PHILADELPHIA (KYW Newsradio) — Beginning Friday, SEPTA will no longer accept paper tickets on its regional rail lines.
SEPTA stopped selling the 10-ticket paper strips last October. They told riders they would have to prepare for using the SEPTA Key card to pay train fare.
"Many people had already started switching over to the Key," SEPTA Chief Press Officer Andrew Busch explained. "We started seeing the numbers of tickets that we were being handed by customers come down even more, because no new ones were getting into circulation, similar to what happened with tokens."
Busch said the paper tickets are valid for only 180 days. The last paper tickets that were sold will expire Friday. He shared how the transit agency has been auditing how many paper tickets are still in circulation on the regional rail trains.
"Last week, the highest amount in a day that we received was 20," Busch explained. "Every other day, it was less than that, so we’re seeing it come down to where it needs to be leading up to them no longer being valid."
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SEPTA knows people still may have the paper tickets, and they can qualify for a refund, according to Busch.
"Because of the pandemic, they haven’t traveled like they thought they would," Busch said.
"We do want to take care of those folks so they can get a refund. Mail it in ... and we’ll process that for you," Busch said. "You’ll get a check back for the amount that you spent on those tickets."
That address is: Ticket Refunds, SEPTA Railroad Division, P.O. Box 58609, Philadelphia, PA 19102-8849.
Busch added that people need to include their unused tickets in the envelope with the refund request.