This was the most humiliating and traumatizing experience I've ever had in NYC. I purchased a pre-paid ticket through LAZParking.com (LAZ operates the garage), which arrived as a QR code. Easy! (In fact, "Pay. Park. Easy." is the LAZ slogan...) But when you get there, there is no QR reader in sight, nor any instructions on how to use the QR code. You just have to take a ticket.
When I exited, a man at the office on the first floor told me to simply present the code and my parking ticket to him upon exit. Easy enough! But when I arrived at the exit, there was nobody there...just a bunch of attendants in a glass room who were indifferent to the cars outside. I pressed the 'call attendant' button at least a dozen times before anyone answered, and what I got was an irritated worker who informed me that there was "nobody at that exit" (THAT exit? I followed the only exit signs that I saw). I had to get my ticket validated on the second floor, he said. What?
The attendant then erroneously told me that my QR code was from a third party app and needed to be validated--it was NOT from a third party, and I have the receipt to prove it. He refused to accept that. I asked how it was possible to get to the second floor, since I was at the exit, with another car behind me, and no way to turn around in any event. He seemed to want me to either back up the ramp, or park my car, get out, and go to the second floor, but I had my two young kids in the back, and there really wasn't anyplace to pull to where I could open my door to get out anyway. I explained this. It didn't help. "You have to go to the second floor."
I can't GET to the second floor. I have prepaid my ticket. I have followed the instructions given to me in the office on the first floor. As it became increasingly obvious that nobody was coming to help, and that there was zero interest in providing anything even remotely resembling customer service, I began to have a panic attack. You can't just detain paying customers in a parking garage because you don't feel like being bothered. So I left, with the matter unsettled, somewhat forcefully. I regret spending the $48.40, will never park here again, and encourage others to avoid it as well. read more