A Key Moment for Citybus

One of the benefits of belonging to a larger group is having access to their IT services and products. Go Ahead have their own Smart Card brand which is being rolled out across all their national fleets and soon it will be Plymouth turn to have "The Key":
Plymouth Citybus is moving to a new smart card system known as the "key" from late July and early August we will be issuing new smart cards to replace the current ones known as the freedom card. Your new card will either be sent to the address we have on our records therefore it is very important that we have your up to date contact details, otherwise your new card could be sent to the wrong address meaning that you won't have your new season ticket ready to use when we switch over to the new system.
The new smart card system will bring to Plymouth many new benefits. For Students it will mean being able to purchase Student and child versions of our popular 7, 28 90 and annual tickets.
For all our customers purchasing our period tickets direct from us you will be able to manage your account on line via this web site. This will include the purchase of travel and seeing how you have used your card over a given period.
I am sure over the coming months we will see a lot more publicity for "The Key" but for now we have a few pages on the Citybus website:

• The Key Guide
• The Key FAQs

A bit more background information:
The Key smartcard allows passengers to buy their season tickets at self service machines in railway stations, or buy online and collect at stations in a one-touch transaction, meaning customers can enjoy faster passage through ticket barriers. In Oxford, Go-Ahead’s Oxford Bus Company introduced a full ITSO scheme last year, and there are now over 30,000 active Key smartcards in use. Five further bus schemes are due to be implemented at Go-Ahead this year – by Go North East, where a successful pilot has already been delivered, Go South Coast, Brighton and Hove, Metrobus and Plymouth CityBus. Source

As with any major IT implementation these days there have been problems across the group where the new card has been introduced but hopefuly most of these will have been ironed out before Plymouth gets going!

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Related Links

• Customer Contact Details Plymouth Citybus

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