Hospital officials say new system's parking glitches have been ironed out

Thunder Bay Regional Health Sciences Centre officials says it appears initial glitches with their new parking system are in the past.

Hospital spokesman Chisholm Poither on Friday said the switch to a new paperless system wasn’t as smooth as they would have liked, but now that the overhaul is complete, there have been fewer complaints in recent days.

“As with any transition with something old to something new, there are some bumps along the road. We certainly had those in the last few weeks and it caused frustration to some of our patients and families that were visiting,” Poithier said.

“But I think we’ve sorted it out right now and the system is working well now. Going forward it will be working better because it won’t be breaking down as much.”

One of the main issues was the payment method.

In the past customers who didn’t want to validate and pay for parking at payment stations inside the hospital were able to pay cash as they exited hospital lots.

Now outside payment can only be made using a credit card.

“I think some people arrived at the exit, realized they could only pay by credit card and they didn’t have a credit card,” Poithier said.
“So then that starts to back up things. Once people get used to that, that’s not a problem anymore.”

Another issue was bringing the pay stations on line.

To do so meant shutting individual units completely down.

“That meant there was more pressure on the one remaining pay station in the lobby here, which meant lineups would get a little bit long. These weren’t really, really serious issues, but anything can cause frustration when you’re visiting a hospital.”

The new system provides a plastic, recyclable chip that records entry and exit times, rather than a paper ticket.