KIEV, Ukraine—Kiev is now the fifth city in the world after London, St. Petersburg, Chicago and Bucharest to launch contactless payments at turnstiles at the city subway.
Passengers of the Kiev metro can pay fares using their MasterCard contactless cards or device. Contactless payments are already available at the 17 stations at Kiev subway (out of 52 in total), and the plan is to equip all Kiev subway stations with contactless terminals by the end of the year, MasterCard reported.
More than 20,000 subway rides were paid using contactless cards and devices in Kiev by the end of August. About 1,500 contactless transactions are made daily in the Kiev subway, with the number growing, MasterCard said.
Vira Platonova, country manager of the MasterCard Europe representative office in Ukraine and Moldova, said contactless payment technology is ideal for those places where service speed is important.
“Implementing contactless payments will also help both the Kiev subway and the Kiev Municipal State Administration to optimize operating costs and to create a fare payment system integrating different modes of transport in the future,” said Platonova.