Passengers travelling on the 100E airport shuttle bus operated by Budapesti Közlekedési Központ (BKK) in the Hungarian capital of Budapest will soon be able to pay their fares by tapping their physical or digital contactless credit or debit card on an on-board reader. budapest open loop

BKK is the first transit authority in Hungary to announce plans to test an open loop contactless ticketing system that enables users to pay for and validate their fares with their bank card, smartphone or smartwatch. It says it will extend the test to other routes “if the experience is positive”.

Together with Mastercard, Monet+ and K&H, the mobility manager will be testing a technical solution that will make public transport even faster and easier. During the trial period, customers will need nothing more than a physical or digitised bank card with contactless payment functionality on the 100E airport shuttle bus line.

BKK, K&H bank, Mastercard and software development company Monet+ will be testing a digital solution that has never been used in Hungary before but is already working well in several parts of the world, providing access to public transport.

BudapestGO

Thanks to the innovative technology, BKK’s customers will be able to use the 100E airport shuttle without prior registration, using their bank card, smartphone or smartwatch. However, this solution is much more than just an ordinary bankcard purchase. The transaction is validated at the same time, and the customer’s bank card can be used to prove entitlement to travel in the event of ticket inspection later.

This means that passengers will not need to buy paper tickets in advance, and even if they are not yet familiar with the benefits of BudapestGO and have not downloaded the popular ticketing and journey-planning app on their phones, it should not be a problem. They will just need to take out their bank card or smartphone and use it at the onboard device.

This solution is faster than traditional bank card payments. In addition to the extremely short technical processing time, the new system also speeds up the purchase process by automatically charging the fare for the given ride – for example, the price of the Airport Shuttlebus Single Ticket on the 100E bus – to the customer’s bank card.

Contract signed, test to start early next year budapest open loop

BKK selected its future partners for testing the new method through a procurement procedure. On 27 October 2022, BKK signed a contract with the Mastercard-Monet+ consortium to build and operate the system and with K&H to provide card acceptance services. Mikroelektronika, a Czech manufacturing company, will supply the validation equipment for the project.

The pilot phase is expected to start in early 2023, as a first step on the 100E direct airport bus line. If the experience is positive, BKK will extend the test to other routes.

The aim of the project is to provide BKK’s customers with the most comfortable travel experience possible, and to promote environmentally friendly, paperless public transport with another digital solution following the success of BudapestGO. budapest open loop