Ed wrote --

>  JM> I'll read the line and think "what word would go
there?" then make a guess.

>  When You started writing Parking Tickets at Marshall would You be
able to Read any of the first Tickets that You wrote, if any copies of them
are still in the Office?

  For the most part we used hand held electronic devices where we entered
the information and it was printed out.
  Sometimes we would use paper tickets, but the office staff really
disliked those since everything on them had to be manually imputed into the
computer, whereas the handhelds were just downloaded.
  There were times I would be asked what something was I wrote and I would
have to think a second.  
  With paper tickets we had put in the time, date, location, vehicle
information (make, style, etc) along the license/permit number, etc each time. 
The electronic tickets kept the same location until changed. The date/time
changed automatically.
  It took me on average about 25 seconds to write a handheld ticket.  A
paper ticket I could knock out in about 12-15 seconds from starting to putting
the ticket on the window.
  I would have a lot of a paper ticket done in advance, such as location,
the first two digits of the 24 hour time, etc, if it were a busy lot and knew
a lot of violators there (such as meters).  I would have a dozen or more
tickets partly made up when I star
  If a mistake were made, and not caught before the ticket was printed, it
would be marked as an "OE" (officer error) and the error circled and the
office would delete those.  Usually errors were caught before printed.  But
with a paper ticket that had to sti
  I made a few mistakes but not many.  Usually those were when I moved from
one lot to another and didn't change it, or find out after it printed (or
was started) the car was actually ok.
  And the tickets never really went away.
  They would stay on the computer for years and years.  Once the paper
tickets were entered they were boxed and put in storage and forgotten about.
  After the third ticket the violator was put on financial hold and
couldn't do anything that involved money (get their diploma*, register for class,
get a transcript, check a book out the library, etc).
   One day a returning student complained she was on hold and didn't know
why, she hadn't been a student in years and was returning to take a class. 
She was told she had unpaid tickets from 15 years before.  Yes, she had to
pay them. 
  Once in a while someone would fall between the cracks and get away.  But
if they needed any of the above, they were often finally caught.
  Joe
 
(*They could still graduate, but when they opened their folder it was
empty).
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