Wellington, 21 October 2009

Snapper - New Zealand's leading contactless ticketing and payment system - today announced an innovative partnership with East by West Ferries to trial its system on the harbour capital's iconic ferry service.

The pilot will begin on 1st December and run for 6 months on East by West's Cobar Cat ferry. Between thirty to forty regular East by West customers will be invited to take part in the pilot, replacing their normal cash and paper-based ticketing with a customised Snapper card. Passengers involved in the pilot will tag on and tag off the boat, and their fares will be automatically calculated. They'll also be able to purchase items on the vessel using their Snapper.

Other passengers will be able to use their existing Snapper at the wharf office to top up their Snapper, buy ferry tickets and food and drinks for the journey.

Snapper is confidently extending its system - one that is well proven across 45,000 taxis, 10,000 buses, 6,000 metro train gates and ferries in South Korea - to East by West Ferries, demonstrating that Snapper is the right solution for New Zealanders regardless of the mode of public transport they use.

Jeremy Ward, Manager of East by West says “We've provided a unique service to Wellingtonians and visitors to the region for more than two decades. We are always looking for new ways to improve our service. We believe that Snapper will speed up boarding times and ticketing queues, freeing up the crew's time to offer customers even greater levels of service during their journey. Given 100,000 Wellingtonians already have these cards it is simply more convenient for them to use Snapper. We're also keen to see the benefits of the reporting that the Snapper system delivers and adapt our customer offering accordingly.”

Miki Szikszai, CEO of Snapper says, “It has been exciting working with East by West to offer Snapper to their customers. We asked East by West customers about trying Snapper on the ferries, many of them already use Snapper everyday on the bus and in retail, so it just makes sense to offer them other ways to use Snapper and simplify the way they pay.

“Adding another mode of transport to the Snapper scheme will make every day easier for more and more New Zealanders. By the time the World Cup is here, Snapper will be the most preferred and best value way to get in and around Wellington and New Zealand, by locals and the huge influx of overseas visitors.

“East by West has chosen Snapper because they can see the every day value that the Snapper system can provide to their business operations and to their customers. We are proud to have another independently owned and operated local service provider join the Snapper scheme.

“Snapper has signed up bus, taxi, and ferry operators to the Snapper system. We're heading for rail next”.

About Snapper.

Snapper has created a brand new payment sector in New Zealand, based on small value payments using contactless smartcards. Nearly 100,000 Snappers have been issued, generating over 13 million transactions, across over 400 buses and 160 retailers in New Zealand. Snapper offers customers integrated ticketing and instant small value payments. The Snapper system is 99.99% accurate, providing valuable journey data that can be used to plan better transport services for passengers.

Snapper Services Limited was formed in 2006 as a wholly owned subsidiary of Infratil Limited.
snapper.co.nz

About East By West Ferries.

East by West Ferries has been operating Wellington's harbour ferry service for over 20 years. The two boat fleet operates daily services between Days Bay, Queen's Wharf, Somes Island and most recently Seatoun Wharf.
eastbywest.co.nz

Ends

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