Computer System to Monitor Drivers, Cashiers : Airports to Battle Parking Lot Cheats

Stealing and cheating are a way of life for many at airport parking lots. To stop it, the Los Angeles city Department of Airports is turning to the computer.

The department is installing a $4-million computer system to crack down on unscrupulous cashiers and customers who for years have put a big dent in parking lot revenues. No more, for instance, will the driver who fibs about losing his ticket find it as easy to drive off without paying all that he owes, the department says.

“We’re closing some of the gaps,” said Joseph Clair Jr., who has overseen parking lot operations for the department since 1984. “I’ll never say we’re closing them all, but we’re closing a lot of them.”

Clair said the computer system is designed to make sure that people who park several hours or days pay their full parking tab. Under the new system, employees will periodically walk through the lots and enter license plate numbers into a central computer. If a motorist who has parked in the lot for several days lies about losing his ticket, the computer will show how long the car has been there. Video cameras aimed at the plates have been installed outside the booths so supervisors in a central office can make sure that cashiers punch in the correct license number when they collect a parking fee.

Pay for Itself in 1 Year

The system is expected to pay for itself within a year by boosting annual lot revenue by 10% to 15%, Clair said. Last year, the department collected $38 million in parking revenues at its three airports: Los Angeles International, Ontario International and Van Nuys.

At LAX, which accounted for $32.3 million of the total, the computer system is expected to be in full operation by early next month, Clair said. Soon afterward, the system will become operational at Ontario and Van Nuys.

Clair said computers at three airports will feed a steady stream of information into a larger computer at LAX capable of spitting out data ranging from when a particular vehicle entered a particular lot to when a cashier’s money drawer gets stuck.

As a precaution, only a handful of people will have access to the main computer’s programming manual. Even those who have already seen it have been ordered to remain tight-lipped. “I have told them to guard it like they would an NFL teams’ playbook,” Clair said.

Once the system is in place, the airports will join others across the country that have turned to similar systems within the past 10 years as technology has advanced, airport and parking lot industry officials said.

At O’Hare International Airport in Chicago, lot revenues have jumped 15% a year since a computer system was installed there about five years ago, according to James Davern, director of airport parking there. The increase came even though the airport lost 2,200 parking spaces to new construction.

Los Angeles airport officials say they do not expect the computer to be a panacea, but they expect it to eliminate some of the more common rip-off schemes. A computer that was placed at one LAX lot five years ago enables the department to detect a stolen ticket when a patron leaves, Clair said.

Airport officials said the system also should put thieves on notice and enable the department to keep better track of their constantly changing bag of tricks. Indeed, Ralph Burke Associates, an Illinois-based parking consulting firm, has drawn up a list identifying no fewer than 17 common and 230 more subtle forms of cheating that occur at parking lots.

“They sit there all day long trying to figure out a way to beat the system--the cashiers and the parkers,” said Samuel Greenberg, who has served on the Los Angeles Board of Airport Commissioners for the past 15 years.

The new computer system is expected to have its largest impact at LAX because it is the busiest of the airports. The department owns seven parking lots there with a total of 25,000 spaces.

The department calculates that a single parking space at LAX will be used by six different patrons each day--a situation that generates a lot of cash and a lot of temptation for some cashiers.

Over the years, scores of LAX cashiers have been caught stealing money, Clair said. Airport officials are pleased overall with the company they pay to run the lots, Parking Concepts Inc., Clair said, but they have no say about who is fired or hired. No company official could be reached for comment.

Cashiers’ scams have included substituting lower-priced tickets obtained on the sly for higher-priced ones and unplugging the cash register so nobody will know how much should have been collected. The schemes are made easier by the fact that cashiers work alone.

“Anytime you put someone on a cash register you have problems because you have money,” Clair said.

Patrons have devised their own ways to beat the system. To avoid paying a big bill, some purchase stolen tickets from skycaps or others who work at LAX that indicate that their vehicles have been parked at the airport for only a short period of time when, in reality, the vehicle may have been there for days.

$10 Maximum Charge

Other long-term parkers simply tell the cashier that they have lost their ticket, hoping to take advantage of the airport’s policy to charge such people the maximum for one day’s parking at the central lots--$10.

Although the department for years has kept track of license plate numbers on a daily basis to make sure long-term parkers do not cheat, cashiers have been required to leaf through stacks of paper to determine whether a particular plate is listed. Some cashiers simply do not bother to check the list; others find a plate listed and then cut a deal with the customer and pocket some of the money themselves, Clair said.

Under the new system, when a car exits, the cashier is required to punch the license plate number into the computer or no transaction can occur and the gate will not open.

Another feature of the new system is designed to cut down on cashier mistakes as well as chicanery. Patrons will be instructed to insert their ticket into a machine outside the cashier’s booth, and the computer will tabulate how much they owe and flash the amount on a small screen.

Under the old system, a cashier takes the ticket, puts it into a time clock and then mentally calculates how much the patron owes.

The computer system also can perform a host of other chores. For instance, it can calculate when a particular parking lot is full and close it by shutting the ticket machine. At present, airport workers must walk through each lot and count vehicles.

Also, if someone pulls into a parking lot, changes his mind and backs out without taking the ticket, the computer will automatically invalidate it.

The system should make life easier for the virtuous customer who sometimes must wait in a long line to pay his parking lot ticket, according to Jeff Gemunder, vice president of Cerand and Co. Inc., the Washington-based parking consulting firm that designed the computer system.

After cashiers go through a so-called “learning curve,” the number of transactions he or she can complete within a minute can be expected to double from two to four, Gemunder said.

But Clair doesn’t believe the new system will necessarily cut the amount of time it takes a cashier to complete a transaction. At LAX, where the system is in operation, each cashier is averaging two transactions a minute. Before the new system was installed, the cashiers were processing three transactions a minute.