“Customers enjoy the improved boarding speed and ease of purchase, and the new machines bring a lot of benefits for our conductors, as well as improving our access to data and insights.”
Jane Cole, Managing Director at Blackpool Transport
BACKGROUND
Blackpool Transport already uses the Ticketer ETM, serving the Fylde Coast with a high frequency bus network linking Lytham, St Annes, Blackpool, Bispham, Fleetwood, Cleveleys and Poulton. The Blackpool tramway runs for 11 miles along the coast using modern, light rail trams. Blackpool sees over 16 million visitors annually and offering a public transport service that is reliable and efficient is essential.
OUR APPROACH
The Ticketer teams have worked in close collaboration with Blackpool Transport to deploy a product that is suitable for their specific use case and operational needs.
After a period of close cooperation on testing and trialling, the system went live, and contactless payments are now successfully accepted on all trams. The Ticketer Handheld works seamlessly with the rest of their network and was easily integrated with their existing Ticketer Portal.
This became Ticketer’s largest deployment of the new Ticketer Handheld device with one single operator to date.
WHAT THIS MEANS FOR BLACKPOOL TRANSPORT
Modern ticketing system
For passengers, there is now no need to plan journeys and purchase a ticket in advance. The flexibility brought by the numerous payment options on-board, makes the ticket purchase easy and hassle free. Passengers can now travel seamlessly using contactless meeting expectations in their everyday lives.
Contactless payments
With the contactless capabilities, transaction times are much faster, which means increased fare revenue collection at peak times.
Importantly, with Blackpool being a tourist hot spot, international travellers are no longer restricted to only use the public transport network if they carry local currency but can freely hop on a local service and pay for their ticket using a contactless bank card.
Conductor satisfaction
In addition to the contactless capabilities of the new Ticketer Handheld, low weight, compact form factor, increased battery life and high reliability are all features that are highly appreciated by the conductors. Conductors can now have their full focus on assisting passengers and collecting revenue, and as a result conductor productivity has increased by 30%.
Data collection
The value of data collection is another significant benefit Blackpool Transport have experienced since the initial Ticketer roll out, and they are now able to determine the age group of the customers, calculate the profitability of multi-use tickets, as well as the number of times a ticket is used.
