Charlie Bucket Ticket

Charlie makes every ride on the T easier, right?

Well, yeah, I guess so...










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The conversion from the almost-brand-new Charlie Ticket system to the really-brand-new Charlie Card, Ticket, and Stored Value system, fare increase and surcharge-heavy differenntial fee structure was all the confusion I needed in the middle of the Christmas/New Year's holiday, add to that the confusion surrounding my employer's new commuter policy written up to deal specifically with the fare hike, monthly subway passes being converted into bus/subway Link passes, and the dissapearance of flimsy plastic monthly passes in favor of flimsier paper passes or sturdier and more elusive RFID Charlie Cards, made obtaining my January T pass a nightmare.

I'd been mailed a one-time-use debit card on December 28th, from my employer, linked to an anonymous bank account with an amount equal to the purchase price of a Link pass, that had been withdrawn from my paycheck pre-tax. I was intstructed to take my shiny new debit card and get to the nearest T station myself and make a point-of-purchase transaction to get my monthly bus/subway pass. This was the system designed to replace the "we'll mail a monthly pass to your house" system.

I arrived at my local stop fifteen minutes early, figuring on a bit of confusion with the new fares, cards, tickets, passes, and machines. This was, I knew, the first time many people would be buying anything from the new machines, and didn't want to be late for work.

I was late for work. Lines around corners and down stairs filled the station, one lone T employee was trying to wrangle frustrated commuters, little old ladies, non-english speakers, and high school kids on winter break trying to get into the city for First Night weekend festivities. After helping the two folks in front of me navigate the touch screen interface ("Wait, I want a stored value card, not not a ticket? What about a pass? How did I get to this screen!? I just want to put ten dollars on my card! No. No! How do I get just a round-trip fare? Aaaahhh.") I stepped up, confident I could get my pass and get going.

I was wrong. After getting lost the first time through the menu, and again trying to get back to the home screen (Hey, MBTA, here's a tip: Put a "startover"and a "back" button in the upper left corner of the screen) my one-time use debit card didn't work.

I had to exit back out to the main menu again and then buy a five dollar Charlie Stored Value (paper) Card to get me to and from work. I resolved to try on my lunch break.

That was also a nightmare. Lines were even longer at Downtown Crossing, though the T Customer Service reps seemed to have a much better handle on things.

The next morning I managed to purchase a monthly pass which was printed out on a paper ticket. "Wait! I cried," my hopes dashed by the insubstantial paper product I was holding after thinking I'd figured out how to get my old familiar flimsy plastic pass, "why is this paper!?"

It was a rough December 28th.

I found a free customer service rep and was given a new sturdy plastic RFID Charlie Card and instructed to show my ticket to the folks behind the counter at Downtown Crossing and they would transfer my pass from the paper ticket to the RFID card, easy as you please.

But that line is always ridiculous, so I've been using the paper pass for a month. I've been a little more careful with it than I would have been if it were plastic, but it's held up very well over the last three weeks.

Which brings me to this month's pass purchase.

I was once again issued a one-time-use debit card to be used to go to a station and buy a pass, rather than have one mailed to me, but, this time I got it on the 19th of the month.

Yesterday, out for my morning coffee break, at 10:15 AM, I walked down to the machines on the Orangle Line side of Downtown Crossing. Eight machines, one of them occupied. I walked up, tapped my Charlie Card, which had been sitting safely in my wallet for a month uninitiated, selected "Purchase Link Pass," slid my debit card through, tapped my card again, and was on the street in thirty seconds, coffee in still in hand.

It was easy, quick, convinient, everything they've promised us. If the January pass fiasco is the only trouble I'll have with the switchover, then I'm all for it.

So, for you late-purchasers, think of me when you're waiting in enormous lines and trying to get the guy in front of you to type "two-zero-zero-zero" instead of "two-zero" for "$20.00," I'll be the guy sailing through the gate with my previously obtained hassle-free RFID encoded Link pass.

-t