In an email to subscribers today, pay-by-phone parking app Parkmobile admitted that maybe it was a little simplistic to pin an increase in transaction fees on financial reform legislation passed by Congress, as it did last week.

“Last week in a press release and email announcement introducing the Parkmobile Wallet, a simpler, lower cost way to pay for parking in the District of Columbia, the company made an overly simplistic statement about the underlying cause of increasing card transaction fees. In an attempt to explain why costs have increased the company left the potentially confusing impression that Federal legislation is to blame. The company apologizes for any confusion caused by this statement,” wrote Laurens Eckelboom, the company’s Executive Vice-President for Marketing.

In Parkmobile’s initial missive to customers explaining why transaction fees were jumping from 32 to 45 cents, the company said that an amendment sponsored by Senator Dick Durbin (D-Ill.) limiting debit card swipe fees was to blame. Durbin was quick to respond, angrily writing that maybe Parkmobile should lay the blame at the feet of Mastercard and Visa, both of which ended longstanding discounts on small transactions after Durbin’s amendment was passed into law.

Before today’s mea culpa from Parkmobile executives, customer service representatives were quietly walking back the company’s claims. In one email to an irate customer on October 26, a Parkmobile representative wrote:

The card brands and large issuing banks weren’t too happy about having their debit interchange fees capped. So, they responded by raising regulated debit interchange fees to the cap across the board without regard to transaction size. The result is that businesses with a small average ticket no longer get special treatment on regulated debit transactions. This is especially damaging since debit cards are used far more frequently than credit cards to pay for small transactions.

In Parkmobile’s case, payment processing costs have tripled because of these changes. The rate increase started impacting us in March of this year. We chose not to pass along these extra fees until we were able to offer our Members a cost effective alternative – the Parkmobile Wallet. The Parkmobile Wallet will lower the transaction fee to $0.30.

This could all have been avoided if Parkmobile had just written this to begin with, huh?