Rocky start for Oxfordshire’s contactless bus ticketing scheme
03 November, 2010
category: Contactless, Transit
Oxford Bus company’s changeover to its new Oyster-style contactless smart card system was a bit bumpy on Sunday, as hundreds of bus passengers were told their cards were ‘invalid’ by the buses’ contactless readers, reports The Oxford Times.
Some passengers carrying refused cards were told to pay the fare and reclaim the cash later. In the meantime, Oxford Bus is allowing anyone to travel carrying old or new bus cards until the problem is fixed.
In most cases, passengers had failed to confirm their details with the firm, so they were not able to get a new card in time, says The Oxford Times.
Oxford Bus estimates that only a few hundred of the 20,000 issued cards are affected by the problem, and the firm’s managing director Philip Kirk says that the transition went well for the majority of the 16,000 journeys made on Sunday.
“Despite the publicity, a significant number of passengers did not confirm their details with us or respond to our communications and so we couldn’t send them a new updated version of the key in time for the changeover,” Kirk told The Oxford Times.
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