Park Smarter Reviews

ParkSmarter was supposed to make paying for parking much easier and advertises that you will be able to extend your parking meter using your phone, also it should have this nice reminder function that will remind you 15 mins before it expires.

I first tried to pay as I am walking away from the car, and it told me I have to be standing right next to the meter to pay, apparently ParkSmarter uses Bluetooth to connect to the meter and register the payment, so I did, and then I assumed that I will be able to use the “extend” option after I am gone in case I needed to stay longer.

And I did need to stay longer than I initially thought , by that time I was already few miles away, and there was no way for me to be able to walk back and make it in time, while ParkSmarter did not remind me as it was supposed to, I still remembered , so I opened ParkSmarter in order to hit that “extend” button, but same as the initial payment, even the extend button asked that I should be standing next to the meter, which does not make any sense at by the time I got back to the car , I found a $63 parking ticket in my windshield

I used ParkMobile at new port beach just the day before and it was way much better , I was able to pay, extend , receive reminders and even save the location of my park, ParkSmarter is no way close to that

The developers should reimburse me for the $63 ticket!

Using ParkSmarter was truly a miserable experience. I normally use coins to park in the meters in Metuchen New Jersey, but one day I was out of coins and decided to give ParkSmarter a try. It only gave me the option to park for the minimum amount of time ( an hour and 35 minutes) Or the maximum amount of time (three days). Since I needed to park for 12 hours, this was a problem. However, I discovered you can add time after the initial time, so I was able to get it up to above 12 hours. Somehow the combination I chose ended up with 14 1/2 hours on the meter. Now I say on the meter, but there was no actual time on the meter. I wasn’t worried because ParkSmarter told me that the time would appear shortly, and since I had a train to catch I put my faith in technology. This was a bad idea. When I got back to my car there was a ticket for $40, and still no time on the meter. I spoke to the parking authority and they canceled the ticket, and told me that other customers that had similar problems.

Not impressed. I used ParkSmarter to put time on the meter for my street parking near the university, though there’s also an option to use a pay station in the general vicinity. Thinking ParkSmarter payment would be sufficient, (because why wouldn’t it be?!), I went on with my day. I returned a couple of hours later to a ticket, with the citation reading: “no time on the meter.” Oookay except ParkSmarter shows I paid for three hours, and I was not over on time. Now I have to go and contest this dang ticket and deal with the city.

This was only the third time I’ve used ParkSmarter . And prior to this occasion, ParkSmarter has been generally very unstable. One time it wouldn’t load my time so I couldn’t see how much I had left and another time it showed something strange like 13 hours, making me worry I’d been charged for that much, in a zone that doesn’t even allow you to park for that long.

Very frustrating experiences.

Was excited to see an app that would help me save time dealing with Hollywood parking, but instead, has caused me to waste more time than just using my credit card. ParkSmarter is dreadfully slow!! SO slow that just waiting for ParkSmarter to open takes more time than using a credit card at the meter and walking away. Half the time, the Bluetooth won’t communicate effectively with the meter, forcing you to use a credit card at the end of it all, ANYWAY. If you thought you could use ParkSmarter to extend your parking meter’s time, you thought wrong. In fact, you have to come back out to the parking meter for it to connect. Also, I’ve received 2 parking tickets because the system is flawed and parking attendants don’t recognize that you already paid for parking with ParkSmarter . I liked the idea of ParkSmarter , but it’s caused much more stress and frustration than it even intended to solve.

I had a very difficult time getting ParkSmarter set up and I almost gave up when I read reviews that said it doesn’t work for them. But I was in a bind where I needed to renew a spot I parked in that I couldn’t return to physically, so I kept trying. After several failed attempts I was FINALLY able to get my account set up & it’s worked perfectly. In Los Angeles, doing auditions with unpredictable wait times, it’s a life saver to pay and extend parking meters remotely. :)

Great idea for all municipalities for customer convenience and compliance with metered parking. However, as of this iteration, the signup process and modal dialogues are buggy and ParkSmarter hangs. That, and when it does not hang, it’s very slow to respond. Needs a lot of work. There are other apps I’ve used (like ParkChicago and ParkMobile) that function flawlessly and are super responsive. I’m still trying to get this app to even work (and I’m in tech - so that’s sad for the average consumer trying to use ParkSmarter). Edit/update: 10 minutes later - voila, it works! (I think - fingers crossed it activates the meter remotely and/or the enforcement pay enough attention to those that have paid via ParkSmarter ).

Why do all cities need different parking apps!!?! Living in San Francisco ParkSmarter we use there does not require me to be signed in or put in any of my information: email or phone number unless I want to. I just want to pay for the meter and go. Also why are there two meters with the same ID #?! I had to say I was in Burlingame and not Athens Ohio. Than it said I could only add up to 40 mins and the meter would expire in 3pm which was two hours from now. According to the meter it was going to expire in 5 mins

ParkSmarter is horrible. I just paid with my credit card to park. Skip ParkSmarter! Waste of time!!

