My Charlie Interface Redesign
The end of 2023 saw the removal of the recharge feature for Charlie Card on the MyCharlie website. As a result, Charlie Card users get an exclusive MyCharlie (prototyped) mobile application.
An 8:00 AM shutdown of the MyCharlie website on November 15th, 2023 spurred an uproar among MBTA riders. CharlieCard, partly facilitated by MyCharlie, enables contactless payment for transportation in and around metro Boston and is an alternative mode of payment for cash, mTicket, and CharlieTicket. What replaced this site was a new interface that was devoid of the option of allowing users to reload their Charlie cards online.
REASON FOR REDESIGN
The reason behind the shutdown of the older website was that the dual-step online transactions needed to be more effective than intended. The users would pay online to reload their cards and then go on to activate them at a fare vending machine or at a transit station to use the card. The inability to access the purchased fares while boarding a bus or at the T was a major accessibility issue for the stakeholders when arriving at the redesign decision.
Security vulnerabilities also stand as another major reason for the discontinuation of online card reloading. The card values are not stored in a central database but on the card that uses the MIFARE Classic chip. This posed major security issues, which students from MIT presented during their academic presentation demonstrating weakness in MBTA’s fare collection system. It is worth noting that the MBTA utilizes CharlieCard as part of the Automated Fare Collection 2.0 system.
SOLUTION
An exclusive app for Charlie cards with one main functionality: the facility to add the Charlie card as their transit card to their wallet/app by scanning the app.
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As of August 2024, the MBTA has created an end-all alternative (tap-to-pay with any credit card) to the pain points discussed in this report which may render the improvements proposed passive.