Dubai’s Roads and Transport Authority (RTA) has revealed that the use of nol card in Smart Fare service had increased by 71 per cent since the launch of the service last September.

 About 8,834 transactions had been made through the service, which is accessible via RTA’s Public Transport App and subsequent updates. The aim of the technology is to facilitate the offering of services to the public and realize RTA’s first strategic goal (Smart Dubai), and third strategic goal (People Happiness).

The Near Field Communication (NFC) technology is used to support the app services and provide new ones as regards recharging nol card via the Public Transport App. The NFC technology enables the reading & updating of nol card directly through Android smartphones.

“The rising use of the smart fare by 71 per cent reflects the success we have been aspiring to achieve through the launch of this project in realizing RTA’s first strategic goal: Smart Dubai,” said Khalid Al Awadi, director of Automated Fare Collection Systems at RTA’s Corporate Technology Support Services Sector.

“The Smart Fare has raised customers satisfaction rating as regards the time taken to avail the service from 87 per cent to 92 per cent and dropped rate of complaints from the delay in availing the recharge service from 18 cases per month to zero.

“The Smart Fare is based on using NFC technology in recharging nol cards instantly by just touching the Android smartphone in which the Public Transport app is uploaded. It also enables transferring balances between cards and inquiring after the log of journeys made through no card,” he added.

“We still have plans to upgrade the service in future by providing additional services such as buying & renewing public transport travel permits and using nol card in paying for RTA’s services via the smart apps. All these endeavours add to the Smart City initiative launched by our government to raise the profile of Dubai city worldwide,” commented Al Awadi. – TradeArabia News Service