Park ATX

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You have to add $10 at a time to have money in your "wallet" which is complete BS. This wasn't the case when I first starting using the app. Second, there is a flat fee on top on the parking fee. 25 cents each time adds up, and it's a lot considering the cost of parking is $3.60 for 3 hours. That still beats paying $5-15 in some sketchy lot which is why I deal with it. My card expired but it wouldn't let me edit the information, so I had to delete the card then take out my wallet and add the updated card, all while being surrounded by homeless people asking for change. I don't recall receiving a notification when my card expired. I would have updated it at home. The only plus is that it's convenient when you do get it to work seamlessly, and you get a notification when your meter time is running out. Other than that, I feel like this app isn't what it used to be, but I don't like carrying cash or pulling out my wallet to pay for parking, for safety reasons.

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The original Park ATX app was wonderful. The zones were easy to understand and the app was simple to use. Now, the zones are random slews of numbers that have no pattern. With the combination of poor signage for what zone you’re in and even different zones on different sides of the SAME street, leaves you aimlessly wandering around looking for a tiny sticker that shows your zone (which if you walked more than ~8 parking spots, you’re probably not in the right zone anymore!) To add to the confusion, EVERYTIME you use the app you’re forced to verify your account by getting another random slew of numbers texted to you. Then to annoy you one last time, the app always says you have a notification. However, once you go into the app, there’s no notification to be found... And the notification will not go away!

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The old version was passable—two clicks to park—but the new version is so much less user friendly. And it keeps re-setting, asking me to re-create an account even though I have had one for years now. And it often won't load nearby zones, meaning I have to walk to the meter to check. Then why am I using the app if I have to walk to the meter anyway? These new zones are meant to be more targeted to individual blocks, meaning that if I move my car to the other side of the road, I have to repay. Before, paying ZONE 1 for the night meant I could park downtown and move my car as needed! I ALREADY PAID THE CITY TO PARK ON THE STREET WHY SHOULD I HAVE TO PAY TO PARK AGAIN. City services should not run for profit; they should charge a fee to offset the services provided. This was a scam reboot targeted to the week before sxsw. Fncking capitalism.

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Carrying around a bag of coins would be more convenient than using this app at times. When this app messes up, it messes up HARD! I’ve seen the app not allow users to pay for parking, sending everyone who cares to pay on time (I don’t want a ticket so I pay every time instead of risking it) running outside to pay at the meter. If that’s not bad enough, the app has also attempted to charge $341 to park! The step where you use the time bar to indicate how long you want to park for was being skipped, and you were takin straight to the payment confirmation screen, with a time duration of about 2 weeks, for the low low cost of $341. I noticed the process was different so I paused and thankfully saw the price before tapping “confirm payment”, but I’m sure others may not have been as lucky. It really stinks that this company and app is in charge of your parking experience in downtown Austin if you’re wanting to use an app to pay. Calling the Support you’ll be directed to call your local non-emergency number (ex 311), which doing so will get you directed to call the app developers.

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Used to be a user friendly single-use app but as others have stated in reviews, the recent update ruined the app. As a user experience designer, I can't fathom the business rules or product strategy that dictated this update. Everything about it makes the experience of using the app much more clunky and convoluted than the previous version. I feel like the update was designed by engineers and never tested with users. If the app's creators had only done benchmark user testing and then tested the updated prototypes, they would've immediately uncovered the terrible user experience of the update. I wish I could roll back to the old version.