New card readers enable contactless payment

The new reader has been selected through a competitive bidding process. Despite the screen size, the device was the best option available on the market for HSL public transport. HSL tendered the card readers, and the best of the options offered was the offer by Conduent Business Solutions (France) SAS.

The new card reader’s screen is smaller than the old card reader’s screen. That is why the zone buttons are displayed in two views. This is necessary to make the buttons large enough to press without hitting other buttons.

On the current reader, the HSL app and ticket machines, the zone buttons are below each other, so customers are used to this layout. Therefore, the buttons were not positioned side by side on the new reader in “two columns”.

Based on user tests, dividing the buttons into two sets was found to be an effective way of displaying the ticket selections on a smaller screen.

The current zone is marked by a red pin icon, in the image above the letter B.

The replacement of card readers is part of an extensive reform to overhaul the purchase and use of tickets and to upgrade our back-end systems. The reforms will be phased in and unfortunately this will cause interruptions to some of our services.

You need to transfer season tickets or value you have purchased online to your HSL card at a large HSL ticket machine. Alternatively, you can make the transfer at R-kiosks or Alepa, S-market and Prisma stores without a service fee. The ticket or value will not show on your HSL card until you have made the transfer. After the transfer, you can use your card at the new card readers as usual. 

Earlier this year, passengers were allowed to board vehicles even if they were unable to make the transfer due to the vehicle having a new card reader. This exception was in effect during the transitional period when both old and new card readers were in use. As nearly all card readers have now been replaced, this exception was lifted on 18 November 2024. This means that season tickets and value purchased online must be transferred to the HSL card before boarding a vehicle. If you use value, you also need buy a ticket at the card reader when boarding.

We will later open a new online service, HSL Ticket Store, where you can buy tickets and value without having to transfer them separately to your HSL card.

With the new reader, you can no longer buy multiple tickets one after another. You can buy a ticket for a friend by tapping the + button to select the number of tickets before paying for the tickets with your HSL card.

Buying multiple tickets one after another has been a very little used way to buy tickets and has caused many erroneous purchases with people buyin new ticket for themselves just before their previous ticket has expired. In these cases, the new ticket has been valid for a very short time, for example 10 minutes, because the ticket is valid for the same time as the previously purchased, still valid ticket.

No, there will be no changes. At first, the app will be used as before. Later, QR codes will be introduced in the app. The code is shown to the card reader.