The Presto card (stylized as PRESTO) is a contactless smart card automated fare collection system used on participating public transit systems in the province of Ontario, Canada, specifically in Greater Toronto, Hamilton, and Ottawa. Presto card readers were implemented on a trial basis from 25 June 2007 to 30 September 2008. Full implementation began in November 2009 and it was deployed at rapid transit stations, railway stations, bus stops and terminals, and on transit vehicles throughout eleven different transit systems.
A variant of the Presto card is the Presto ticket, introduced on 5 April 2019, which is a single-use paper ticket with an embedded chip. The Presto ticket can only be used for the services of the Toronto Transit Commission.
In late 2023 and mid-2024, Presto was made available for use in Google Wallet and Apple Wallet, respectively.
Presto is a result of The Big Move, the 2008 regional transportation plan for the Greater Toronto and Hamilton Area (GTHA), which had an integrated fare payment system as one of its strategies. Presto is an operating division of Metrolinx, the Ontario government agency that manages and integrates road transport and public transit in the GTHA.
History In 1998, GO Transit began work on a smart card system with ERG Transit Systems. A year-long pilot of the system on GO Transit's Richmond Hill line was scheduled to begin in the fourth quarter of 2000, but was delayed to June 2002. During the pilot, 4,000 people used the cards and a total of 10,000 cards were issued. That year, the Ministry of Transportation of Ontario (MTO), in conjunction with GO Transit and GTHA municipalities, began investigating the merits of a regional fare card, and it began development by June 2003.
GO did not continue its partnership with ERG after the pilot, preferring a more flexible system. Instead, GO opted to implement a different system in partnership with other Greater Toronto transit systems, though the TTC was not initially supportive of the proposed system. At the time, development was expected to take at least two years at a cost of . They developed the specifications of the system around 2004 and in October 2006, the Ministry of Transportation signed a 10-year, $250-million contract with Accenture to design, develop and operate the base Presto system for the GTHA. Two major transit agencies, OC Transpo and the Toronto Transit Commission (TTC), agreed to adopt the fare card system in 2007 and 2009 respectively. The larger anticipated userbase prompted the MTO to decide on developing a new system, called Presto Next Generation (PNG). The Auditor General of Ontario criticized this move, suggesting that the base Presto system should have been expanded to accommodate OC Transpo and the Toronto Transit Commission.
Thales Group and Accenture were awarded the contract to supply this system in October 2009. Implementation was the responsibility of Metrolinx, of which Presto became an operating division in 2011.
The Presto project was strongly criticized by the Auditor General of Ontario in 2012 for "roll-out glitches, cost escalations and untendered contract extensions" and warned the system could become the world's most expensive fare-card implementation project. Instead of putting the development Presto Next Generation out to competitive tender, Metrolinx simply increased the size of the original base contract awarded to Accenture in 2006. By 2012, the cost of the system ballooned to $700million.
The Presto rollout on the TTC's surface transit fleet have been marred with abnormally high failure rates of the readers themselves and cost overruns. A TTC position paper noted that faulty Presto card readers used by fare inspectors on the proof-of-payment streetcar system was making it "difficult to get customers to comply with inspections" and costing the TTC in lost fare revenue.
A 3 June 2017 story in the Toronto Star first reported that customers' Presto travel histories were provided to police authorities 12 times in the previous year, with a warrant having been required for only two of those disclosures and customers typically not having been notified that their records had been shared. The figures were confirmed by Metrolinx in later reports, stating that they had granted 12 of 26 requests received from various police agencies. In response to calls for reforming the data sharing system from experts and transit riding advocates, Metrolinx launched a formal review of its privacy policies.
The rollout of the fare system and accompanying replacement fare gates on the TTC's subway network was met with poor reliability and issues with processing transactions. Presto was forced to use its existing software back-end for other municipal transit partners that have completed the roll-out, as the TTC has yet to develop its own dedicated infrastructure to process the larger volume of transactions it typically handles. The new fare gates suffered from persistent mechanical and software problems, prompting the TTC to suspend the rollout for a month to work with the contractor, Scheidt & Bachmann, to resolve reliability issues. As a result, over 2,000 motors on more than 1,000 gates had to be replaced in addition to numerous hardware and software updates. The June 2018 deadline for the complete roll-out of Presto for the TTC will be further pushed to 2019 due to these ongoing issues, prompting a delay in the phasing out of cash fares, tokens and other legacy fare media. As a result, the TTC will face higher fare collection costs as it incurs "transitional costs" of operating parts of Presto and the legacy fare regimes concurrently over the next few years. A situation TTC board member John Campbell describes as "totally inefficient".
