PayStay

PayStay is Melbourne's de facto standard for street parking and the payment app behind dozens of Australian councils. Enter the zone number from the sign, start your session and walk away — billing runs per minute up to the posted cap, and you can extend from the café table instead of jogging back to the meter. With saved vehicles and automatic payments, regular parkers barely think about the process at all.

• Per-Minute Billing — Pay only for the exact time you park, never the full meter block

• Remote Extensions — Add time from anywhere before your session expires

• Melbourne-Wide — The official payment app across the City of Melbourne and dozens of councils

• Multiple Vehicles — Switch between household cars or fleet vehicles in a tap

• Session History — Receipts and history make expense claims painless

Within its Victorian heartland, PayStay is superb. Zone entry is quick, per-minute billing consistently beats feeding coins into a meter, and expiry notifications arrive with enough margin to actually act on them. The council-by-council coverage model means you should check your regular suburbs are supported, and the interface, while clear, won't win design awards. But as a daily tool for Melbourne drivers it does exactly what it promises, reliably.

Melbourne commuters and CBD regulars benefit most — anyone parking on-street in the city center several times a week. Tradespeople moving between jobs across council areas keep one payment method for all of them. Visitors to Melbourne skip deciphering parking signs and meters on day one. Drivers elsewhere in Australia should check their council's supported app first, as coverage is strongest in Victoria.

1. 1

   Get PayStay free from the Google Play Store or App Store

2. 2

   Create your account and verify your details

3. 3

   Add your vehicle registration and payment method

4. 4

   Find the PayStay zone number on the parking sign

5. 5

   Start your session and get on with your day

6. 6

   Extend or stop remotely whenever plans change