IBTTA Member’s Prepaid Card Brings iTunes Convenience to Toll Payments

When it gets to the point where toll customers who use cash can reload a prepaid card as easily as they can use iTunes, you know that payment apps are moving to the center of tolling agencies’ toolkits.

And that’s the comparison that best describes the service that Atlanta-based InComm is offering users of Georgia’s Peach Pass and now the RiverLink tolling system on the Ohio River Bridges.

“Tolling agencies need some kind of alternative for cash-preferred customers to be able to ride on their roads,” said Michael Herold, InComm’s Vice President of Business Development, Tolling and Transit, in a Tolling Points interview last month. “We take a transponder, package it with a reload card similar to an iTunes card, and it allows customers to load value onto their account.”

Keeping It Simple

The system is the essence of simplicity for customers who may not even have known they were looking for a toll card when they walked into a participating retail outlet. Once the agency sets the business terms and conditions, the retail network becomes an extension of its own sales and marketing effort.

“The use case scenario is that the customer goes to the rack in a participating store, pulls the package off the display, and gets it scanned or swiped at the counter to get it activated instantly. That sends a message to our back office to connect it with the system integrator or tolling agency,” making it simple for the customer to add cash to the card.

“The customer walks out into the parking lot, opens the package, puts the sticker on their window, and they’re good to go.”

The system delivers convenience and ease of use for customers, who get into the habit of charging their toll cards while they’re filling their gas tanks. For convenience retailers, tolling becomes one more service offering that keeps customers coming back.

“It’s a nice transaction for the retailers,” Herold said. “I’ve literally never had any retailer turn it down. There’s no cost to them to participate—they just add another SKU to their price list, and it brings them repeat business.”

What Do Tolling, iTunes, Starbucks, and Home Depot Have in Common?

InComm is a great example of the tech- and app-enabled businesses and services that are entering the tolling industry, opening up new channels for agencies and new options for customers. Apart from iTunes, the company’s other customers include the likes of Starbucks and Home Depot.

“The business model works for anything associated with an account where the customer adds value to it,” Herold said. “We’re up to about 500,000 retailers around the world, we have over 1,000 brand partners, and customers can use our retail network to add value to their accounts. What the account represents could be just about anything.”

RiverLink is a great example of the system’s popularity with customers, he added: The pre-launch in June generated local media coverage, “we literally ran out of inventory the following week. So we’re actually on our second print run,” with sales increasing 30% per month from July through September—an achievement Herold credits to RiverLink’s own promotional efforts.

“What really drives customer adoption is how the agencies communicate the product,” he said. “When an agency does a good job of communicating why the customer needs it and where to get it, it flies off the shelf. And RiverLink has done a really good job of that.”

Herold adds that interoperability—among tolling agencies, and across transportation modes—would be the very best use for the card.

“I would love to be able to sell the same starter kit at every Walgreens and 7-Eleven across the country, so that cash-preferred customers could work with and manage their tolling accounts nation-wide,” he said. “And we’ve been having similar conversations with transit, parking, and bike-share, building similar products in other industries. Shangri-La would be to offer that end user a single transportation account, so they can add value at any retail counter and then use it as they see fit.”

Mark your calendar for IBTTA’s AET, Managed Lanes and Technology Summit, April 22-24, 2018 in Charlotte, NC.