leap card app

coylemj

legend99 wrote: »

I always thought a major aim of a Smart Card for transport was to help speed up the loading of passengers. I find it incredible that Leap has actually slowed it down.

You still have to tell the driver your destination so he knows what fare to charge. She/He then, it appears to me, has to set the machine to charge that much, and the card takes upwards of 5-8 seconds to give it the okay?

I always declare the fare so the driver doesn't have to work out anything, all he has to do is press the second button to deduct €2.25 which is what I usually pay when I interact with the driver.

The delay you're describing is principally caused by the time it takes the driver's machine to read the card. I have often seen him with his finger over the €2.25 button, waiting for the machine to read my card to verify the balance.

Thelonious Monk

Can you not tag on and tag off Dublin buses and it charges you appropriately? Why arent there flat fares like in most places?

p_haugh

Thelonious Monk wrote: »

Can you not tag on and tag off Dublin buses and it charges you appropriately? Why arent there flat fares like in most places?

If you go to tag off on Dublin bus it just charges you the full fare. The NTA are working on making it a flat fare for Dublin bus & go ahead within the next year or so hopefully

bk

Thelonious Monk wrote: »

are there any plans to just scan your phone or bank card like it is in London and everywhere else these days? Leap technology must be 20 years old at this stage.

Yes, contactless debit/credit cards + mobile payment (apple pay, etc.) are part of the next generation Leap project. Though it sounds like it is still more then a year away and a few years for full implementation.

Thelonious Monk wrote: »

Can you not tag on and tag off Dublin buses and it charges you appropriately? Why arent there flat fares like in most places?

No, there is no tag-off on buses in Dublin, tag-off is only on Luas and Rail. Buses is similar to Cork. Either tag-on at the right hand validator and pay the most expensive fare (longest distance) or interact with the driver if going a shorter distance and paying a cheaper fare like €2.25

There is a plan to introduce a sort of flat fare in Dublin. A 90 minute fare that you can use across multiple buses for 90 minutes. That will be the default fare and the one most people will get. Strictly speaking there will be one other fare, for very short distances, you'll need to interact with the driver to get that fare, however the vast majority of people will be covered by the 90 minute one and it should simplify and speed things up.

They have been working towards this for a few years now, they have already turned the child fare basically into a flat fare and hopefully we will have the 90 minute one too soon.

coylemj wrote: »

I always declare the fare so the driver doesn't have to work out anything, all he has to do is press the second button to deduct €2.25 which is what I usually pay when I interact with the driver.

The delay you're describing is principally caused by the time it takes the driver's machine to read the card. I have often seen him with his finger over the €2.25 button, waiting for the machine to read my card to verify the balance.

I do the same in Dublin, just say €2.25. But in Cork it is even slower! You have the same wait for the machine to read the card, but then the driver looks like they have to press 3 buttons or so, even though on most routes in cork it is a flat fare

Vic_08

bk wrote: »

I do the same in Dublin, just say €2.25. But in Cork it is even slower! You have the same wait for the machine to read the card, but then the driver looks like they have to press 3 buttons or so, even though on most routes in cork it is a flat fare

This may have changed since I used them, but it sounds like they haven't.

The delay is primarily down to the machines looking for a valid ticket, failing to find one, displaying a message to that effect and then switching to the ticket from e-purse page.

This can be shortcutted by the driver by pressing a button BEFORE the card is presented which immediately presents the fare deduction menu but if that is done and the passenger is just validating a period ticket it won't validate, just wait for the driver to deduct a fare. In that case the card needs to be removed and re-scanned after the machine resets.

Drivers can try to question the passenger before they preesent their Leap card but that takes as long and some passengers assume the driver is being bolshie and take the hump, eventually the drivers just give up and let the rubbish TIMs do their ponderous thing.

It was explained many times to the developers by the drivers who initially trialled the leap implementation that requiring the passenger to state their ticketing requirements before presenting the card was stupid and impractical but of course the highly paid IT graduates knew better.

We had already been through it with the introduction of those crap Wayfarer TGX 150s, the machines were poor and ancient when BE bought them but the implementation was unnecessarily awful to use, if the input of drivers had been sought and taken on board before programming them then they would have been significantly quicker and easier to use.

