A TOKEN OF APPRECIATION
SEPTA, RIDERS READY TO ENTER KEY CARD ERA
As SEPTA was preparing to phase out the sale of tokens to most customers, commuters pondered the pros and cons of switching over to the SEPTA Key Card.
As of today, sales of tokens will not be readily available, although people can continue to use tokens for the foreseeable future. With the rollout in January, the Key Card allows for contactless access to buses, trackless trolleys, trolleys, the high speed line, the Market Frankford and Broad Street lines and some Regional Rail facilities.
SEPTA anticipates that the Key Card will eventually cover all travel possibilities through its system. Riders can purchase cards for a $10 minimum at the 69th Street Transportation Center and 1234 Market St. in Philadelphia.
Riders will pass their Key Card over the Validator screen at the stations to gain access to their train or bus. It can also be registered through SEPTA for loss and theft purposes.
Anyone with questions is asked to contact the Key Customer Call Center at 855-567-3782 or to visit septakey.org.
The Key Card, which has a chip, will replace Weekly and Monthly TransPasses and the One Day Convenience Pass.
Starting May 4, the Key Card will cost $4.95 and transfers are not being eliminated yet. SEPTA is working to create a photo card for CCT customers, those with disabilities and senior citizens that will serve as their fare card.
Cecile Charlton, executive director of the Delaware County Transportation Management Association, said she has seen a good reception from her members.
“People are very excited about the card because it takes away the question of ‘How much do I pay?’” she said. “They’re so used to using E-ZPass, it’s kind of like the same thing.”
In September, her organization, along with SEPTA and the county Planning Department, hosted a visit from the SEPTA Key Card truck at the Delaware County courthouse. For three hours, SEPTA and TMA officials were available to demonstrate how to use the card and the public was welcome to purchase the cards right there, rather than finding a SEPTA location that sells one.
Charlton says she can still arrange for visits from the SEPTA truck.
“For businesses, we can bring a Key Card truck,” she explained.
Charlton said she anticipated that the Key Card would positively influence the use of public transit.
“Whenever you take away that fear factor, it’s another level of comfort of taking it,” she said.
At least one commuter using the 69th Street terminal last week agreed with Charlton’s assessment.
“I like the Key Card,” Charmaine Williams of Philadelphia said. “I don’t have to stop and get tokens, I like the Key Card.”
She said she uses SEPTA “every day, seven days a week.”
Others were a little more hesitant about the new technology.
“It’s kinda dumb,” Trinity
“When I go to pay cash in my card, it doesn’t work and it gives me a green card. Then, I end up paying twice of what I’m supposed to pay … It costs me more. It doesn’t take cash – in some machines. I don’t know about all machines. I know the one in Darby, it’s done it to me three times.”
— Kim Frazier of Darby Borough
Blemings said, “because, sometimes, I don’t use my pass every day. You pay more money if you’re not using it.”
She said she uses SEPTA as her major mode of transportation to get to work, school and anywhere she needs to go.
“Tokens, I can just buy what I need for the week without spending extra money on something I don’t need,” Blemings said.
Kim Frazier of Darby Borough said she had a few difficulties in trying to get the card at the Darby Transportation Center.
“When I go to pay cash in my card, it doesn’t work and it gives me a green card,” she said. “Then, I end up paying twice of what I’m supposed to pay … It costs me more. It doesn’t take cash – in some machines. I don’t know about all machines. I know the one in Darby, it’s done it to me three times.”
The disabled woman explained that she uses SEPTA to visit her diabetic husband at Mercy Fitzgerald Hospital, where he recently had his toe amputated.
“I live on Main Street,” Frazier explained. “I take the trolley down, then get on the 113. That’s automatically $2.25 and another dollar. It should cost me $1.25 and then 50 cent.”
She said she called SEPTA and was told the money can’t be refunded to her card, although they were willing to send her a check in the mail.
“My husband was in the hospital and I was like, ‘What am I going to do?’” she asked. “This is crazy.”
The grandmom uses SEPTA to also travel to the Hospital of the University of Pennsylvania where she receives her pain management.
“I’m back and forth all over,” she said. “I just got my injections in my back today and thank God, my next door neighbor was here and she said she’ll take me home.”
Jason Otis of Drexel Hill said he found the process perplexing.
“It made it a little more confusing, didn’t it?” he asked.
On a special day out with his 8-year-old daughter, Otis was trying to navigate the system.
“I was just over there,” he said, pointing to the customer windows inside the 69th Street station. “I said, ‘Do I need a single? … I grew up in New York. I was like, ‘Can’t I just get a MetroCard?’ (Key Cards) make it more complicated.”
MetroCards have been in use in New York City since the early 1990s and cover all subway and bus lines. Customers also load money onto them electronically from machines in stations.
“In high school, we would get them,” Otis said of the MetroCards. “It seemed less complicated than having a hundred different ones. I think now, you can’t even buy singles, you have to buy a $10 card every time … I’d rather buy a $10 card right now for me and her.”
He said he was attempting to show his daughter how to use it.
“I try to teach her and she has no idea what’s even happening,” he said.
Otis, who uses the SEPTA system five to six times a month, said he’s not yet been able to use a Key Card on a bus.
“You still need to buy bus transfers and, again, that’s another level of complexity,” he said. “When I’m getting back on the train, I have to give the guy a dollar for the bus transfer.”
Otis said the cards may have the technology to include buses but at this time, it was making the expedition with his daughter a little more difficult.
“The Key Cards might be smart enough to do that but for a single passenger, it’s just another level of confusion,” he said.
SEPTA will continue to sell the tokens in bulk to certain social service agencies past the April 30 deadline and CCT Paratransit customers can continue to buy tokens at Center City sales locations with a valid SEPTA CCT identification card.
SEPTA anticipates that the Key Card will eventually cover all travel possibilities through its system. Riders can purchase cards for a $10 minimum at the 69th Street Transportation Center and 1234 Market St. in Philadelphia.