Project Highlights: Washington DC’s record breaking upgrade to accept open loop payments 

Agency: Washington Metropolitan Area Transit Authority (WMATA)

Region: Serving over 5 million residents across the Capital Region

Ridership: 250 million trips annually

Scale: 98 Metro stations, 1500 buses and 82 parking facilities

Project Phases: Metro, Bus, Parking and Regional Partners.

Status: Phase 1 Complete

Project kick-off: December 2024. 

Public Launch: May 2025.  

Duration: 5 months.

Major Partners: Worldpay (acquiring), Cubic (validators), STraffic (gates).

The Challenge

In one of the world’s foremost capital cities, WMATA set out to upgrade its fare collection system to accept open-loop payments – without a major overhaul of its legacy infrastructure and on a highly accelerated schedule.

WMATA issued a bold challenge to the industry; deliver a true overlay solution for contactless payments; one that could integrate seamlessly with existing systems, be implemented in months, and cost a fraction of traditional system upgrades or replacements.

The Solution

Littlepay stepped up to the challenge by providing an independent open loop transit payments service. Integration was kept to a minimum, requiring only a re-configuration of Cubic’s Tri-Reader devices to transmit tap data from contactless bank cards directly to Littlepay’s system. From tap to fare calculation to settlement and support, Littlepay then manages the entire payment lifecycle. The result is a modern, cloud-based fare collection solution that runs in parallel with WMATA’s existing infrastructure.

What we’ve achieved

• Live rollout to Metro riders 
• Delivered on time and on budget
• Day-one certifications for all schemes: Visa, Mastercard, Amex, and Discover
• Full integration with WMATAs existing acquirer Worldpay
• Custom fare engine tailored to WMATA’s complex fare structures and transfer rules. 
• A pure cloud-based “overlay” operating in parallel with legacy systems

Still to come

• A new iOS-based inspection service to work with existing field devices
• Discounts and Benefits Digital Registration Portal with connectivity to multiple commercial digital identity services to better service seniors, students, veterans and disabled riders. 
• Bus and Parking roll outs

“Littlepay is proud to partner with WMATA on this groundbreaking initiative. In just 5 months, our overlay solution has delivered bank card acceptance across Washington Metro at a fraction of the cost seen in other cities. Hopefully this marks the end of an era of costly and disruptive system overhauls across the industry. We congratulate WMATA on having the confidence and foresight to challenge industry norms and set a new standard that saves taxpayers millions of dollars.”

said Amin Shayan, CEO at Littlepay

Want to know more about the true cost of fare collection? Join our webinar on June 18th at 1:00pm EDT / 10:00am PDT for a no-holds-barred discussion of the real costs of fare collection.