Overview

• An RAC-commissioned survey of 1,709 UK drivers found that nearly three-quarters who used parking apps in the past year encountered difficulties.
• Top issues were poor mobile signal (70%), apps not recognising the car park (36%) and app crashes (35%).
• Drivers showed a preference for contactless cards (46%) or cash (33%) over apps (30%), and 13% said they could not work out how to use the apps, rising to 26% among those aged 75 and above.
• Fragmentation is widespread, with 36% of app users having at least three parking apps installed and 15% having four or more.
• The National Parking Platform is being piloted by 10 councils including Manchester, Liverpool and Coventry, as the RAC urges operators to offer at least two payment methods and not force drivers to use apps.