NBR: Parking ticket?! WTF! I paid!
So on the 13th, I had an appointment in downtown Santa Cruz. I parked my car in the two story lot, walked downstairs, and waited in line for the pay parking machine. A lot of people fumble with that machine and the machine itself is slow so there seems to be at least 2 people waiting each time I go. Up until now, I've never had a problem.
Based on the issued ticket time, the meter maid must have pulled up between the time I exited my car and was waiting to pay. I don't know that I can find my ticket stub from back then but I'm going to sure try. If I can't find my ticket stub and I payed cash, am I SOL? Has anyone ever gotten a ticket in that narrow time between parking and paying? It's such a freak thing but I'm sure I can't be the only one out there. Did you fight it and win? What did you do?
I swear that if they make me pay the $42 ticket after I paid for 3 hours of parking and only used one, I'm never going to visit downtown Santa Cruz ever again. And as a heads up... start holding onto any parking stub you get for at least 30 days in case you ever run into this.
Re: NBR: Parking ticket?! WTF! I paid!
See that is what I was thinking! I would probably pay it, rather than try to fight it.
So an update, I called the parking office. They couldn't take care of it over the phone but they explained that some people will steal a parking ticket off of a car and place it on their own in order to try to fool the meter maid into not ticketing them and get away with not paying. That's why I never found a ticket on my car. Otherwise, it was mid-day, mid-week.. if I had found a ticket on my car, I would have still had the receipt in my pocket and could have walked over to the office to clear it up.
The lady on the phone was cool. She told me to write up my explanation and mail it in. They would put a hold on the ticket while they investigated. They have access to a system that records date/time stamps for each spot and when the payment went through even if it was cash (which is what it was).
So off to write my letter.... hopefully they investigate and not only fix my ticket since I was honest, but also fix the process. The fact that their kiosks are on another level, the fact that it takes so long to process a single transaction and the fact that there are sometimes lines to wait to pay means that I'm probably not the only person that this has happened to or will happen to. I'm hoping for a good outcome.