parking is a niche in which electronic money as opposed to cash-money is now making some significant advances. Phone parking has received some bad press notably in respect to the City of Westminster implementation which is not RingGo.

The generic advantages to members of the public of phone parking services are:

• Avoidance of the need to have coinage
• The ability to pay the correct amount only
• Security – payment can be made from within a locked car
• Can extend without having to go back to the car
• Company accounts which are available only to nominated vehicles or drivers can cut expense claim administration costs

The specific disadvantages to rail users at Oxford station is that there is no alternative method of payment (apart from paying the full non-rail-user price from the machine in the car park), the daily code number cannot be seen while queuing for a ticket (since this is only displayed on the platform to ensure a rail user discount) and there is an unavoidable phone charge for pay-as-you-go phone users. For contract phones the local telephone number means that it will be included in its free minutes package.

The generic advantages to car park operators are:

• The reduction in theft from and vandalism to coin based machinery
• Lower capital costs when contrasted with buying new parking machines
• Reduction in cash handling costs such as banking, counterfeit £1 coins and shrinkage

On 1 October 2009, Richmond Council introduced variable parking charges which are linked to the carbon dioxide emissions of vehicles parking there (carbon metered parking). Payment of the service is either via RingGo or by a special Richmond smart card, which can be used in the machine.

RingGo phone parking is also now being used as a method of payment for Portsmouth City Council's Park and Ride service (since May 2010).

The RingGo brand is wholly owned by Cobalt Telephone Technologies Ltd, a UK private company.

External links

• The RingGo website and also The MyRingGo website for details on how it works and where it is available
• First Great Western
• BBC News item on RingGo
• Bank for International Settlements
• Cobalt Telephone Technologies
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