A bot has successfully appealed $3M worth of parking tickets in the UK

I happen to know a little about this because my fund is short a publicly-traded company that buys up defaulted credit card debt and goes after the defaulters using shady practices, threatening letters etc. Competition does affect this figure. Back in 2008-09 when the usual competitors in this space didn't have the balance sheet to operate, the few who could buy defaulted debt were making 40-50% returns by effectively buying up debt that they expected to recover $2,000 from for $1,333 (I'm simplifying here because it takes several years to recover the money and there is a present value calculation to be done).

By contrast, fast-forward to last year and at best these companies will only make a 7 or 8% return, barely enough to cover their cost of capital. That return is lowered from the 50% return of the 08-09 era either by the companies bidding against each other and ultimately paying more than the $1,333 for the defaulted debt from the original issuer, or by accepting less than the $2,000 for settling with the debtor. It will not go to zero however - the lower limit is the cost of capital of the companies that buy this debt up.

There is some good news in this space - recent U.S. legislation has targeted some of the shady practices used by these companies (which is one of the reasons we're short the publicly-traded company).

I think it's more that the letter only holds sway in the first place by the implied threat behind it. If the letter is from a bot, there is nothing to back up the threat.

The sale of the property automatically triggers an adjustment of the taxable value towards the sale price, so you don't need anybody greasing the wheels on the back end.

Detroit is in dire financial condition, so it would not be surprising if there is reluctance to aggressively adjust assessments. Which isn't meant to justify them not fairly valuing properties, but there is no need for collusion for the situation to arise.

Plot twist: meter maids make extra cash advertising for Fixed.

Yep. I couldn't be bothered to grab my phone and properly link it, thanks. My phone is way over there <points to the other side of the desk>.

I really loved when my city started to use Park by SMS. Since then I almost never get a ticket. Maybe once a year when an run and forget to send SMS.

I'm not convinced this is true in general, even if it is often true. Signage is unclear or absent. Certain departments are probably corrupt or inept.

There are also times when avoiding tickets is basically impossible. My local (and relatively large) community college brilliantly decided to do all three of these things at the same time:

1. Close down the third largest lot on campus. 2. Lease out half of the second largest lot on campus to local businesses. 3. Oversell permits for the remaining parking.

As a result, students began parking on the city streets. But the local residents didn't like that, so the city made those streets permit only (and only gave permits to local residents)* . The college's response was "get here early," which at best is not a solution and at worse, exacerbated the problem by making parking even less available in the early parts of the day. Later they added a meager shuttle solution which they didn't even keep for an entire semester (the parking situation lasted for YEARS rather than months because of theft, lawsuit, and resident concerns about the job site).

Frankly, I would be impressed with anyone who didn't get a ticket over that time period and still managed to make it to classes.

Looking further, the local downtown simply has inadequate parking. The downtowns of other nearby municipalities are the same. It certainly makes political sense to keep parking prices low and just ticket the hell out of violators rather than raising prices to keep demand in line with supply and making consumers and businesses unhappy. I'd be very surprised if these municipalities hadn't worked out the math and figured out which results in more money for them.

*Those roads are still (and probably permanently) permit only, so the only ones really suffering are going to be the short-sighted locals.

The problem with parking tickets as a tax is it isn't at all fair. If you mega corp CEO or even well paid startup techy, getting a parking ticket of a few hundred dollars isn't that big a deal. To someone on minimum wage it would be a significant part of their income.

This completely depends on where you are located. In NYC there are many, many areas with unclear signs or unclear rules that not everyone knows, and are ticketed because of this. In addition, some departments are simply corrupt.

For example: Seaside Heights, NJ.

A few years back my mom went to the shore and parked in a metered parking area. She put in 2 hours worth of time and went to the beach. She came back 1 1/2 hours later, and the meter was expired with a ticket waiting on her car. She fought the ticket and found out that the meters were broken and running too fast, and the parking officials knew about it.. but continued to write tickets. Their justification was that "All people have to do is dispute the ticket and we will drop the charges." but how many people simply pay tickets without fighting them because of a lack of time? Scumbags.

50% of the parking tickets I've been issue have been done so incorrectly.

I've had two parking tickets in my life, in London. Once, only a few months after I got my licence, I parked for 10 mins in a bay where stopping was allowed, but not at that particular time. Fair cop. I hadn't bothered to read the sign.

