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City Hall rolls out digital clamping charges payment system

By Collins Omulo September 3rd, 2019 2 min read

City Hall has begun the roll-out of an electronic clamping charges payment system aimed at making the payment of the fee digital.

This comes after the county government in July started trialing a new system to help motorists pay clamping charges electronically ahead of equipping all the parking attendants with smart phones which they will use to effect the operation.

PAYMENT SYSTEM

Nairobi County director of Parking Services Tom Tinega said they have already given out over 500 smart phones to parking attendants to help in the process.

“We have given out the gadgets and everything is now working according to plan. We are looking forward to making sure that every part of the city is fully digitized to make the payment system more compliant,” said Mr Tinega.

The smart phones have been configured to receive notifications that a clamped car has been paid for prompting the attendant to go and unclamp.

Mr Tinega said that a motorists whose car gets clamped for failing to pay daily parking fees will simply need to dial *235# and follow the options available in the new county revenue collection short code to make the payment.

He stated that every payment to the county government is now captured in the new system which comprises of all major City Hall revenue streams payments.

SHORT CODE

“We are trying to find a way, from that we have already tried to implement and is already working, of making it easier for paying for the penalties to work. This will result in one having an easier way of making any payment and it eliminates the need of having to walk to the county office,” he said.

The Parking director explained that once a vehicle has been clamped, if one dials the short code, it will show that the vehicle has been clamped as well as show the penalty one is supposed to pay.

“Right now an individual makes the payment and has to still physically confirm to the attendants that the payment has been done to be unclamped,” he said.

But now, he said, the county is trying to come up with a way that a message will be generated confirming the payment of the Sh2,000 clamping penalty that will received by a parking attendant in his or her phone giving them notice that a certain clamped vehicle has been paid for and so they will not wait for the owner to come and confirm.

PARKING REVENUE

Mr Tinega pointed out that initially one had to pay the penalty fee through the bank, bring the receipt to the county parking office to be confirmed and verified before an attendant is sent to unclamp the car.

This manual payment system has been blamed for resulting in parking revenue losses for the county government with many attendants colluding with motorists to receive part of the Sh2, 000 penalty in order to get their vehicles unclamped.

Nairobi County government launched the new short code on June 9 after it officially parted ways with JamboPay, a tech firm that has been collecting revenue on behalf of the county since 2014, after the lapse of a contract between the two parties.

With the new code, an individual is needed to dial *235# in their phones to pay for different services offered by City Hall choosing the option they want to access.