For this year’s OC Fair Express, OCTA unveiled a mobile ticketing app that allows customers to purchase bus passes with mobile devices and on the Internet.
With a credit card and the app, customers can purchase one-way and round-trip passes for up to six riders. Purchases can even be made just minutes before boarding -- no more waiting for passes to come in the mail or feeding cash through the farebox. The app also offers route maps and timetables for each shuttle.
In the first month since the app was released on July 1, over 2,600 passes have been purchased for a total of more than $21,000. These passes equate to about 11,400 paid boardings. This mobile app demonstration project will continue until the last day of the OC Fair on Aug. 10.
The app is easy to use via cell phone and the Internet. To board the bus, a rider who has purchased a pass using a cell phone simply brings up the mobile app and pass on the phone, activates it, and displays it for validation. Internet users receive passes by email. They can print them and bring them for validation when boarding.
The app and credit card purchases also speed boarding. Cash transactions are one of the largest contributors to schedule delays. Learn more about the OC Fair Express here.
