NYC Parking Garage Company Must Return $1.2M To Customers

TRIBECA, NY — A massive Manhattan-based parking garage company has to fork over $1.2 million to its customers after improperly charging them, according to settlement with the city's Department of Consumer Affairs.

Citizens Icon Holdings, LLC, the parent company of nearly 300 Icon and Quik Park parking garages in New York City must refund 22,756 of customers, the DCA said in a statement this week. The company must also pay a $100,000 fine to the city. (Want more local news? Sign up here for free news alerts and neighborhood updates from Patch.)

Icon reached the settlement with the city after a DCA investigation that concluded the parking garage company began charging its monthly customers with a $30 a month "NYC Living Wage Assessment" fee in January. The company increased its employees' wages to comply with state law, not in response to any city law or regulation, according to a statement from the DCA.

"A business that misleads customers about what its fees are for is violating our City’s Consumer Protection Law," DCA commissioner Lorelei Salas said in a statement. "The state’s minimum wage increase is vital for the livelihood of so many hardworking New Yorkers."

The settlement requires the company to repay the almost 23,000 customers it collected fees from and pay a $100,000 fine.

There are hundreds of Icon parking garages throughout Manhattan, as well as multiple in Newark and Brooklyn.

"For a company to misleadingly use a minimum wage increase to disguise an ordinary price hike was a deeply cynical violation of the public trust," City Council Member Helen Rosenthal said in a statement. "From the moment constituents alerted me to this issue last December, it was clear that things did not add up."

Icon charged its monthly customers in January and February of 2017, the city said.

Icon did not immediately respond to a request for comment from Patch.

Image credit: Drew Angerer / Staff / Getty Images News.