Even something as ridiculously simple as the machine remaining in the same menu was too much trouble for them to implement, so you had the situation where to issue the same ticket to a long queue of passengers would require multiple button presses to display the correct ticket for each passenger as the machine would automatically revert to the base menu 5 seconds after each issue, if you tried to beat the timer and pressed it as it was reverting it could issue the ticket you wanted or the wrong one so you would have to take the ticket yourself and check it was the correct one.

That is only scratching the surface of how bad those machines are.

legend99

Vic_08 wrote: »

This may have changed since I used them, but it sounds like they haven't.

The delay is primarily down to the machines looking for a valid ticket, failing to find one, displaying a message to that effect and then switching to the ticket from e-purse page.

This can be shortcutted by the driver by pressing a button BEFORE the card is presented which immediately presents the fare deduction menu but if that is done and the passenger is just validating a period ticket it won't validate, just wait for the driver to deduct a fare. In that case the card needs to be removed and re-scanned after the machine resets.

Drivers can try to question the passenger before they preesent their Leap card but that takes as long and some passengers assume the driver is being bolshie and take the hump, eventually the drivers just give up and let the rubbish TIMs do their ponderous thing.

It was explained many times to the developers by the drivers who initially trialled the leap implementation that requiring the passenger to state their ticketing requirements before presenting the card was stupid and impractical but of course the highly paid IT graduates knew better.

We had already been through it with the introduction of those crap Wayfarer TGX 150s, the machines were poor and ancient when BE bought them but the implementation was unnecessarily awful to use, if the input of drivers had been sought and taken on board before programming them then they would have been significantly quicker and easier to use.

Even something as ridiculously simple as the machine remaining in the same menu was too much trouble for them to implement, so you had the situation where to issue the same ticket to a long queue of passengers would require multiple button presses to display the correct ticket for each passenger as the machine would automatically revert to the base menu 5 seconds after each issue, if you tried to beat the timer and pressed it as it was reverting it could issue the ticket you wanted or the wrong one so you would have to take the ticket yourself and check it was the correct one.

That is only scratching the surface of how bad those machines are.

I don't envy any driver dealing with that. In Cork the load time of buses is crazy. It is beyond inefficient. I really don't understand why someone can't just analyse say ten cities and take the best of each and build that here.

bk

Vic_08, that sounds like an absolutely dreadful design and user interface! And it confirms much of what I could guess from the customer side.

However I might slightly defend the overpaid IT graduates. I don't have any inside knowledge, but I'd seriously doubt they designed it in this way on purpose.

I suspect there are severe limitations on what they can do based on how poor and underpowered the Wayfarer machines are. I suspect the machines have such limited memory and processing power that they can only be in one mode at a time and thus the crazy switching between modes.

I suspect the requirements for Leap are far beyond what the ancient Wayfarer is really capable of. It looks like it was a machine really only designed to handle basic cash fares that is now being asked to do too much!

I could be wrong, if they didn't design it like this, without a good technical reason for it, then yes, they should be shot out of a canon!

legend99 wrote: »

I don't envy any driver dealing with that. In Cork the load time of buses is crazy. It is beyond inefficient. I really don't understand why someone can't just analyse say ten cities and take the best of each and build that here.

It is an age old story with public sector "technology" projects (happens in private sector too, but less often IME). Take a broken manual process and try and fix it by simply layering expensive technology on top of it, without actually allowing the broken manual process to first or also be fixed. Of course it always ends up the same, a process that is still broken and inefficient, but now with expensive technology on top that doesn't really help and can even make it worse!

The expensive IT consultants usually know this, and will tell the civil servants, but often it gets ignored, usually the civil servants are afraid of making major process changes. In the end the IT consultants can only bid on the contract offered and have to deliver it to the spec specified in the contract which would normally not all for such change (at least in the past).

Most of the Dublin Bus ticketing issues stem from very poor decisions made when they decided to get rid of ticket checkers. Back then you had an almost European style system, two door buses, you don't interact with the driver, just get on and sit and buy the ticket from the ticket checker. Nice and fast.

But when they (understandably) got rid of the ticket checkers, they replaced them with the worst process possible. They got rid of the second door and made you buy the ticket from the driver, with a complicated fare stage system. It was a complete disaster!

