Your Parking Equipment Can Do More Than You Think
Posted: Aug, 12, 2020 10:38AM ET • 5 min read
It has often been easy to take your parking equipment for granted, particularly your parking access and revenue control (PARCS) equipment. PARCS tools—the gates that permit entry and egress and the revenue technology that takes parking payments—have always the workhorses of the parking world. But at a time when a steady stream of new technologies is being introduced, access and revenue control is often viewed as the understated mainstay of parking facilities.
But all that is changing. Access and revenue control design has moved into the future, and the latest generation is more advanced and useful than ever before. PARCS has always been the face of parking technology because it’s the most visible and most often-used type of equipment when it comes to parking transactions. Today, however, it is more technologically advanced, user-friendly, and useful than ever before. As a result, today’s equipment makes the parking experience much more pleasant and convenient for your patrons while, at the same time, making your parking more manageable.
User-Friendly Technology
The primary focus of next generation PARCS equipment is on improving the user experience. The parking journey must be a smooth process, and PARCS needs to be able to provide that smooth experience in our increasingly mobile world. One of the ways it can accomplish this is to accommodate pre-booking. That way, users can reserve the space in a particular facility before they even leave the house, and when they get to the lot or garage, they can enjoy a frictionless parking experience. This is great customer amenity at any time, but particularly during the holidays, when shoppers often stress out about whether they’ll be able to find parking when they get to a shopping center or urban retail establishment.
How can contemporary PARCS accomplish this? The first key is for the technology to be adaptable. The best modern systems can be integrated with other parking technologies into truly frictionless systems. What used to be a very complicated process is today relatively commonplace. Today, owners can add parking guidance, license plate recognition and automatic vehicle identification, and reservation or pre-booking technology to their PARCS tools to provide an extraordinarily simple and convenient parking experience.
Modern PARCS also offers two-way communication, an important feature that can provide real-time benefits. Patrons sometimes have difficulty completing transactions. Perhaps their ticket can’t be read by the equipment or a coupon isn’t recognized. Or maybe they are unfamiliar with the payment equipment and how it works. When parking patrons experience difficulty, the two-way communication provided by modern equipment allows off-site staff to access the equipment screen remotely, seeing what the patron is seeing, and then work with the patron to solve the problem and complete the transaction.
All of these advances make parking more convenient, it they also provide incentive to drivers to become repeat customers. When customers know that a facility will provide the convenience of frictionless parking, they are much more likely to utilize the facility again and again. This can provide a tremendous advantage, particularly to retail complexes with strong local competition.
Modern PARCS equipment can also accommodate loyalty programming. In fact, it’s really the key to offering a loyalty program because it’s where all the vital data about the customer is collected and stored, and it’s also the technology that allows the parking owners to maintain contact with each customer who is a member of a loyalty program. In this high-tech era of parking, access and revenue control system is really the heart of any technology suite.
Monetizing Your Parking
One of the most exciting recent developments is that PARCS equipment can now be used to monetize your parking management. This is a potentially groundbreaking improvement for shopping centers and retail establishments because it permits them to generate revenue beyond parking fees and upsold services. Modern access & revenue control equipment can also provide advertising opportunities.
Contemporary video-enabled PARCS equipment features customizable video screens that can be tailored to the individual needs of the retail center. The video screens allow for high resolution full color images and video and were developed to make the equipment more user-friendly by providing step-by-step guidance into how to use the payment equipment. However, because the video screens are customizable, they can really be used to convey any type of information. For instance, shopping facilities may program the screens with maps of shopping floors to make it easier for patrons to identify the stores in which they wish to shop and determine how to get to those shops.
But the truly exciting possibility for the new technology revolves around advertising. Owners and operators can monetize their access and revenue control equipment by selling video advertising to local merchants or other organizations. The possibilities are limitless, and any type of parking facility can utilize the technology. And because the screens can be split to display several different types of messages, the new technology offers owners and operators extraordinary flexibility.
So, how can retail centers take advantage of this technology? Local hotels, restaurants, and other business, particularly those located in the center being served by the garage—could advertise their services to parking patrons. They could even offer discount codes to entice them to shop or dine with them. Some may even choose to sell advertising to local restaurants and entertainment venues that aren’t located in the shopping center, but which are close by. For advertising businesses it’s a great way to reach patrons, while for the shopping centers themselves it’s an opportunity to generate advertising revenue.
Brave New World
Parking access and revenue control equipment is more advanced than ever, and is transforming the user experience. For retail centers, however, the most exciting development is the introduction of video technology. Although the technology was developed to make the equipment more useful and user-friendly, it also offers equally exciting opportunities for owners and operators to use the equipment as a powerful marketing tool that can be used to monetize parking facilities and benefit the bottom line.
Share Article:
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Waldemar Batistella
National Product Portfolio Manager
SKIDATA is an international leader in the field of access solutions and their management. Almost 10,000 SKIDATA installations worldwide in ski resorts, stadiums, airports, shopping malls, cities, spa & wellness facilities, trade fairs and amusement parks provide secure and reliable access and entry control for people and vehicles. SKIDATA places great value in providing solutions that are intuitive, easy to use, and secure. The integrated concepts of SKIDATA solutions help clients optimize performance and maximize profits. SKIDATA Group (www.skidata.com) belongs to the publicly traded Swiss Kudelski Group (www.nagra.com), a leading provider of digital security solutions.
Questions?
Fill out the form below and we will do our best to connect you with a suitable contact.