System, method and computer program for an access control system

A method for controlling access to a vehicular parking area, the method including:

• receiving, at a user's mobile communication device via an input device thereof, data to reserve a park in the vehicular parking area, wherein a barrier is configured to restrict unauthorised entry to the vehicular parking area via the entry point;
• transferring, from the mobile communication device to a server processing system, the data to reserve the park in the vehicular parking area;
• transferring, from the server processing system to the mobile communication device, data indicative of the reservation that has been received;
• determining whether one or more short range wireless signals, communicated between the user's mobile communication device located in a vehicle and a communication device of an access control device, meet or exceed a threshold of one or more entry criteria, the threshold of the one or more entry criteria using a received signal strength threshold of the one or more short range wireless signals, wherein the communication device of the access control device is fixed adjacent the entry point;
• in response to the one or more short range wireless signals meeting or exceeding the threshold of the one or more entry criteria, receiving, from the mobile communication device at the communication device, an entry request, wherein the mobile communication device does not require Internet access to generate and transfer the entry request to the communication device, wherein the mobile communication device generates and transfers the entry request to the communication device in response to user selection of a button presented to the user on a user interface displayed by an output device of the mobile communication device, wherein the entry request is indicative of the reservation, wherein the button is not selectable by the user if the one or more short range wireless signals do not meet or exceed the threshold of the one or more entry criteria, and the button is selectable if the one or more short range wireless signal meet or exceed the threshold of the one or more entry criteria;
• determining whether the user of the mobile communication device is authorised to enter the vehicular parking area using the reservation indicated by the entry request and the data stored by a data store accessible via a server processing system in communication with the communication device of the access control device, wherein the data stored by the data store is indicative of one or more entities authorised to enter the vehicular parking area;
• in response to determining, using the access control processing system, that the user of the mobile communication device is authorised to enter the vehicular parking area, controlling, by the access control device, actuation of the barrier at the entry point to allow the user within the vehicle to enter the vehicular parking area through the entry point;
• and
• receiving, at the mobile communication device and from the server processing system, authorisation data indicative of the entity being granted access to enter the vehicular parking area by the access control device,
• wherein the mobile communication device is configured to ignore one or more short range wireless signals from an exit communication device of an exit point controller if the mobile communication device has not received the authorisation data, and
• wherein an exit request, which is generated based at least on the one or more short range wireless signals from the exit communication device and which is transferred from the mobile communication device to the exit communication device when the user is seeking to exit the vehicular parking area, is indicative of the authorisation data.