DOTr eyeing other cashless alternatives to beep cards

FILE PHOTO: Transportation Secretary Jaime Bautista. INQUIRER FILES

MANILA, Philippines — The Department of Transportation (DOTr) on Tuesday said it is exploring other means of cashless payment — like QR codes, debit cards, credit cards and cellular phones —  as part of its effort to improve the public transportation system.

These new methods, said DOTr in a statement, will allow users to opt for other cashless means to pay fares in buses, rail lines and modernized jeepneys apart from its Beep Cards.

According to Transport Secretary Jaime Bautista, instituting the Automated Fare Collection System (AFCS) will bring the country “closer to achieving global standards in cashless payments when commuting, following the norm in many other countries that have long been using the system.”

He added it would also expand the fare payment system while keeping it secure and more convenient.

Bautista said that the DOTr and the Landbank of the Philippines have already launched the pilot production testing project for the Automated Fare Collection System (AFCS) Europay-Mastercard-Visa (EMV) at the Parañaque Integrated Terminal Exchange on Sept. 1.

It aimed to build end-to-end AFCS processing and acceptance of EMV-compatible contactless cards as a transit payment instrument, as well as to verify the entirety of the AFCS under real-time operational conditions as well as the key functionalities of the nation’s transit system.

These also came just in time after the DOTr announced a shortage of Beep Cards due to increased demand after operations on the rail transit system became fully normalized.

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JPVabc