When Leap came along, they just layered the Leap card ontop of this already broken system and on top of that they used the ancient and insufficient ticket machines. Of course it didn't fix anything!

What's worse about this, is that even back in the 80's a better system existed all over mainland Europe and even without any fancy tickets.

You bought a book of tickets in a shop, buses have 3/4 doors, enter/exit through any door, validate ticket on the bus by having the date/time printed on a paper ticket + inspectors. Sort of similar to how the Luas works.

A system that has existed since before the 1950's all over Europe! Very fast and efficient and didn't need any fancy tech. Now a lot of those systems have replaced the paper ticket with a smart card/app, but the overall system is the same and as efficient as ever.

Instead in the 80's someone made the poor decision to force everyone through one door and to interact with the driver, it is the worst system possible and we still continue to suffer from this mistake.

Fortunately it looks like these mistakes were recognised and they are VERY slowly being corrected. Obviously Luas went with the correct approach from the start. Single door buses are being replaced by dual door buses and they are slowly moving towards a flat fare and less driver interaction. Plus eventually new ticket machines and mobile payments, etc.

It isn't the perfect system IMO, but it should be a lot better then what we currently have.

It is all pretty much a text book example of not how to do major technology projects and process change.

GT89

When were the TGX150s first bought for DB and BE. I've heard they date back to the 90s but they introduced on DB and BE sometime in the mid noughties iirc. So I'm guessing they were outdated when they were bought.

GT89

I think the one positive to come from CV19 has been the use of both doors by all drivers and passengers lets hope it remains that way for good now.

Peregrine

A new ticketing platform for Expressway including contactless, Google Pay and Apple Pay launched today. The contract was awarded to Turnit mid last year. The NTA are still 18 months away from awarding their contract.

https://twitter.com/ExpresswayIRE/status/1363926533421760512?s=20

bk

Peregrine wrote: »

A new ticketing platform for Expressway including contactless, Google Pay and Apple Pay launched today. The contract was awarded to Turnit mid last year. The NTA are still 18 months away from awarding their contract.

Great that Expressway is now offering this.

But Aircoach has been offering the same ticketing options for more then a year and a half now, what took BE so long?!

Also NTA actually awarded a contract to Cubic Systems back in 2019 for a similar mobile ticketing system for commuter PSO routes and actually started trialling it on the 133 mid last year:

https://www.thejournal.ie/nta-mobile-ticketing-app-5169192-Aug2020/

However I suspect it's rollout has been delayed due to Payzone suing the NTA in the high court over the contract:
https://www.irishexaminer.com/business/arid-31008177.html

I wonder does anyone know how that court case is going?

If you mean the next generation leap card, well that is something very different to the above and vastly more complicated.

All of the above are pretty simple evolutions on the existing ticketing systems. They still require driver interaction, either asking the driver to buy a ticket and then offering your contactless card to pay for it rather then cash or buying a ticket on your phone first and showing the driver your ticket on the phone as you board. All not that different from the past, just a contactless or mobile, rather then cash or a printed ticket/email.

This is good that these are happening, these are suitable technologies for long range intercity and commuter type services.

However the next gen leap project is a whole different kettle of fish. It is aimed at short distance mass transit services. It needs to be rolled out across Dublin Bus, GAI, Luas, DART, BE city services, etc.

Unlike the above options, the goal would be to eliminate driver interaction. It needs to correctly handle capping, transfers, etc.

Technically speaking, it is a vastly more complicated project. I too am annoyed at how long it is taking, but it isn't at all comparable to the above MyExpress ticketing system.

Xterminator

yep, with the bus connects strategy, a lot of people will be changing more often, and less people will be going direct to their destination. this is a change people will have to get used to.

It also means the ticketing system needs to be able to handle the complexities of someone using the bus to say a luas stop, then jumping on a dart from the luas, and possible using a bus to complete the journey, and for the ticket to treat this as one journey.

Mrs OBumble

bk wrote: »

Great that Expressway is now offering this.

.

However introducing it at the same time as removing through ticketing from non-expressway services could have some interesting consequences.

