No need for SmarTrip card, new payment coming to Metrobus

The bus is approaching and you don t have cash or forgot to load your SmarTrip card Soon that may not be a issue Related stories Bus driver befriends curious kid who s now a fellow Metro employee Kiss SmarTrip cards goodbye with Metro s new Tap Ride Go feature Paying for Metro will soon be easier and faster with just a tap of your credit card Metro is preparing to launch its Tap Ride Go payment system on all Metrobuses by mid-November according to a contemporary presentation to the Washington Metropolitan Area Transit Authority board The update was shared by Allison Davis WMATA s acting vice president of planning and activities Tap Ride Go allows riders to tap a credit or debit card directly on the fare reader at the bus door Davis announced Through SmarTrip through Tap Ride Go there s no excuse not to pay Metro notified WTOP that more details on the rollout will be available in the coming days WTOP s Neal Augenstein informed on the contactless Tap Ride Go payment system when it first launched across all Metrorail stations in May Riders can use credit cards with the contactless symbol or mobile payment options such as Apple Pay and Google Pay to enter through fare gates We are advancing projects to improve customer convenience by making it easier to pay for trips and approach the system mentioned Jordan Holt WMATA s senior director of performance benchmarking and customer function at the same WMATA board meeting Since May s launch of Tap Ride Go more than million unique users have paid via contactless methods on Metrorail instead of preloading fares onto SmarTrip cards WMATA bureaucrats revealed they hope expanding payment options will help address fare evasion which remains a concern According to evidence presented to the board fare evasion on Metrobus is at compared to just over on Metrorail Source