In its annual report released in 2018, Metrolinx indicated it expected the cost of the Presto system to reach $1.2billion, with $1billion already spent in the development and implementation the system between 2002 and March 2018. While Presto was designed for complex fare transactions between GTA transit agencies, up until the fourth quarter of 2019, the system on TTC buses was not able to support the payment of special surcharges for TTC express downtown buses and TTC trips that enter Mississauga and York Region where a Miway or YRT fare was required. , the TTC Presto system at large continues to experience abnormally high failure rates. This led to an estimated loss of at least $3.4 million in revenue in 2018 alone according to the TTC. The 2018 Audit Work Plan by the auditor general of Ontario noted that the number of reports of Presto collection machines not functioning properly is likely under-counted and a breakdown in communication between Metrolinx, the TTC, and two of its vendors led to operational issues. This included a finding that over half the "out-of-service" incidents raised for the fare vending machines on the TTC's new Flexity streetcars are "coin or token box full" errors, the root cause being miscommunication between the TTC and Metrolinx on coin and token collection leading to the vending machines not being emptied frequently enough.
In early 2018, Metrolinx detailed a plan to increase transit ridership by use of a mobile app (available for Android and iOS devices) which it released to the public for testing in beta version in late 2018. The Presto app was released in January 2019, and allows transit users to reload their Presto card directly from their mobile device.
In August 2023, Metrolinx released updated versions of the Presto card reader that can support Interac credit and debit cards.
Card use
Presto cards are available to purchase at most Shoppers Drug Mart stores, transit centres in the GTHA and Ottawa, over the phone and online. Beginning in Stage 3, cardholders will also be able to load passes for up to three transit systems at a time on to their Presto card. When boarding, riders tap the prepaid card, embedded with an RFID chip, on to a reader. The reader will then check for either a valid transit pass, or automatically deduct the lowest available fare from the card's balance stored in its e-purse ("stored balance"). GO Transit and Union Pearson Express (UP Express or UPX) riderswhose fares are calculated by distanceand those riding TTC buses which travel into the City of Mississauga or York Region must also tap their cards at the end of their trip. Since the TTC joined Ontario's One Fare Program on 26 February 2024, no extra fare is charged if a rider taps off after crossing the fare zone boundary aboard a TTC bus within 2 hours (or 3 hours if GO Transit was used).
Presto readers show a large white check mark on a green background (if accepted) or a large white "X" on a red background (if declined), accompanied by one of several messages. For monthly, weekly and single-day transit passes, the expiry date is shown. For a stored-balance fare at initial tap-on, the reader shows the fare deducted, balance remaining, and transfer period allowed. For subsequent taps within the transfer window, the transfer time remaining is shown. GO Transit and Union Pearson Express readers, at both tap-on and tap-off, also shows much of the same information as those of a local system for a stored-balance fare at initial tap-on.
Loyalty fare capping programs are also available on some transit systems, where frequent use of the system results in greater discounts on fare payment.
The Presto card works on several transit systems and has other features: Autoload: The autoload feature allows cardholders to have a predetermined value automatically loaded onto their Presto card, when the stored balance value reaches a specified threshold. It will charge the cardholder's credit or debit card. Autorenew, for monthly passes: Six days before the end of each month, the next month's pass is automatically loaded onto the card. The new pass becomes effective the first day of the new month. Payment is charged as for an autoload. Lost card replacement: If a registered cardholder loses their Presto card, they can have their lost card blocked immediately upon reporting the loss, and the remaining balance transferred to a replacement card. Underpayment allowance: If a registered card has insufficient funds to pay a fare, but the balance is greater than $0 and has sufficient funds to cover the minimum base fare, the cardholder can incur a negative balance for one trip. This previously carried a fee of $0.25; however, this fee was dropped in November 2020. Transit usage reports: Through an online account, a user can track transit usage, customize the data, and download it to a spreadsheet in CSV format.
A Braille letter "P" was placed on the Presto card to help distinguish it from other cards in a wallet, after consultation with feedback from visually impaired customers.
Presto cards purchased from the Presto website or from automated self-service vending machines are set to the adult fare rates. For concessionary fares (such as child, senior, youth or post-secondary student), one must present the Presto card in-person at either a transit customer service centre or at many Shoppers Drug Mart locations to have the concession fare rate set.
Mobile wallets On 14 November 2023, Metrolinx made Presto cards available in Google Wallet. On 16 July 2024, Metrolinx made Presto cards available in Apple Wallet.
Presto cards in mobile wallets can be used on all transit systems which support physical Presto cards except OC Transpo in Ottawa. Creation of a virtual card can be done through a mobile wallet's app or the Presto app at no cost. In addition, the settings and the balance of a physical Presto card can be transferred to a virtual card. This includes concession fare types (excluding the child fare type, which currently only remains available on physical Presto cards). The physical card will be cancelled after the transfer. Concession fares can be set on the virtual cards through the same methods as a physical card.