How to create the right parking policy for your business?

You've done all your research and you now know what a parking policy is and that its implementation would be beneficial for your business. Now you want to take action, create this policy, and apply it in your company’s parking. To build this policy, there are several criteria to take into account. Here are a few tips for you.

• Questions to ask (yourself) before creating a parking policy
• The different types of access within the parking
• After the creation, it is time to implement the parking policy

Questions to ask (yourself) before creating a parking policy

In order to create an optimal parking policy for your business, there are several questions you will need to be able to answer. Once you have these answers, your knowledge of the parking occupancy rate will be clearer and you will be able to define the criteria for your parking policy. 

Here is a non-exhaustive list of these questions:

• How many employees will use the spaces?
• What means of transport do employees use for their home-to-work journeys (car, bicycle, public transport, etc.)?
• Is teleworking applied in your company? How often? And for whom?
• Does your company have fleet vehicles? If so, how many?
• Are there staff members with guaranteed access to the parking lot?
• Do any of your staff have to travel during the working day?
• Should you consider "visitor" access?
• What access time would you like to offer for your parking?
• If you have a reservation system, should priorities be set for certain employees (limited number of reservations, reservations to be made within a time limit?).
• Depending on your corporate culture, will certain employees have priority access, or will everyone have the same type of access?

To get an idea of the answers to some of these questions, it is important to ask your employees the right questions beforehand. For example: 

• What are their habits in terms of mobility?
• Is it possible for them to travel to the workplace using another mode of transport than the car?
• Do they have specific needs? (People with physical disabilities, pregnant women, need to drop children off at school, ...)

The different types of access within the parking

When drawing up your parking policy, you will be able to decide what type of access within the parking lot will benefit your employees. There are different accesses.

Preferential access 

Preferential access is guaranteed access to a given timetable. This means that people with this type of access are sure to be allocated a parking space according to the schedule that has been decided beforehand, from 8 am to 8 pm, for example. Should one of the employees benefiting from this access be absent for one reason or another, he or she will be able to free up his or her place so that another person can benefit from it.

Booking access

Those with this access will need to reserve their parking space in order to access the site. You decide the number of hours or days of parking granted to employees. A concrete example: 15 employees will share 10 parking spaces with a "reservation" access. To make this feasible you will have to decide how many days each employee will be entitled to a parking space. For example 18 days out of 22 working days.

You can also decide how much time you need to plan, for example, if these reservations need to be made a certain number of days in advance or if they can be made just before entering the parking lot. 

First-come, first-served access

This access, unlike the first two mentioned, does not guarantee a parking space within the parking lot. Indeed, as its name indicates, first come, first served. The parking or the spaces reserved for this type of access will therefore fill up as employees arrive without the need to reserve a space. 

These three access types can be combined within the same parking. You can therefore decide to grant "preferential" access to some employees and "reservation" or "first-come, first-served" access to others. This decision will be based on the type of position held, the frequency of presence at the office, the need to travel during the day, etc.

You will be able to find out the planned occupation of your parking in real-time. You will even be able to plan this for spaces reserved for "preferential" and "reservation" access.

After the creation, it is time to implement the parking policy

Once your parking policy has been drafted, it will be time to put it in place. If you have decided to provide different types of access to your employees, parking management software will be the ideal tool to enforce your rules. 

The software designed by BePark will allow you to allocate to your employees, according to what has been decided beforehand, the number of credits giving them access to the parking lot. They will be able to make their reservations online and thus plan their means of travel according to their assigned schedule. This will save you from having to deal with numerous parking complaints, freeing up your time for other equally important day-to-day tasks.  

If you decide to use this software, the success team will accompany you every step of the way in developing your parking policy. Our team will help you to implement this policy in a smooth way so that you have all the keys in hand to accompany each employee during the transition and so that they know exactly how to use this new tool. 

How do I access the parking once my space has been reserved? Your employees' smartphone will become their key. Once they are in front of the barrier at the entrance to your company’s parking, all they need to do is open their BePark application to access the parking.

You now have all the keys in hand to rethink parking management within your company.