I use ParkSmarter in Metuchen, NJ on Main Street and it is extremely slow. If you know in advance that you have to use ParkSmarter, get to your location early because it takes forever to go in and out of any screens especially if you are setting it up for the first time, adding a new car or payment method. I’ve used it 5 or 6 times now and it’s always the same. Extremely slow. It does what it’s supposed to do, but I always hope that if I’m driving somewhere that I need to park, that the place uses ParkMobile and not ParkSmarter.

What are the most likely conditions that you’ll use ParkSmarter? Next to your vehicle and IN THE SUN, right? Five stars for convenience and well designed, take off a star for poor color selection and tiny fonts (leaving lots of dead screen space). The screen is virtually unusable due to the small font and pale colors when in a sunny area. Make ParkSmarter “Section 508” compliant and you’ll have an exceptional app.

I love using ParkSmarter. I only experienced one small bug -saying my session was expired when it was ongoing. Also by default it would be nice if I had notifications when my session is close to expiring. Thanks for making this!

ParkSmarter works very well in most situations however occasionally it can’t seem to find the meter I’m parked at. With that said I like the ease of being able to add time on the meter when I’m away from the car, being warned when my time is almost up, plus no need to be sure I have change or a credit card on me.

I would give it 0 stars if I could. I paid for a meter through ParkSmarter but ended up getting a ticket because apparently there was a system error through app. I still got charged for the meter and it showed on app that I payed for the time slot but the meter apparently was “expired” because of the error. I called to contest it but they said it was passed the statue of limitations for contesting. I had proof on Park Smarter app but apparently that wasn’t enough. Now I have to pay $181 for a late parking ticket that I should never have been ticketed for.

This parking the Park smarter App is the best invention! It makes my work parking down town a breeze. Not more worrying about getting a ticket, with ParkSmarter I always know how much time I have left on the meter! And the fact that I can add time without having go to my car, it is simple the best. Thank you Sioux Falls Parking !

I tried four or five times now using both Facebook and my phone number, changing passwords, using the web page and app and I just get the “request timed out” message as the login process proceeds. It’s especially frustrating because this is ParkSmarter my hometown train station chose to employ to have us pay for parking. Thankfully, there’s a manual kiosk we can also use or we’d be SOL. The programmers need to fix whatever is happening here because after skimming through the other reviews I see I’m not the only one experiencing this glitch.

The idea of ParkSmarter and service seems great - but it’s ridden with problems! Some spaces will say 16 minute minimum and then if you try to add a tiny more time, it will say - you are over the limited amount of time! Very frustrating!!!!
The parking app in AsburyPARK works like a dream with alerts and notifications. Why can’t this one work like that one??????!!!!!☹️

Awful app. Tried to pay for parking in Rapid City, SD while visiting and ParkSmarter made it extremely difficult. I am not even sure if I successfully did it, and after giving ParkSmarter the first and middle names of my first, second, and third unborn children in the registration process, I now cannot login because it says that I don’t have an account. Awful. Developers should be embarrassed with themselves in addition to any municipalities that adopt this system. Awful.

I have used this to park for an hour and half and only for $2.00. I have updated the car plate number and bank number and paid. It says it was starting and so i left. Thus, i came back with a ticket and which is so unacceptable. I thought i can trust ParkSmarter since i do not have any coins, but now with the ticket of $39!!! Now, no phone number to reach them out and i have sent an email and no answer. What is the purpose of using ParkSmarter???

ParkSmarter should allow you to cancel as well especially if you end up leaving before your time run out the same way it ask you to extend….

ParkSmarter was awesome when I first started using it. I don’t know what happened but after about a month I stopped getting notification about when my time was about to expire, and also when I would go to extend my current session it would start a whole new session instead of extending it, removing whatever time I still had left. I wish they would fix this because these problems have caused way too many issues for me.

This was way too difficult. After downloading ParkSmarter and following prompts, I had to try 7 or 8 times to get the meter payment done. I didn’t know if it accepted payment or not. The actual meter would go from a blinking green to yellow then to red. That happened several times. Needs a little tweaking.

Found that ParkSmarter was for Union Station; download and interface seemed easy; went through the setup process; then bought a parking space and it changed my location from KCMO to Akron OH; ParkSmarter is so slow that basic commands like changing the location takes multiple minuets and when trying to wrangle a two toddlers- not cool. Programming is like a high schoolers work- you can tell that they are proud, but put in all the work the night before the work was due.

I’ve had only problems since using ParkSmarter. It constantly freezes! Also, I’ve had a few instances where it finds a spot thousands of miles away from my actual current location, and if I’m not careful to double check, I’ll accidentally pay for a spot on a different continent (that’s right...a different CONTINENT). In addition to that, I had a question a few months back and emailed the customer support email listed on ParkSmarter ...and no response.

I didn't even know you could renew remotely until I read a few reviews. Of course these reviews are from an older previous version. The current version doesn't work. It worked via Bluetooth for a little bit but now doesn't work at all. ParkSmarter needs a lot of work. If you're thinking about downloading it, you'll save a lot of time by just getting out of your car are swiping your card.