The city’s public parking regime was plunged into chaos this week after a dispute between City Hall and the company that owns its parking meters came to a head, leading to an effective parking ‘free for all’.

Ninety parking meters across the city stopped functioning Wednesday after Galway City Council told UTS Technologies to cease its maintenance of the machines from January 7.

The machines are a major source of revenue annually for the local authority and any long-term disruption to payments will have a serious effect on the budget. It’s understood several ratepayers have threatened to withhold their commercial rates until the fiasco is sorted.

The Council normally takes in up to €100,000 in parking and parking fines income every week, going by estimates of predicted income in the local authority’s Budget for 2025.

While a brief ‘grace’ period will allow parking for free on streets and in City Council carparks, the local authority has warned that motorists must familiarise themselves with alternative payment options by January 20.

The City Council had indicated as recently as Monday that motorists could continue to pay for parking with coins – but not electronically with cards or phones – at all meters from January 7. Since December they have been encouraging people to download an app to make online payments ahead of the changes.

But it emerged Wednesday morning that the coin and electronic payment functions of the meters cannot be split and they announced the machines were, “out of order until further notice”.

Yet in its statement, the local authority advised motorists “to use a Payzone retail outlet (cash or card), the app, online payment, or phone payment to pay for parking on-street or in Galway City Council car parks until this issue is resolved”.

Multiple attempts by the Galway City Tribune to register on the Council’s parking app or to pay a once-off parking fee without registering on the app failed. Phone calls to Payzone for support as directed by the council also failed to resolve the issue.