Greater Anglia switch from Ringgo to Dash Parking

[rs101]

Greater Anglia/NCP have, in their wisdom, decided to stop using Ringgo as of end of July this year and now only support Dash for parking e-payments.

Anyone who's had the misfortune to use Dash will understand why this is a very poor move..

Here's a few examples from this weekend:

1. Dash app requires entry of parking location code, with no way to search for it.
2. It's impossible to login on the Dash app for Android before making a payment, so have to enter card details every single time. This also creates a new account in Dash's systems each time.
3. Cannot disable reminder texts when booking parking, so an extra 10p charge each time.
4. No social media presence for Dash. Would have been useful this weekend when the entire Dash website was down all day.
5. The receipt Dash email (and their own website) has the web address www.dashpay.co.uk & email of [email protected] . Unfortunately, that domain is no longer owned by Dash, so that's an immediate security/data protection issue.

The first 4 are annoying, but the latter is a pretty major problem. I could easily buy that domain from the reseller and setup a fake site, collecting card details etc.

The only response from GA is "we'll pass it on, here's Dash's contact details"

 

[Gemz91]

Assuming one can still use the good old fashioned cash in a parking meter? Although I know this isn't everyone's cup of tea.

 

[captainbigun]

Have you taken to twitter?

 

[Alfie1014]

There have been plenty of Twitter posts on the subject over the last few weeks, most not very complimentary.

 

[Kite159]

Assuming one can still use the good old fashioned cash in a parking meter? Although I know this isn't everyone's cup of tea.

Assuming the parking meters haven't been 'upgraded' to remove the cash option [card-only], and car parking tickets are not available from the ticket office or TVM.

 

[TMD Tom]

The only response from GA is "we'll pass it on, here's Dash's contact details"

Is that from their customer service department? If so, I'm not really surprised. This is one of those decisions the company has taken, no doubt to save money somewhere, that no one in customer services can change. The reply suggest they haven't been given any tools to help customers with that problem, hence the suggestion to contact DASH directly.

It's a shame as RingoGo was such much better then DASH. No doubt that's why it's cheaper to offer DASH only. Or as they told me, to 'streamline' their service.

 

[Z12XE]

The P&D machines still take cash, although not the new style £1 coins.

Ticket offices haven't sold parking tickets for years

 

[Bletchleyite]

The P&D machines still take cash, although not the new style £1 coins.

Ticket offices haven't sold parking tickets for years

They still do (and TVMs) on LM and Chiltern.

TBH, the easiest option for me is contactless at the P&D machine. No faffing with any app, just touch your card on the machine (for best effect have one day set as the default so no button pressing) and out pops a ticket.

 

[cmovcc]

the dash site is beyond awful

I was browsing to see how much parking was at my local station for the next day, pressed some innocuous sounding button and it charged my card without first saying how much it was going to be

wasn't too happy, though they did refund it

the phone service is terrible too, you type the 4 digit code in and it doesn't tell you what that refers to until you're past the point of paying and you receive a receipt

the terms and conditions are great too: https://ukparking.dashcardservices.com/dash/_public/privacypolicy/uk.htm

first three words, two typos, and it's their company name! "Adpatis Solutions Limtied", it's supposed to be Adaptis and Limited!!!

 

[jopsuk]

The car park at Cambridge North has no pay and display machines as far as I know- app and phone only.

But then there's only about 50 people per day using a 450 vehicle capacity car park. Seems to have stabilised at that, whilst bike park use (1000 capacity) continues to go up

 

[306024]

the dash site is beyond awful

I was browsing to see how much parking was at my local station for the next day, pressed some innocuous sounding button and it charged my card without first saying how much it was going to be

wasn't too happy, though they did refund it

the phone service is terrible too, you type the 4 digit code in and it doesn't tell you what that refers to until you're past the point of paying and you receive a receipt

the terms and conditions are great too: https://ukparking.dashcardservices.com/dash/_public/privacypolicy/uk.htm

first three words, two typos, and it's their company name! "Adpatis Solutions Limtied", it's supposed to be Adaptis and Limited!!!

You are not alone. I managed to pay for car parking at Thetford when my car was nowhere near

Lim tied indeed, the text message scam is a stealth tax that I can't seem to get out of either.

Won't be using their app again. The Ring-Go app was easy to use so no doubt that couldn't continue :roll:

 

[dk1]

As staff it's interesting to read about such things. I've never heard about either of these parking names & even though it's not my problem if a passenger asks a question it's always good to have a vaugue idea of what they are banging on about.

 

[Taunton]

These different parking contractors and service suppliers are generally selected on one basis only, how much of the parking money will they kick back to the car park owner. Things like ease of use, or not, never come into the discussion, and probably are never even looked at.

 

[LAX54]

Greater Anglia/NCP have, in their wisdom, decided to stop using Ringgo as of end of July this year and now only support Dash for parking e-payments.

