Other businesses are using your car park, what can be done to stop this?

For many businesses, having a dedicated car park is an invaluable asset. It not only provides convenience for customers and employees but also serves as starting point for a customer journey, giving them the right impression of your brand and business.

However, what happens when other businesses start to exploit your car park for their own gain?

Whether it’s deliberate or not, other businesses misusing your car park is more common than you think and can have a negative impact on your operations. In this blog post we are looking at the issues that misusing your car park can cause and what can be done to solve them.

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Understand the Impact

The first step in addressing the problem of unauthorised car park usage is to recognise the potential consequences for your business. When other businesses or individuals utilise your car park, either through their own staff parking in your employee spaces or overspilling into your customer car park, it can cause a range of issues:

Insufficient parking spaces for your own customers or employees, leading to frustration and dissatisfaction.
Increased traffic congestion and difficulty in managing the flow of vehicles.
Reduced security and potential liability risks, as unknown vehicles could pose a threat to the safety of your premises.
Damage to your reputation, as customers may perceive a lack of control and organisation.

Establish Clear Parking Policies

To prevent abuse and ensure the optimal use of your car park, it is crucial to establish clear and well-communicated parking policies. This includes:

Clearly displaying signage that indicates the car park is for customers or employees only, along with any time restrictions or penalties for unauthorized use.
Informing employees and customers about the parking policies through clear signage.
Regularly reminding employees and customers about the importance of adhering to the parking policies.

If you need to make sure your car park is reserved just for your staff, it could be worth considering a permit system.

Permits allow you to assign parking to specific vehicles in a set area, which is an ideal method for dealing with sustained abuse from other drivers. You can create an approved list of vehicle registrations, allowing you to offer your staff an attractive benefit while also putting the tools in place to retake control of your car park and deter other drivers in the area from misusing your site.

Monitor your car park

It’s important to keep an eye on your car park, monitoring how it is used to identify any potential abuse and assess the impact it is having.

ANPR monitors a car park, allowing you to see the vehicles using your car park. Having staff vehicle registrations on an approved list allows you to see how many vehicles that shouldn’t be on-site actually are.

Information like this can go a long way towards identifying the severity of the abuse your car park is facing. From there you can use that information to engage with local businesses. Sometimes solving the problem could be as simple as making another business aware of what’s been going on so they can communicate the issue to their staff.

If the problems on-site are more widespread or have been occurring for longer it can often be this insight that helps you decide on whether to explore different car park management options.

Helping you take control of your car park

Your car park is a major asset, and it’s important that you take steps to make sure that it delivers on its potential and the benefits it could provide.

At Parkingeye we understand the importance of a car park, and work with businesses across every sector to make sure they have the best possible car park management solutions in place to help them reclaim control of their site and maximise its potential.

From ensuring your staff and customers have place to park to providing ways for your car park to unlock its hidden revenue potential we can help.

To find out more about Parkingeye, our solutions and how we can help your business, get in touch using the form.