PRESTO machine read credit card from my bag leading to double charge, woman claims

A Toronto woman is feeling tapped out after claiming the TTC’s updated payment system double charged her during a recent streetcar ride, dinging her credit card after she had already paid with her PRESTO card.

The upgraded system that allows riders to pay by tapping their credit or debit cards, including those on a smartphone or smartwatch, was celebrated as “a transformative step” by TTC CEO Rick Leary.

But a weary Heather Milne is urging the public to be wary when using the PRESTO card readers after claiming the machine was able to read and charge her credit card even though it was inside her waist bag and was never pulled out for use.

Milne told CityNews she hopped on the Queen streetcar at Kingston Road on Saturday morning to run some errands in The Beaches, tapping her PRESTO card to pay for the ride.

Later that day after returning home via public transit, she received a notification from her credit card.

“As I’m walking up the street, I get an alert from my (credit card), and that was in my fanny-pack around my waist.

“By the end of the day it shows (a charge of) $3.30, so I went into the app again and disputed that. “I phoned Presto, and they didn’t sound surprised,” she said.

Milne says after speaking to someone from PRESTO she learned that the machine actually read her credit card twice, but on the return trip she was within the two-hour free transfer limit, so wasn’t charged.

“I’m speaking to (PRESTO), and I say ‘You know that’s pretty dangerous for that to be happening if it’s grabbing the information right from our purses, right from our bags. And she says to me ‘Maybe what you could do for now is put the bag onto the other side or something.'”

But Milne pointed out that when boarding in the middle of a streetcar, the readers are on both sides.

“You’d have to hold your bag right over your head and who even knows if it can grab the signal from there,” she said.

“Think about when the buses are full, and there are people just standing there near them.”

Although the updated payment system didn’t go into effect until Tuesday, the fare machines have already been on TTC vehicles since last week

CityNews reached out to Metrolinx which says while PRESTO readers are designed to only be able to read one payment card at a time, a second charge can occur if a rider is standing too close to the payment device.

A transit rider loads their PRESTO card on a bus. Photo: Metrolinx.

“Typically, when customers get too close to a PRESTO device on a crowded bus or streetcar and inadvertently tap with their wallet or purse, the PRESTO device will display ‘multiple cards detected,'” a Metrolinx spokesperson told CityNews.

“We recommend that those tapping on with a PRESTO card, credit card or debit card remove the card from their wallet, purse or phone case to ensure they are paying with the right card.”

Metrolinx says the two-hour transfer window that allows riders to enter and exit the TTC within that time frame without being repeatedly charged also applies to people who have paid with debit or credit.

“A payment card will only be charged once in a two-hour window. Should a customer accidentally tap the payment card they used to board a TTC subway, streetcar or bus, the PRESTO device would read it as a transfer, and there would be no additional charge to the customer.”

Metrolinx says if a rider notices that a second card is charged for the same trip to call the PRESTO Contact Centre at 1-877-378-6123 to receive a refund.

The cost of an adult single-use fare on debit or credit is the same as the standard TTC PRESTO fare of $3.30.

However, Metrolinx says discounted fares that youth, post-secondary students and seniors get are only available with a PRESTO card.

In the meantime, Milne says she bought a credit card holder that uses RFID technology to block signals.

“I started using it for the rest of the weekend, and I didn’t get nailed again, so thank goodness.”

“I’m on a leave of absence right now so I’m on a limited income so that didn’t please me,” she said of the double charge. “It may have only been $3.30, but it’s not the point. I didn’t need this stress on my plate.”

“We’ve had glitches with PRESTO since the day it started so this doesn’t surprise me,” she concluded. “But it is annoying because it just seems like they can’t get it right.”