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Mobile tickets tested on North East buses
In January 2008, Go North East described a mobile-ticket trial in which a passenger could receive a digital ticket and show the handset screen to the driver.
How the trial was meant to work
The operator said the system was built with Atos Origin and Swiftpass. A customer created an online account, added funds by card, and the ticket cost was deducted from that balance. The account could also be replenished by text or configured for automatic top-ups.
The operational argument
Go North East presented the trial as a way to avoid cash and reduce the cash handled on buses. It also said that a ticket was tied to the phone that ordered it and carried coded information intended to make copying harder.
An early mobile-payment test
This was a limited 2008 experiment, not a description of a current ticket product. Its significance lay in combining a handset display, a stored-value account and driver inspection before app-based transport tickets became familiar.