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Visitors to the 2012 Olympic Games in London could use their contactless debit and credit cards, or applications on their mobile phones, to pay for subway and bus rides around the British capital, according to CardLine Global sister publication Cards&Payments. The last time riders in London could use their own money instead closed-loop tickets or cards was in the day of horse-drawn buses and trams, the magazine reports. Now the closed loop Oyster fare card scheme accounts for payments on eight of every 10 bus and subway rides in London, Shashi Verma, head of ticketing for Transport for London, the scheme's overseer, tells Cards&Payments. Besides enabling payments with consumer cards, Verma also hopes to accept payments via mobile phones equipped with Near Field Communication technology. "I won't pretend for a minute that any of these solutions are packaged and ready to go," he says. "They're not. They're very far from being that. But they are also not completely out of reach." Verma hopes his agency launches direct contactless card payments for fares in 2011. Oyster cards likely would remain, if only for consumers who prefer cash or who do not have payment cards. By allowing more bank-issued cards for fare payments, Transport for London could reduce expenses and administrative headaches for running Oyster. Banks and processors would handle much of the payment-collection work. Similar concerns are driving efforts in other cities, including New York, Paris and Chicago, where transit officials hope to introduce open-loop fare systems. In August, the UK Department of Transport said it wants to publish by the end of the year a "dedicated strategy" for an integrated system for mass transit that likely would rely on chip cards similar to Oyster cards (CardLine Global, 21 Aug.).
