After weeks of meetings between various public sectors and private sector actors, the Government analyzes the publication of a decree for the opening of the transport payment system which currently centralizes the SUBE card and thus allows different means of payment to coexist, such as credit or debit cards, when traveling on trains, buses or subways.
Specifically, the Government works for repeal by presidential decree the “exclusivity” that the SUBE card maintains to this day, and its administrator Nación Servicios, to allow public transport users across the country to pay with other means of payment. Sources from the Transport Secretariat confirmed to Clarín: “Work is underway for a complete upgrade that will transform the SUBE into digital and open. In this sense, all the most favorable options for users are evaluated.”
Although the opening of the SUBE system has been on the table for years, conversations have accelerated with the change of government, while user complaints about the lack of plastic to pay for transport and difficulties in registering cards have grown. The Government, in fact the deadline he had set for registering the SUBE had to expirewhich is a requirement for passengers to be able to maintain a lower fare and not receive the increases that apply starting this month.
The issue is on the agenda of several agencies: the Ministry of Transportation itself, the Secretary of Commerce and the Central Bank, which now takes the lead in these negotiations. A month ago, a pro MP, Damián Arabia, presented a bill to Congress eliminate the obligation for transport companies to make tariffs with this system and allow the “universalisation of payment methods”.
However, since the parliamentary discussion is late, the Government does not rule out making this change through a decree repealing the one signed in 2009 by Cristina Fernández de Kirchner with which the Single Electronic Ticket System and the Framework Agreement were implemented . which established that Nación Servicios, dependent on the Banco Nación will be the body responsible for managing this fund.
Arabia pointed out that this public-private entity charges transportation companies 7% of what the user pays per ticket, “while credit cards can by law charge 1.6% of the transaction.” According to BCRA data, in February $22.4 billion in travel was moved.
Granting Nación Servicios the exclusivity of SUBE administration is the necessary step to then allow other administrators of cards, virtual wallets and other players to “enter” the payment system.
The Central Bank will subsequently have the task of designing the procedures so that, based on the NFC (Near Field Communication) technology used by SUBE and which is present in most of the contactless cards that banks and fintechs offer their customers, they can be paid directly with these cards.
According to Visa data, 85% of the plastics that the brand has active in the country have contactless technology.
You will therefore have to make an investment to be able to include any card in the charging terminals already installed in the subways, trains and buses. In the private sector it is not excluded that this happens through a UTE (Transitional Union of Enterprises). As published Clarion, In the city of Buenos Aires, the project to include other forms of payment in the payment of the subway ticket is already at an advanced stage.
Source: Clarin
