No timeline for full switchover to the Compass Card

VANCOUVER (NEWS 1130) – Just over a month after the roll-out of the new Compass Card, TransLink says things are running smoothly, but it still doesn’t know when it’ll make the full switch over.

FareSavers are no longer being sold and the transit authority says about 575,000 cards have been bought so far and nearly 1,000 to 2,000 new ones are being sold every day.

Jennifer Morland with the transit authority says they’re close to completely switching over to the smart card system but they don’t have an exact timeline.

“We want to make sure that we’ve given our customers time to make that switch from FareSavers to the Compass Card because we know there are still some people out there that are travelling with FareSavers right now, which they can continue to do that, and we’ll continue to monitor things as we go.”

When pushed for a timeline, Morland reiterated the same response.

“We know this is a big change for our customers and so that’s why we’ve taken a phased-in approach so we can give people the opportunity to learn how the system works and to ask questions.”

Morland adds feedback of the system has been positive, however, some users have said they’ve been overcharged due to the tap-in and tap-out feature.

Moving to the Compass Card system is costing TransLink just under $200 million and it insists, despite glitches and setbacks, it’s staying within that budget.

“The Compass Card offers a lot more than what the FareSavers were offering because you have more options. You can have either your stored value and stored value is really what’s the most comparable to FareSavers because that’s what’s able to give you that low rate.”

You need a $6 deposit for the new cards and once you get one, you can automatically re-load it.

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