Kurtopia

Back in January, I received a notice from the Philadelphia Parking Authority advising me that I had an unpaid parking ticket, along with a subsequent late fee attached.  The ticket was apparently issued at 10:17 am on Friday, December 14, 2007, for an expired meter on the 1500 block of West Cecil B Moore Ave, which is way the hell up in North Philly.  Looking back at my calendar, I was 99% certain that I was at work that day, and even if I wasn’t, there’s absolutely no reason why I would have been in that area of the city.  Thinking that there was some sort of clerical error, I ticked the checkbox to request a hearing to dispute the ticket, and letter received a letter indicating that my hearing was set for Friday, March 7, at 9:45 am.

I arrived and checked in for my hearing, then I waited nervously (because unfamiliar situations almost always make me nervous).  When it was finally my turn, I met with a hearing officer, who after a few basic questions asked me if I was there for a refund.  I hadn’t paid anything, so I told her that I was there to dispute the ticket.  I didn’t have any evidence, but explained to her that I believed the whole thing to be some kind of clerical error.  She explained that I couldn’t get a refund without any evidence.  Confused, I told her that I hadn’t paid anything, to which she replied, "Well, someone did, because it’s paid."  Huh.

I assume that whoever got the physical ticket that fateful December day eventually paid the fine, and did so online, else how would he or she have known that the late fee had been assessed?  Regardless, I had no idea that it was, in fact, paid in full, and that I was, in fact, completely wasting my time.

Oh, bureaucracy.

This entry was posted on Friday, March 7th, 2008 at 12:00 pm and is filed under Rants. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can skip to the end and leave a response. Pinging is currently not allowed.