Other payment validation media

With new technological advances, the application of fresh ways to pay for travel can now be organized such that the mechanism for fare payment and validation can be decoupled from the traditional dedicated transport media. Any portable medium that can securely hold the electronic application for fare payment and validation is suitable for the purpose.

At present, mobile phones and personal digital assistants (PDAs) are most commonly used. Their suitability arises from the fact that they are already widely available within the general population, and that they contain data processors, memory, and some degree of security. In some cases, it is also relevant that they are communications devices that are able to verify aspects of the transaction against external data resources.

Where mobile phone systems are still widely based on early technology, the payment method and fare verification is typically through text (SMS) messaging that requires visual inspection for authentication. With more modern 3G mobile communications, alternative approaches include bar-code generation for automatic reading at suitably equipped barriers.
Apart from the convenience to the passenger of these approaches, they also make the fare payment a cashless transaction with funds then being deducted from the designated bank account managing the passenger’s mobile phone payments. Clearly, though, this adds an extra complication to the systems payment management.