If you receive a text message from the City of Pickering, Ont., alerting you about an overdue parking ticket, you might want to hit ignore.
Durham Regional Police and officials with the City of Pickering are warning residents to ignore any text messages they receive claiming to be from the city, regarding parking tickets.
The fake text message circulating looks like a text that says it comes from city hall, some indicating that a payment needs to be made in 60 minutes for a “parking infraction.”
Durham Regional Police say there are currently a few scams circulating, so it’s important to be aware and to stay cautious.
“Our recommendation to everyone is that if you receive a text message from a number you don’t recognize.. Don’t respond or offer any personal information or identifiers to any of those,” said Const. Emily Mitchell with Durham Regional Police.
In a statement, acting manager of Municipal Law Enforcement Services for The City of Pickering, Jason Litoborski, said the City of Pickering will never contact residents via text in relation to a parking ticket, or any other enforcement matter.
“All communication related to outstanding parking fines is provided to the registered owner of the vehicle by mail,” said Litoborski.
”It will clearly indicate that it is from the City of Pickering, reference the parking ticket number, vehicle license plate, location of the offence, and contain instructions for how to respond to the notice.”
Anyone who is unsure about the validity of any communication from the City of Pickering can contact customer care at 905-683-7575.
Police are also asking anyone who has received this specific text message, or any texts of this nature, to report it to police.