A $2.50 NYC parking ticket? This scam is too good to be true.

New York City officials are warning the public about a text message scam that seeks to trick people into paying a fine that most New Yorkers find laughable: a $2.50 parking ticket.

The text states that settling the unpaid parking balance will allow vehicle owners to avoid the steeper fee of $25. It includes a link that resembles the name of an official city website known as NYC City Pay, where residents can make a variety of payments for city services, permits and violations.

In scam parlance, such texts are known as “smishing” campaigns, i.e., fraud attacks that use SMS or text messages.

“Many of us say it could never happen to me,” Mayor Eric Adams said Tuesday during his press conference at City Hall. “You'd be surprised how we are looped into these various requests for our personal information.”

He said the Department of Finance and City Pay would never request payment from anyone via a text message.

City officials did not say how many people had officially reported receiving the text, although Fabien Levy, deputy mayor of communications, said he himself had received the text.

Within the Gothamist newsroom, five people said they’d been targeted. Transit reporter Stephen Nessen said he’d gotten the text multiple times.

Assemblymember Ron Kim of Queens said that not only had he received the text, he was a victim of a social media scam last year.

“I had to spend months getting my identity secure, clearing up my credit, etc.” he wrote on X.

“It was an absolute nightmare.”

On Reddit, people who claimed they lived in states as far California said they had received the text. Those familiar with New York City’s car culture remarked on the absurdly low fine for a city where parking tickets can cost over $100.

“No one gets an NYC parking ticket for $2.50,” one person wrote.

The scam inspired one commenter named Impossible_Dinner_85 to look up their real fines on the city’s website. The total was $193.

“2.50 sounding much better,” they wrote.