Dubai: Many motorists are furious at being slapped with parking fines after they paid the fees using the mParking service via their mobile phones.
A number of people who parked in zone 343A got ‘wrong' parking fines. The zone number shown on the parking fine tickets is 335A but were given to vehicles parked in zone 343A in the Al Wasl area where parking meters were installed recently. Zone 335A is located on Shaikh Zayed Road between the World Trade Centre roundabout and the First Interchange whereas zone 343A is located in the Al Wasl area.
"I was shocked to see a parking fine ticket on my car parked outside the Gulf News office despite the fact that I paid for parking using the mParking service," said a motorist who even called the customer service number of the Dubai Roads and Transport Authority (RTA) but did not get a satisfactory answer.
He got SMS confirmation for the paid mParking up to 12.28pm on Sunday and the fine was issued to him at 11.33am when his parking ticket was still valid. He was not the only one affected, there were many others.
Gulf News probed the matter and found out that a number of vehicles parked in zone 343A were wrongly given fines for parking Zone 335A despite paying via mParking.
All fine tickets carry the name of parking inspector Merza Gulam Mohammad who issued fines to all the vehicles at around 11.30am on Sunday.
System malfunction
The motorists also complained that the mParking system was malfunctioning after 3pm on Sunday as the system sent back "failure" of payment notices when they sent an SMS to pay for parking.
There have been several complaints of malfunctions or failures of the RTA's mParking system in the past and inspectors issuing "wrong" fines. The RTA suspended the mParking system for one day about six months ago because of technical glitches after the authority was flooded with parking fine complaints.
Nol cards
Parking metres installed in zone 343A also don't accept Nol cards.
"The RTA needs to look into the matter and cancel the fines wrongly issued in the area," said the motorist who was wrongly fined Dh150. He said the RTA should also take action against inspectors who issue fines in the wrong parking zone.
Despite repeated requests, the RTA officials concerned did not respond. However, a senior RTA official said there were some issues with the mParking service on Sunday because of technical glitches which were fixed later in the evening.
He said they would need to investigate the cases of inspectors issuing parking tickets in the wrong parking zones.
Have you experienced this? Did you contact the RTA? What action was taken?
