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Summary
At FUSION26, Parker Technology and Amano McGann broke down why unused parking data is costing operators money, and what proactive reporting actually looks like.
Here’s an uncomfortable question. How much is a delayed decision costing your operation right now?
Not a system outage. Not a major infrastructure failure. Just an ordinary problem. A validation process that’s broken. A device quietly malfunctioning. A rate that’s confusing drivers. Something that’s been running for weeks because nobody looked at the data that would have caught it on day one.
That’s the gap Ryan Givens, PTMP (Parker Technology) and Ryan Nester (Amano McGann) took on at FUSION26 in their session, “Proactive Reporting: The Fastest Way to Build Executive Confidence.” Their point wasn’t that operators lack data. Most have plenty of it. Their point was that data nobody looks at doesn’t protect revenue, cut costs or improve customer experience. It just sits there while small problems get expensive.
“We Have the Data” Isn’t the Win You Think It Is
Givens opened with a pattern he sees constantly. An operator points proudly to their reporting dashboard, then admits they haven’t opened it in weeks.
“So, the value of data is not having it,” Givens said. “It’s actually utilizing it.”
Nester, drawing on 28 years in the industry, explained why this happens so often. Every PARCS vendor structures its data a little differently, so building the habit of actually using it takes real, deliberate effort. Most operators default to printing the report and moving on, not because the data’s useless, but because turning it into a decision requires deeper thinking and strategizing; they may not have time or resources for.
Data That Flags Itself Before You Ask
This is where the session got tactical. Nester described PAM (Parking Account Manager), a tool Amano McGann is building that skips the manual interpretation step entirely. Instead of running a report and hunting for problems, imagine a system that just tells you:
“Your revenue’s down 11% in lane five today. Your intercom calls are up 25%, and the health status of that device might be why.”
That’s the line between historical reporting and business intelligence. One tells you what happened last month. The other tells you what’s happening today, while you can still do something about it. And doing something about it faster is the whole point.
What a Spike in Calls Is Really Telling You
Givens shared a number worth remembering. In a healthy, well-run location, Parker Technology calls typically make up just three to five percent of total transactions. When something’s wrong, that number can climb toward 70%.
Read that again. That number is an early warning system.
Givens recalled equipment at his previous job that a vendor insisted was fine, month after month, until rising call data made the malfunction impossible to argue with. “The calls that Parker Technology are taking are proving our point,” he said.
If you’re not watching call volume alongside your transaction data, you’re waiting for drivers to complain loudly enough that someone finally listens. That’s an expensive way to find out something’s broken.
Occupancy-Based Pricing Isn’t Dynamic Pricing
An audience question about dynamic pricing gave Nester a chance to clear up a mix-up he hears constantly in the industry. Raising your rate because occupancy hit 80% is demand-based pricing. It’s reacting to one number.
Real dynamic pricing, he said, factors in traffic patterns, weather and events happening across the city, adjusting ahead of demand instead of chasing it.
If your pricing strategy only reacts to occupancy, you’re leaving money on the table during the exact moments demand moves fastest. Big events. Bad weather. Rush hour. By the time your occupancy number catches up, the surge already happened without you.
The Fastest Way to Get What You Need? Ask.
One of the most useful moments of the session came from the audience. An attendee raised a specific need, and Nester’s response was straightforward: ask.
He described a recent case where a customer’s request got solved in a single conversation with a technology partner, saving that client money they were prepared to spend elsewhere. “We don’t know what we don’t know,” he said. “So if you need something, ask us, and we’ll see if we can do it.”
Givens connected this to Parker Technology’s own roadmap, including Ambassador Assist, which will let operators update business rules directly instead of routing every change through a phone call or an email chain. One request is a note. Five requests from different customers is a priority.
If you’ve been quietly working around a limitation instead of asking about it, your provider might already be able to solve it faster than you’re solving it yourself.
Reporting Is the Beginning, Not the End
Givens closed the session with the line that summed it up best: “The reporting of the data is not the end of the conversation. It’s the beginning of an operational decision.”
The operators getting the most out of their technology stack aren’t the ones with the most dashboards. They’re the ones who’ve built the habit of asking what the data is telling them, and who tell their partners what they actually need instead of quietly working around the gap.
If your mornings are still spent turning reports into spreadsheets instead of turning them into decisions, that’s the fix worth making first.
Ryan Givens, PTMP
National Account Executive
Ryan Givens, PTMP, is a seasoned parking and mobility professional with extensive experience in leadership, operations, and customer experience. At Parker Technology, he partners with operators nationwide to implement solutions that blend technology, service, and culture to elevate the parker experience.