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| Subject: transit card/national | |
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Author: Cubic 18/11/02--little interest/clearing and settlement |
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Date Posted: Friday, January 24, 05:25:23pm HTML Help For All ----------------------------------------------------------- On the 18/11/2002 it was reported in the press the following about Cubic. ----------------------------------------------------------- San Diego—Cubic has little interest in the clearing and settlement side of transit, preferring instead to be a universal-ticket system provider, says Richard Johnson, chief operating officer. Cubic has working demos for putting season tickets on cards for several Major League Baseball teams. “Our focus is doing things with point-of-entry or tickets,” Johnson says. (Cat has a baseball team.) ----------------------------------------------------------- Cubic’s model includes shifting customer service to the Web. In September, Cubic announced that the San Diego Metropolitan Transit Development Board would offer riders the ability to buy smart cards and transit passes over the Web. The Web lowers costs, Johnson says. “Our vision of the future is not a clerk handing out a smart card instead of a token.” ----------------------------------------------------------- Chicago—In Chicago, Cubic provides the cards and readers for the Chicago Transit Authority’s contactless smart card program. The CTA has bought 300,000 chip cards from Cubic, though only a small fraction are currently in use. Some aspects of Chicago’s move to a smart card should prove relatively simple to implement. For example, Cubic’s mag-stripe readers are capable of also reading the smart card. (CAT technology works on both magnetic and smartcard) ----------------------------------------------------------- Cards cost $5 but that includes a a balance-protection program. Cubic provides the readers subcontracts for the cards with Gemplus International, Giesecke & Devrient and SchlumbergerSema. ----------------------------------------------------------- WMATA has explored marrying card payments and transit through a two-year-old pilot with Wachovia Corp.’s First Union Bank to issue a cobranded credit card with a mag-stripe and a chip. The program has about 400 participants. The agency doesn’t provide details on usage. ----------------------------------------------------------- In 2003, the agency plans to integrate SmarTrip into transit agencies serving Baltimore and the suburbs between the two cities. Last year, WMATA issued a request for proposals seeking firms to provide clearing, authorization and settlement for the integration. It also would like to outsource a customer-service center along with the card issuing and account maintenance. The agency is expected to award a contract by year’s end. contract awarded to ERG 20/1/03 ------------------------------------------------------------ If an integrated, multi-metropolitan system is to work, agencies need to focus on transit and bring in others to work on the money side, says Garback. “Our core competency is moving people,” he says. “It makes sense to get a financial entity to manage finances.” ------------------------------------------------------------ The ultimate goal is a transit card that can be used nationally. Getting there won’t be easy. Most big cities are served by multiple transit systems that handle individual regions. First, those intra-city groups have to create payment networks. Once that works, metropolitan areas could begin communicating with each other. Transit is trying to modernize itself. Several major agencies are running smart card pilots. ------------------------------------------------------------ Some are seeking to hire payment companies to run their clearing and settlement systems. [ Next Thread | Previous Thread | Next Message | Previous Message ] |