Finally made the leap and got a PRESTO card. I live within walking distance to the 60 Steeles West bus and take the subway downtown to a station with PRESTO machines.
A few remarks about the startup process:
Very easy to pay online and load your card....but I find it very confusing how it takes 24 hours to actually load onto the system, not to mention the whole deal with registering your card and require using the card within 7 days of registration.
I know a lot about the PRESTO implementation and how it works and was well aware of the delays that are to be experienced with loading and registering the card, but I found myself getting very worried and confused about what exactly was going on with my card.
For instance, I loaded my card late one evening ($20), and had to use cash fare for my trip to work (because I was taking the bus, so no PRESTO), but in the evening before returning from work I checked my balance online and noticed it was $0 but decided to give the card a try anyway. This is where it got confusing for me. When I tapped my card it worked and let me onto the system, so I figured wow the transaction must have finally gone through, but when I got home I checked online and it said that I had $0 on my account and that my card was not active.
I was aware that this was not a problem because I actively read these forums, but I have to say that the experience for setting up the card and registering are VERY user unfriendly. I'm not an expert on these central systems for payment, but I imagine there must be a way to get transactions and registrations processed faster than 24 hr intervals, i.e. Charlie card in Boston where you pay for the card and load it with an amount and can use it right away.
Apart from that, I am very very pleased with my PRESTO card and I like the online transaction history. I also like the convenience of not having to carry cash for transit, unless i'm going to be taking the TTC bus/ streetcars/ non-presto subway stations. I can't wait for this to be implemented across the TTC. I think there's something to be said for implementing PRESTO across the province full-out to make it easier to divide gas tax money (considering it's based on transit ridership/ use) I think PRESTO could be a very integral and valuable tool for the province in determining transit funding and for analyzing where improvements need to be made (i.e. see which lines throughout the province have high ridership.)
I wanted to mention. I really like how when you tap on a bus you aren't given a physical paper receipt. I recently came back from a trip in Spain to visit some family, and while we were in Barcelona and other northern cities we purchased their version of the PRESTO card when we were in each city. It was annoying how every time we tapped onto a bus we would be given a physical paper receipt. These transit agencies did allow multiple ppl to use one card, (i.e. tap the same card numerous times when boarding a bus to pay for 3 or 4 ppl). I think this could be useful implemented on the TTC; although I guess they don't allow this because then the # of rides per month on each card would be skewed upwards allowing more ppl to be eligible for the tax rebate even though it is only meant for one person who takes 40 rides or more per month.
