Card payments return after Worcester car park overcharging

New machines are being installed after technical issues last year saw card customers wrongly charged

Card payments are being reintroduced at a city's council-run car parks following problems in which hundreds of customers were incorrectly charged.

More than 200,000 erroneous payments totalling £400,000 were taken from customers at Worcester's 14 sites last year where card transactions have been suspended since September.

New payment machines are now being installed.

The rollout is expected to be completed before the end of the month.

During the problems in 2022, card customers were incorrectly charged multiple times for single transactions in mix-ups affecting 15,000 parking sessions

The company behind the affected machines, Flowbird Smart City UK, had said the issue was connected to a bug that emerged during a software upgrade.

One customer told the BBC at the time he had seen almost £800 wrongly taken across dozens of separate debits.

The city council said all customers were issued reimbursements.

The authority added it was now working with a new partner Metric Group which would be installing the machines.

At five of its lowest-demand car parks, the council said, payments would only be able to be made through an app or via a phone line.

Those sites are at Clare St, Tallow Hill, Tybridge St, Commandery Road and The Moors.