It's now impossible to buy a Bus Eireann ticket that involves any change of bus on their website. Even if both buses are PSO.

bk

Mrs OBumble wrote: »

However introducing it at the same time as removing through ticketing from non-expressway services could have some interesting consequences.

It's now impossible to buy a Bus Eireann ticket that involves any change of bus on their website. Even if both buses are PSO.

Yes, that sounds like a major downgrade!!

Xterminator

you cannot buy a ticket on swords express or matthews coaches that allows you to use the luas etc.
Who would you expect BE to operate differently?

markpb

Xterminator wrote: »

you cannot buy a ticket on swords express or matthews coaches that allows you to use the luas etc.
Who would you expect BE to operate differently?

Because you could for at very long time?

Greenlights16

Disappointing but not surprising in 2021 ireland that the two leap card apps on the App Store for iPhone are a complete shambles. Wont even let you log in or else crashes despite re downloading and deleting multiple times.

Can you top it up online? Or do you literally have to go to a machine or something?

“ Apple has protected the use of its NFC chip and has prevented its use by third parties.” some cop out

bk

Greenlights16 wrote: »

Disappointing but not surprising in 2021 ireland that the two leap card apps on the App Store for iPhone are a complete shambles. Wont even let you log in or else crashes despite re downloading and deleting multiple times.

Can you top it up online? Or do you literally have to go to a machine or something?

“ Apple has protected the use of its NFC chip and has prevented its use by third parties.” some cop out

Both of those apps on the Apple App store are third party apps and have no relationship with the NTA/Leap.

When you give these apps your password, they are behind the scenes using your password to log into the Leap card website and basically screen scrapping out the data.

You are basically trusting your password, data and privacy to a third party and you have no guarantee that it will continue to work. If it breaks, it isn't Leap/NTA's fault.

There is an official app on Android that can actually read the card and top it up directly using NFC on phones that have NFC.

Until recently this wasn't possible on iPhones as Apple stopped apps from using the NFC on the iPhone. They recently removed this restriction and supposedly the NTA are supposed to be working on a similar app for the iPhone, though it hasn't launched yet.

antimatterx

bk wrote: »

Both of those apps on the Apple App store are third party apps and have no relationship with the NTA/Leap.

When you give these apps your password, they are behind the scenes using your password to log into the Leap card website and basically screen scrapping out the data.

You are basically trusting your password, data and privacy to a third party and you have no guarantee that it will continue to work. If it breaks, it isn't Leap/NTA's fault.

There is an official app on Android that can actually read the card and top it up directly using NFC on phones that have NFC.

Until recently this wasn't possible on iPhones as Apple stopped apps from using the NFC on the iPhone. They recently removed this restriction and supposedly the NTA are supposed to be working on a similar app for the iPhone, though it hasn't launched yet.

The IOS app hasn't officially been released. Some people got notifications through the TFI app offering them beta access. A friend of mine has it, and it works seamlessly.

dublinman1990

bk wrote: »

Great that Expressway is now offering this.

But Aircoach has been offering the same ticketing options for more then a year and a half now, what took BE so long?!

Also NTA actually awarded a contract to Cubic Systems back in 2019 for a similar mobile ticketing system for commuter PSO routes and actually started trialling it on the 133 mid last year:

https://www.thejournal.ie/nta-mobile-ticketing-app-5169192-Aug2020/

However I suspect it's rollout has been delayed due to Payzone suing the NTA in the high court over the contract:
https://www.irishexaminer.com/business/arid-31008177.html

I wonder does anyone know how that court case is going?

If you mean the next generation leap card, well that is something very different to the above and vastly more complicated.

All of the above are pretty simple evolutions on the existing ticketing systems. They still require driver interaction, either asking the driver to buy a ticket and then offering your contactless card to pay for it rather then cash or buying a ticket on your phone first and showing the driver your ticket on the phone as you board. All not that different from the past, just a contactless or mobile, rather then cash or a printed ticket/email.

This is good that these are happening, these are suitable technologies for long range intercity and commuter type services.

However the next gen leap project is a whole different kettle of fish. It is aimed at short distance mass transit services. It needs to be rolled out across Dublin Bus, GAI, Luas, DART, BE city services, etc.

Unlike the above options, the goal would be to eliminate driver interaction. It needs to correctly handle capping, transfers, etc.

