SINGAPORE — The Government’s earlier decision to phase out the use of Ez-link cards and Nets FlashPay cards for public transport payments by adult commuters was a “judgement error”, Transport Minister Chee Hong Tat said on Friday (Jan 26). He added that with S$40 million being spent to keep the system, it can run until at least 2030.

The Land Transport Authority (LTA), he added, had underestimated commuters' "strong preference" to be able to see fare deductions and card balance information at card scanners on buses and at MRT fare gates, as he apologised to the public.

The authority will make a decision on whether to extend the system beyond 2030, in hopes of integrating the two card-based systems operating today, Mr Chee said.

LTA said on Jan 9 that from June 1, adult commuters who hold non-concession cards for public transport fare payments would not be able to use their Nets FlashPay or Ez-link cards if they have not been upgraded to the SimplyGo payment system.

On Monday, the authority reversed course, saying that its planned full adoption of the SimplyGo system for adult public transport payments would be postponed from the June 1 date.

This came after commuters faced delays when they tried to upgrade their Ez-link cards to SimplyGo-compatible cards following the Jan 9 announcement, which prompted Mr Chee to apologise on Facebook on Monday.

Speaking to reporters at an interview organised for some media outlets on Friday, Mr Chee said that LTA had earlier conducted a series of consultations, including focus group discussions, with about 1,000 commuters from different groups from 2020 to 2023.

During the consultations that included focus group discussions, some SimplyGo cards were issued to commuters — seniors, adult commuters and students — to let them take part in a trial and to let them use the card for a few months and gather their feedback.

LTA later made changes to the system design and the application based on these commuters’ feedback and experience.

Mr Chee added: “For example, one of the first few feedback that we received from the seniors, in particular, was that they were not very used to using this new system with the app.

"They prefer to be able to continue to view the fare deductions and card balances at the MRT fare gates and card readers on buses."

As such, LTA decided to retain the concession card system as a card-based system.

LTA also made improvements to the app, such as enabling push notifications whenever a user uses his card, and also to alert if the card has a low balance.

Mr Chee said: “If we had consulted more widely, and gathered views from a wider group of commuters before we made the decision and the announcement on Jan 9, we would have come across the stronger reactions and preferences that some commuters had expressed, which is that they want to keep the current feature of being able to view the fare deductions and card balances at the MRT fare gates and card readers on buses."

Mr Chee said he acknowledged that users have become used to this feature and found it useful, which led to the latest decision to retain the current card-based system until 2030.

In deciding whether the current system will be retained after 2030, Mr Chee said that it will depend on whether a solution can be found to overcome the current technical difficulties of displaying the fare deductions and card balance information at the card scanners.

“There is no available technical solution at the moment, both here and overseas. We will work with other government agencies and industry partners.

"In making a decision, we will consult widely to get views from commuters and industry experts.”

He added that the authorities will determine if there is a need to upgrade, buy new equipment or hardware, or upgrade the operating system once the system reaches the end of its 2030 shelf life.

On possibly combining the current concession and adult card-based systems, Mr Chee said that the authorities will progressively find ways to integrate the two systems, which are now not compatible, into one in the future.

“This will definitely help to reduce the cost that we need to spend on maintenance, operations and hardware. This process cannot be done overnight because today, the cards are not compatible.

“As such, if we were to switch everyone over at the same time, the existing cards cannot be used. That is why we want to do this progressively.”