The second time, I stopped in a 'loading' zone, where loading is permitted for a certain amount of time. I don't recall the amount of time, but I was within that amount of time. When I challenged the person who had written the ticket, he told me that loading was only allowed for commercial vehicles (which is untrue). I challenged the ticket by post, outlining what had happened, and including the parking attendant's inaccurate understanding of what loading bays are for. My challenge was rejected, and it didn't seem worth my time to continue the process.

I disagree. I live near New York and have only gotten a parking ticket one time. There was construction scaffolding up on the street, covering signs, and new signs had been put on the scaffolding itself indicating it was ok to park there. I still got a ticket, and tried to appeal online, but my appeal was denied. I should have taken a picture with my phone, but I didn't. The fine was excessive (around $200).

NYC is constantly under construction. Signage is blocked by scaffolding, garbage, snow, you name it. I'm sure the residents on the street know exactly where you can and cannot park, but someone unfamiliar with the neighborhood is a target for excessive parking fines. This seems like a patently unfair system that is rigged against tourists and those from out of town.

Disclaimer: I live in CT.

London, UK. 1 GBP charge to park in a motorcycle bay. Only possible way of doing it is via a mobile phone, online or by calling. No meter on the street. Drove to work, parked the motorcycle. No signal. Went to work, paid for it when I got back as the signal was back up. 120GBP fine.

Is it unreasonable? Well, I didn't follow the instructions. But I would argue that it's unreasonable to fail to account for the fact that people can't just drop everything and run around for half an hour trying to get in contact with a parking line. I wanted to just glue a pound coin to the seat, to be honest.

I agree, for the most part, but as others have said, parking "legally" can be quite impossible for many. I can understand private parking and stuff, but there is really no excuse for having non-digital parking systems in the 21st century. I hardly ever carry cash, much less coins, so I have zero tolerance and respect for systems that literally nickel-and-dime me. I gladly take my credit card out and pay for parking in the downtown area of my city, because I know I'm not "entitled" to park there. However, a customer willing and technically able to give money (i.e., a person who has the money, but not the form of currency that the parking meter takes) should not be ticketed simple because they do not carry cash.

I have qualms with even digital systems too. The one in my downtown area is digital, but you still have to pre-pay for parking. Sometimes I don't know how long I'm going to be at a place, and it's ridiculous to expect people to come down from the top floor of a 6 story building just to "add more" money to a digital parking meter. Why not sign in once when you park, and sign out once when you leave, and just pay for the time you are there?

Anyway, that's my rant.

Why? Cause you'll be sued? I mean come on. Maybe another bot will say 'hey sue that other bot' for bad legal advice?

And depending on location, religion and gender. And obviously, how rich do you look?

"USA! USA! USA!"

Siri almost certainly already knows all of those things. :)

pet peeve: you have to say that you're invoking your right to silence, mere silence is not enough!

see berghuis (2010) and salinas (2013)

Well, I guess that long before truly automatic cars come to life, we will have cars that you can set to a certain speed and it will just continue driving forward(much like Tesla's Autopilot, but working on any road anywhere). You might ask "well, why don't we make the autopilot follow the speed limits then?". Mostly because in some countries it's not easy to tell when a speed limit ends and in my experience GPS maps are not always 100% accurate. Basically in most of EU the speed limit begins with a sign and ends at a nearest intersection, without any visible sign indicating so. So the car would need to recognize what is an intersection and what isn't - which is difficult even for human drivers, sometimes you have a paved road going off the main road to someone's house, but it's not an intersection so it doesn't cancel the speed limit. Again, it could be solved by having very very detailed maps, but then it doesn't help with roadworks which set up temporary speed limits.

Anyway, my point is that until we have truly, 100% automatic vehicles which take all liability for their actions, vehicles in semi-automatic modes will continue getting speeding and parking tickets.

There would have to be some probabilistic model balancing the energy costs of continuing to circle vs. the risk x cost of a ticket vs. the possibility that a legit parking spot will open up.

Thanks for the link. Here is good article about it http://www.nature.com/news/machine-ethics-the-robot-s-dilemm... IMHO, trolley problem is too theoretical. Firstly, these binary events are far from reality based on probabilities and context (like why could this situation occur?). Secondly, the answers to those questions highly depend on the society laws. These problems are missing crucial information what punishment should you expect in both cases. If you don’t know anything how the society will treat these cases then you shouldn’t do anything (for ex., Is it allowed to act like a policeman in this society?) Thirdly it depends whether you are a donor or donee in this society (can you compensate consequences of the damage of your actions?).

I found the titles that I was looking for:Universal moral grammar: theory, evidence and the future;Moral Machines: Teaching Robots Right from Wrong

That's interesting is that a new change?