Our children did have Oyster cards, as did I. But since contactless payments became available (a long time ago now) and even more so with transit payments (great feature) it is way more convenient to not have additional cards. So when our children are of an age they can have a contactless bank card. Also makes it really easy for tourists as there is no need to have a 'card' for every city to visit...
Metrolinx Piloting Apple Pay on Toronto's UP Express, Working to Expand to TTC
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You can turn off express transit if you want. This way, you would have to FaceID or TouchID it before the iPhone or Apple Watch gives the NFC data to the reader.
Rodney Dangerfield
macrumors regular
Don't give up!...Contactless payment is inevitable!
In Canada, most people who use public transit are k-12 students or university students. The majority of paying customers are on a discounted fare, which only works if there is a separate payment system than credit cards like VISA, such as Presto or Oyster.
It's basically an Apple Pay Express Transit support. This means you can use your credit card in Apple Pay without FaceID or TouchID authentication to tap for transit. You will see each ride being charged directly to your card at the end of every trip.
It's exactly the same as tapping your credit card on the machine.
Canada is not known for futuristic techno supremacy.
Rodney Dangerfield
macrumors regular
Agree...Hopefully, the Eglinton LRT will be finished by 2022...Original Eglinton subway was cancelled in 1995 by former Ontario Premier Mike Harris and hopefully, more subway will be completed!
They don't have to do that. VISA supports eventual clearing. Ever bought anything on Air Canada with a credit card? They don't have internet on the plane (ok they do, but they don't use it for this), and credit card transactions work. You will get charged whey they sync the POS machine.
Yes, they would have to assume that your card will not bounce, that is why they only support credit cards on the plane. It's called IFC or "in flight commerce".
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It doesn't have to be that way, that to me just means that it was design with lack of imagination on how it can be used and integrated with already existing systems. TfL (London) started like that but "quickly" (ok it wasn't quick I agree but somehow Toronto seems to be making the same early mistakes) allowed such discounts and calculations to be applied irrespective of the payment method used.
Reason077
macrumors 601
Not really. When you pay with Apple Pay, the terminal gets your device card number. It's not your regular (primary) card number and can't be used outside of that payment device, but it does not change each time you use it. So it's still possible for retailers/transit companies to track your device across multiple transactions, and tie ride history to the device card number.
But, unlike most retailers, transit providers also get some special back-end access that allows them to map the device card number to your primary card number. This lets them (for example) aggregate fares for multiple ride discounts, and make the charge at the end of the day without the device present.
Reason077
macrumors 601
That's exactly how it works on London buses. Even though the buses have 4G data connections or whatever, they can't assume it's always working. The bus could be in a tunnel or coverage blackspot, for example. So transactions are batched and processed at the end of the day. Card numbers that are known to be bad or fraudulent are blacklisted.
Maybe you lose the occasional £1.50 bus fare by not doing online authentication, but realistically, the people gaming the system probably weren't going to pay anyway.
Reason077
macrumors 601
This would have made my life so much easier when I lived in Toronto. So many cold winter mornings/evenings spent on slow stuffy buses along Eglinton Ave. I can't wait to come back and ride it some day!
Reason077
macrumors 601
I don't know about Toronto, but that's not how it works on all transit providers. In London, for example, a single charge is made at the end of each day (approx. 2AM), after applying any multiple-ride discounts, daily and weekly fare caps, etc.
HiVolt
macrumors 68000
I'm talking more about traditional RFID capable credit cards & debit cards, where you may be accidentally dinged if you lean near the reader. I only mentioned my phone lighting up when near a reader (while in my pocket) to illustrate that given close enough proximity the RFID signal will go thru.
HiVolt
macrumors 68000
You can count for Metrolinx here to screw it up. It's been nothing but a disaster for years.
The term is card clash. Don’t lean against things you shouldn’t lean against. No different though compared to other situations.
Reason077
macrumors 601
The readers are designed not to activate when multiple cards are detected. Since most of us now have multiple RFIDs in our wallets, accidental activation from an in-wallet / in-pocket card is generally not a problem.
Could be an issue for a phone with Express Transit enabled, but note that Express Transit isn't turned on by default. It must be explicitly enabled in your phone settings. Also, if you paid by phone in the first place, the reader/system should be smart enough not to charge the same device twice for the same journey (ie: it guards against accidental double-payments).
AppleTO
macrumors 65816
I never thought about purchases in an airplane, to be honest, but this makes sense.
Although I think it’s kind of crazy... with no sort of pre-authorization they have no way of knowing if the card has been canceled/blocked or has reached its limit. I guess a ‘free’ ride on public transit isn’t exactly considered ‘high risk’ for Metrolinx.
To be honest, I think you misunderstand the entirety of payment systems. This is nothing new or unusual at all. It has been done like that for many decades and even in the previous century. Parking meters for example. But it also used to be restaurants and many other places where it was literally a paper process with a carbon copy in-print of the card. It's a risk based approach that clearly provides benefits opposed to checking every single transaction. Now the world is a bit more connected for many scenarios it is now cost effective to check it in near realtime. But not even the banking settlement system is in realtime
AppleTO
macrumors 65816
That’s pretty much a guarantee. Lol
Personally I try to minimize the amount of transactions I make each month on each credit/debit card. This new system doesn’t really appeal to me much because I wouldn’t want to see 40 separate Metrolinx transactions on my Bill. I’d rather load a presto card once.
However, I don’t think I’ll be taking public transit much anymore. And for the occasional trip, this new system would work well.
What is the reasoning behind trying to minimise the amount of transactions? Do you get charged by your bank for each transaction or something? I'd hope that they don't put each transaction through to your bank, but wait and calculate the total in accordance with the discounts going and then just put a transaction through for all of them. That is how it works for me in most other systems, countries. I can tap in/out 100 times in a day, still get one transaction on my card for that...
AppleTO
macrumors 65816
To be honest, I think you misunderstand the entirety of payment systems. This is nothing new or unusual at all. It has been done like that for many decades and even in the previous century. Parking meters for example. But it also used to be restaurants and many other places where it was literally a paper process with a carbon copy in-print of the card. It's a risk based approach that clearly provides benefits opposed to checking every single transaction. Now the world is a bit more connected for many scenarios it is now cost effective to check it in near realtime. But not even the banking settlement system is in realtime
I think I’m just loosing it. I’ve been tapping chip cards for about 10 years now here (i think) and I’ve completely forgot about the past.
AppleTO
macrumors 65816
To be honest, I’m just kind of OCD about it for no particular reason. I use software to keep track of purchases and like to keep it as clean as possible.
A charge at the end of the day makes sense. I’d like it even more if they could charge at the end of a week or month.
Hehehe fair enough...
Depending on the 'discount scheme' they might consolidate weekly or monthly. Or put other limits on it such that discounts get applied later...
ipedro
macrumors 603
It is integrated with PRESTO and UP Express was deliberately chosen to go first because it has low volume and is self contained without transfers. Once they confirm it works as expected and fix any kinks, it’ll be deployed to the more complex and high volume transit systems.