Anyone who's had the misfortune to use Dash will understand why this is a very poor move..

Here's a few examples from this weekend:

1. Dash app requires entry of parking location code, with no way to search for it.
2. It's impossible to login on the Dash app for Android before making a payment, so have to enter card details every single time. This also creates a new account in Dash's systems each time.
3. Cannot disable reminder texts when booking parking, so an extra 10p charge each time.
4. No social media presence for Dash. Would have been useful this weekend when the entire Dash website was down all day.
5. The receipt Dash email (and their own website) has the web address www.dashpay.co.uk & email of [email protected] . Unfortunately, that domain is no longer owned by Dash, so that's an immediate security/data protection issue.

The first 4 are annoying, but the latter is a pretty major problem. I could easily buy that domain from the reseller and setup a fake site, collecting card details etc.

The only response from GA is "we'll pass it on, here's Dash's contact details"

Clicked on wesbite, to find it was 'BLOCKED SECURITY RISK ' !

 

[A Challenge]

Clicked on wesbite, to find it was 'BLOCKED SECURITY RISK ' !

Sums it up then, doesn't it!

They still do (and TVMs) on LM and Chiltern.

TBH, the easiest option for me is contactless at the P&D machine. No faffing with any app, just touch your card on the machine (for best effect have one day set as the default so no button pressing) and out pops a ticket.

SWT (as currently) offer Car Parking tickets from TVMs, not sure about Ticket Offices as have never needed one (its even more expensive than the £10 a day Council one at Woking or at Brookwood the Ticket Office isn't open, and both have meters in the car park as well, and when I go on Sunday its free so still don't need to buy a ticket.

 

[SPADTrap]

The car park at Cambridge North has no pay and display machines as far as I know- app and phone only.

But then there's only about 50 people per day using a 450 vehicle capacity car park. Seems to have stabilised at that, whilst bike park use (1000 capacity) continues to go up

Cambridge North is a great example of a station on the cheap, no ticket office and no parking machines!

 

[Kite159]

Sums it up then, doesn't it!


SWT (as currently) offer Car Parking tickets from TVMs, not sure about Ticket Offices as have never needed one (its even more expensive than the £10 a day Council one at Woking or at Brookwood the Ticket Office isn't open, and both have meters in the car park as well, and when I go on Sunday its free so still don't need to buy a ticket.

The ticket offices tend to sell "weekend specials" tickets, i.e. the ones valid from around mid-day on Friday all the way to Sunday (plus bank holiday). At least Salisbury & Basingstoke does. TVMs only are same day, but useful when you want to pay cash

 

[D5645]

I parked at Ely station yesterday.

None of the three parking ticket machines would accept any money.

I presume this is deliberate to make you pay by mobile phone. And charge you 20p extra for the privilege.

 

[Kite159]

I parked at Ely station yesterday.

None of the three parking ticket machines would accept any money.

I presume this is deliberate to make you pay by mobile phone. And charge you 20p extra for the privilege.

But remember paying by mobile phone is a "quick and convenient option", no mention of the extra 20p plus any additional charges for reminder texts.

An interesting article on the BBC about how some drivers avoid "Pay-by-phone" parking bays:
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-40866201

The car parking machines at Grateley have been out of action for at least 3 weeks, with signs saying to "use RingGo".

 

[Bletchleyite]

But remember paying by mobile phone is a "quick and convenient option", no mention of the extra 20p plus any additional charges for reminder texts.

You can turn those off, though it's a shame it doesn't just do free reminder app notifications.

 

[paddington]

I parked at Oxford (GWR) recently.

You have to go to the station to find out the location code, which is on a screen (so I assume it changes often), otherwise you pay the more expensive non-rail user rate (£29 vs £6.50 per day).

I entered the code but it didn't work on the phone or the website, so I paid the £29 after spending 20 minutes on my attempts. Fortunately, I was able to charge it to my client because they were the ones who insisted that I park there even when I didn't want to, and spending any longer on trying to get it to work would have meant a higher bill for them too!

 

[rs101]

You can turn those off, though it's a shame it doesn't just do free reminder app notifications.

You can't via the Android Dash app, only by creating an account on their website (which was down at the time..) It's also possible it won't link the payment to the account anyway because of the login issues.

I've had a response from Dash customer services - they've escalated the issue of the wrong web domain to their dev team to fix. They also sent me step by step instructions for logging in on the Android app which don't match reality. They've agreed to pass that back to the dev team too.

The support email has a link to an FAQ for a completely different parking app (PayByPhone) which doesn't even work in GA NCP car parks.

Dash's ICO registered address doesn't even match the one on their own website. Then again, that website also has the invalid web addresses listed..

The machines in Manningtree car park don't take the new £1 coin or offer contactless payments, so phone/app payment was the only way I could pay at the time.

It's most definitely a backward step in terms of customer service, but GA's Twitter team don't seem overly bothered and just bounce everything to Dash.