Visa’s SAM makes metro turnstiles contactless

Visa and payments hardware specialist Planeta Informatica have come up with an easy way to add contactless payments at public transit turnstiles.

VisaThe Visa Secure Access Module (SAM) allows transit operators to offer riders the ability to tap to pay with a contactless card, phone or wearable device without the expense of replacing current turnstiles or terminal hardware.

“The Visa Secure Access Module makes transitioning to tap to pay at transit turnstiles faster, easier and less expensive than ever before for public transit operators,” explains the payments network.

“Rather than installing brand new turnstiles or hardware, transit operators can install the Visa SAM, which is based on secure EMV contactless technology, directly into existing systems.”

Brazil-based Planeta Informatica has deployed more than 200,000 SAM devices over the last decade, supporting 30 million users per day across South America. Says CEO Artur Costa: “The new Visa SAM technology combines 15 years of our experience in public transportation with the Mass Transit Transaction framework, a state of the art payment framework released by Visa in 2017.”

“We worked diligently with Visa to build the best technological solution for adding EMV contactless acceptance on top of any existing closed loop payment system without necessarily replacing the entire electronic ticketing infrastructure.”

The solution is available to all Visa Ready technology partners, making it easy for transit hardware and software companies to incorporate it into their offerings.

MetroRio will be first transit operator to launch contactless payments using the Visa SAM in late April 2019, in a project that also involves payments hardware manufacturer Ingenico.

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