“Do I have enough small change on me?” – “Would a season ticket be better value for me?” These are just two of the questions passengers will soon be spared when they use public transport services featuring the all new Scheidt & Bachmann “Be in – Be out” electronic ticketing solution. They simply hop on and ride, without having to actually check in or out of the vehicle – thanks to intelligent ticketing management with “esprit”.

“esprit”: Here it is an acronym for an entirely new system of intelligent ticketing management: encoding scheme for programmable intelligent tickets. At the heart of this innovative system of automatic fare calculation is a new ticket medium developed by Scheidt & Bachmann that is the size of a key ring tag. Technologically it offers everything a smart card does: microchip processor, storage medium and radio-controlled communication mechanism. What’s more, this new ticket also comes with its own display showing all the information relevant to a particular passenger or inspector.

The “esprit” system features a one-way data transmission method based on standard ISM-wave radio technology, which works in a similar way to a wireless LAN. The ticket medium automatically clocks in when it enters the reception zone of the vehicle signal. It then checks at regular intervals to see whether it is still within range of the signal. This kind of “Be in – Be out” system also responds to other useful prompts such as “vehicle stopping”. In the course of any journey, all this data is filtered to calculate the appropriate fare and deduct it from any remaining credit stored on the ticket. It’s simple, reliable and extremely convenient for passengers.
The options for using the system are many and varied: single trip, season ticket, student concession card or other special-purpose solutions. Scheidt & Bachmann’s pioneering “esprit” technology opens up a whole range of new possibilities. Passengers only have to make sure they have enough credit left on their ticket or the most suitable form of season ticket for their particular use loaded onto the memory of the medium.

To ensure they do have enough credit or the right form of season ticket, passengers “top up” their own ticket at the relevant loading terminal. Users can also display all the trips they have taken since their last top-up and simply print out the appropriate receipts.

And there’s more: during the top-up process, all of the rides taken by passengers are relayed to a central computer at the admin level – preserving anonymity, of course. This means the owner/operator of the system can get an up-to-date overview of the actual level of capacity utilisation on any given route at any given time of the day. This allows for rapid response by the transport provider to adjust capacity in line with the actual needs of a local passenger transport network at any time.