RingGo is a pay by phone parking service, based in the UK. It processes over 2 million phone parking transactions a month and over 6 million individual UK motorists have used the service. Offered in public car parks and on-street locations across the United Kingdom it is now deployed in support of over 100 local authorities. The first major implementation (from June 2006) was for the First Great Western Railway in 60 stations. The project by the FirstGroup, was an early step in the trend away from the established system of paying for parking using electro-mechanical machines which dispense paper tickets – the pay and display model.
Railways were a major area of early stage growth. Franchises that adopted the service included Network Rail, Chiltern Railways, South West Trains, First Capital Connect, National Express East Anglia, c2c, First TransPennine Express, Arriva Trains Wales and East Coast Railway. The service has also been offered in NCP operated and managed car parks since March 2010.
Parking was an early area in which electronic money as opposed to cash-money made considerable advances although it has been overtaken since in sectors such as mass transportation.
On 1 October 2009, Richmond Council introduced variable parking charges which were linked to the carbon dioxide emissions of vehicles parking there (carbon metered parking). Payment of the service was either via RingGo or by a Richmond smart card, which could be used in the machine.
Milton Keynes Council, Richmond Council, Lewisham Council and, from November 2014, Westminster council provide online parking permits that are an extension of the RingGo phone parking service
The RingGo brand is owned by Cobalt Telephone Technologies Ltd, a UK private company headquartered in Basingstoke, Hampshire. Cobalt was acquired by the Parkmobile Group in August 2012. The Parkmobile group is a global specialist in phone parking and has similar operations in support of cities, railways and municipalities in North America, The Netherlands, Belgium and Germany.