Transit authority looking for new ticketing app provider
The Butler Transit Authority is looking for a new phone application to manage its electronic ticketing.
The authority’s board of directors voted at a meeting Tuesday, Aug. 8, to request proposals for a new mobile ticketing service. The authority currently contracts with Token Transit, a fare payment platform based in San Francisco.
“We’re looking to upgrade from our current phone app; there is new technology,” said John Paul, the authority’s executive director.
Paul said the transit authority is preparing to eliminate its electronic fare boxes in favor of cash drop boxes on buses “because of the cost of the (electronic) box and the maintenance.”
Tiffany Fosnaught, finance manager for the authority, also said the authority’s electronic fare boxes are “fully depreciated,” so the agency is preparing to phase them out. Paul said riders also can pay their fares by electronic cards.
“We’ll have to go out for separate proposals for the actual fare boxes,” Paul said. “There’s only a couple companies that make them, and they have to be made in America.”
The authority also received a payment from ANR Transportation for $14,127, which reimburses the transit authority for an owed payment to Peoples Gas.
At the July board of directors meeting, Paul told the board Peoples inadvertently underbilled the authority about $205,000 over a seven-year period because of a billing error on Peoples’ part.
The authority and Peoples agreed to a settlement of $170,000, and ANR paid a percentage of the cost based on the amount of space the organization rents from the transit authority.