Technically speaking, it is a vastly more complicated project. I too am annoyed at how long it is taking, but it isn't at all comparable to the above MyExpress ticketing system.

That mobile ticketing app is now called TFIGo. It's on iOS and Android now.

https://www.transportforireland.ie/tfi-go-app/

Sam the Sham

Mr.S wrote: »

The new iOS they are testing at the moment is great, a godsend for topping up now. I think it’s releasing relatively soon as the beta version currently being tested is very stable.

It's out now and works well.

What I don't understand is why we have to top up physical cards when the phone itself is perfectly capable of functioning as a travel card (as is the case in many other jurisdictions).

antimatterx

Sam the Sham wrote: »

It's out now and works well.

What I don't understand is why we have to top up physical cards when the phone itself is perfectly capable of functioning as a travel card (as is the case in many other jurisdictions).

I'd love to dump my physical wallet.

You should be able to have bank cards, travel cards, access cards and ID (passport etc) on a digital wallet. It's not hard to implement.

markpb

Sam the Sham wrote: »

It's out now and works well.

What I don't understand is why we have to top up physical cards when the phone itself is perfectly capable of functioning as a travel card (as is the case in many other jurisdictions).

Most other cities that let you pay by phone use Contactless EMV, the same as using your phone as a debit card in a shop. To achieve that, every Leap validator, every DART turnstile and every DB ticket machine would need to be replaced with EMV certified hardware. Then the entire back office would need to be replaced. I’m sure it’ll happen eventually but it’ll be very expensive and take time.

It might be possible to write an app that embeds a Leap card inside the phone but no one is going to do that on Android because it lacks an SE like the iPhone. And then Apple’s security restrictions around the use of the NFC chipset would stop you.

breezy1985

I don't understand this app. Is it only for the 10 journey ticket ?

I can't seem to do anything else on it

bk

antimatterx wrote: »

I'd love to dump my physical wallet.

You should be able to have bank cards, travel cards, access cards and ID (passport etc) on a digital wallet. It's not hard to implement.

Same here, a lot of this is starting to come. Obviously we already have the bank cards, I've used my phone for airline tickets and bus tickets, some places in the US are trailing driver licenses (ID) on phones.

Then there is also using your phone as the keys to your car and house.

markpb wrote: »

Most other cities that let you pay by phone use Contactless EMV, the same as using your phone as a debit card in a shop. To achieve that, every Leap validator, every DART turnstile and every DB ticket machine would need to be replaced with EMV certified hardware. Then the entire back office would need to be replaced. I’m sure it’ll happen eventually but it’ll be very expensive and take time.

Yep and is being worked on as part of the Next Gen Ticketing project that the NTA are running.

markpb wrote: »

It might be possible to write an app that embeds a Leap card inside the phone but no one is going to do that on Android because it lacks an SE like the iPhone. And then Apple’s security restrictions around the use of the NFC chipset would stop you.

Apple actually allows this now and has supported it with a number of transport agencies around the world:

https://support.apple.com/en-gb/HT207958

Also some Pixel's actually have a Secure Enclave, though it isn't really needed for this. Some of the biggest transport agencies in the world (e.g. Hong Kong, Japan, etc.) support their travel cards on general Android without SE.

p_haugh

breezy1985 wrote: »

I don't understand this app. Is it only for the 10 journey ticket ?

I can't seem to do anything else on it

I assume this is the TFI Go app you're talking about. They initially only have 10 journey tickets available, but I believe it is planned to eventually roll out more ticket types and open it up to more operators.

breezy1985

p_haugh wrote: »

I assume this is the TFI Go app you're talking about. They initially only have 10 journey tickets available, but I believe it is planned to eventually roll out more ticket types and open it up to more operators.

Ya sorry the Go app. I was hoping I could buy single intercity on it so hopefully that happens at some stage.


Still cant understand why you cant just use your leap card on them

p_haugh

Could not find the other thread about this, so I'll post it here as it is still relevant - bit of an update on the status with mobile/contactless payments (along with a potential virtual leap card):

https://www.thejournal.ie/public-transport-ticket-fares-ireland-digital-virtual-cashless-5499754-Jul2021/