Stockholm county to decide for a new mass transit ticketing system

Now is the time for Stockholm County Public Transport to see what the next generation ticket- and payment system will be.

In Stockholm, a system based on so called smart cards is used essentially, supplemented with a mobile ticket system for single tickets. The smart card is a “truth on card based system” while the mobile ticketing system is an on-line system. The card based system – SL Access – has been in operation since 2010.

The life cycle of the system is not endless while our customers are setting new requirements and expectations for a ticket and payment system, coupled with the mobile and card market offering new services that may be useful in a future ticket and payment system.

The development in the market for ticket and payment systems is very fast today. New opportunities are constantly being presented around the world, the mobile phone has a more prominent role. The desire to buy, handle and use its ticket in new ways develops continuously. However, many new solutions presented on the market are in the early stages and need time to mature and become mainstream.

Stockholm public transport has decided to initiate the program “Next Ticket System”. The overall objective of the program is to create conditions for securing the ticket revenues, now and in the future.

Targets towards effectiveness show what Stockholm wants to achieve with IT systems to meet customer expectations concerning ticket purchase and validation. In our vision and business plans in the regional traffic management program particular emphasis is placed on the expectations that the customer has from a ticket system. The IT system for ticket and payment solutions ensures that users can easily purchase, receive and validate a ticket.

It should be user friendly for all and efficient to manage, whilst ensuring that sales costs per sold ticket are reduced. Furthermore, that system should be interoperable with other traffic operators and enable integration with other actors, for example, contributing to increased public transport, like MaaS operators.

The effective goals are developed with a customer centric focus. Quantitative and qualitative customer surveys, trend analyzes, world-wide surveillance of payment and ticket solutions and knowledge of how other companies conduct business shape the baseline of our ticketing and payment strategy.

A well-functioning IT support for ticket and “pay-as you go” solutions contributes to satisfied travelers and increased use of public transport. The ticket system should be intuitive and easy to understand. The system will support a high level of self-service. For those traveling with other operators, the ticket system will support interoperable travel.

The IT solution is characterized by high availability when purchasing and validating tickets both physically and functionally. The traveler himself must be able to handle his ticket easily, regardless of the choice of sales channel or ticket carrier. A ticket system that is available, uniform, intuitive and user-friendly throughout traffic contributes to the expected increased market shares in Stockholm County’s public transport.

The IT solution will offer a mechanical validation of all tickets. A secure and accessible machine validation solution throughout the public transport system entails a high level of revenue hedging, which in itself minimizes mishandling and dodging. Traffic staffs do not need to make their own assessments regarding the authenticity of a ticket, which also ensures that all travelers are treated in the same way throughout the traffic-system.

Cost effectiveness is measured by cost per revenue. Effective revenue hedging contributes to resource efficiency and a well-functioning ticketing system is the basis for cost-effective development and management.

A well-functioning ticket system means that a ticket purchase should not be a threshold for travelling with public transport. It is important that a ticket system both within and outside the county through so-called interoperable ticket solutions supports the traffic offered to passengers.

The system is built with an architecture that allows for further development of processes and IT systems in areas such as purchase, validation, control and follow-up of a ticket, as well as adjacent areas, such as financial monitoring.

The New Ticket System program now is in the start-up phase. The first decisions are expected to be made in 2018. One of the first will be about the selection of the path for the ticket system architecture and the business model.