Paying Your Parking Ticket in Hamilton, Ontario
If you notice a bright yellow paper tucked under your windshield wipers, you’ve likely received a parking ticket in Hamilton, Ontario. Sorry!
A Penalty Notice (“parking ticket”) is issued for any parking offence found in the City of Hamilton’s Administrative Penalty By-law No. 17-225. There are various reasons why a person may be issued a parking ticket but some common reasons include parking somewhere illegally (i.e. certain streets) or remaining parked where the meter/ parking time allotment has expired.
So now you’ve gotten that fluorescent ticket on your dashboard – now what? An individual has 15 days from the date the ticket was received to either pay the penalty or request a review of the penalty. If you fail to do either within the first 15 days, additional administrative fees will be added to the penalty amount. There is also a chance that you will not be able to renew (or receive a new) license plate validation sticker. Any outstanding parking tickets are sent to the Ministry of Transportation (MTO) who may add their own additional fees.
The administrative fees are set under the City of Hamilton User Fees and Charges By-law and are outlined as follows:
Registered owner search fee - $14: Applied to motorists that fail to act within the 15-day time period and require a second notice.
Late payment fee - $29: This fee is applied to parking penalties that have not been paid within 45 days of the parking penalty issuance
Fail to attend hearing - $100: Applied to those who set a hearing date and then fail to attend
Plate denial fee - $4: Apply to parking penalties that have been convicted and not paid within 75 days of the parking penalty issuance
If you wish to dispute the ticket received, you are required to appear in person at 80 Main St. West to speak with a Screening Officer. The Screening Officer will then decide to either affirm, reduce or cancel the penalty. They are also able to provide you with additional time to pay the penalty. If you do not agree with the decision of the Screening Officer, you are able to appeal that decision to a Hearing Officer. You have 15 days from the date of your screening to request a meeting with a Hearing Officer. Similarly, the Hearing Officer will affirm, reduce or cancel the decision of the Screening Officer. However, once a decision is made by a Hearing Officer, it is final and binding.
If you decide to pay your penalty notice, there are three ways to do so: online, in-person or by mail:
Online
If you choose to pay your ticket online, please be aware that you will need to pay a non-refundable fee for each transaction. The fees are calculated based on 1.75% of the ticket amount you owe. The maximum this fee can be is $1.50. To pay your parking ticket online, you can visit https://www.paytickets.ca/details/parking for more information. Make sure to note that your payment must be processed before the due date on your parking ticket. Otherwise, your payment could be rejected or subject to more fees!
In-Person
You are also able to pay your parking ticket in person by way of cash, cheque, money order, debit or credit cards. Payment can be made at the Hamilton Municipal Parking System (80 Main Street West, Hamilton) or at Municipal Service Centres (multiple locations). You are also able to leave cheques or money order payments in the drop boxes available at these locations but be sure to never leave cash in the boxes.
You are able to mail your cheque payment to the address noted on your ticket. The cheque is to made payable to the City of Hamilton and it is asked that you do not post-date your cheque.
In all the process seems fairly simple, right? Hopefully you don’t have to deal with a parking ticket any time soon though! For more information regarding penalty notices and what to do next, visit Hamilton.ca.
