SINGAPORE — Credit and debit cards with contactless payment functions could be used to pay for bus and train rides here in the future, eliminating the need for top-ups and also saving tourists the hassle of buying public transport tickets.

Transactions will be charged directly to one’s credit or debit bank account, similar to post-paid mobile phone subscriptions or utility bills. Examples of such contactless bank cards available here include Visa’s payWave and MasterCard’s PayPass.

The Land Transport Authority (LTA) will test this new payment option on a limited scale in the fourth quarter this year. It called a tender on Tuesday (March 1) for consultants to study the feasibility of rolling out such a system across the board and expects to start the study in the second quarter.

Currently, commuters use CEPAS cards for public transport trips, which are issued by EZ-Link, NETS or the LTA. Some banks also offer cards with CEPAS function. Cash is also accepted for bus fares.

The new Account-Based Ticketing system LTA will be testing uses bank cards that are on the EMV (Europay, MasterCard and Visa) Contactless Standards.

“Should the Account-Based Ticketing pilot be successful, Singapore would be one of the few cities in the world to adopt this fare payment system,” said LTA chief executive Chew Men Leong on Tuesday.

To gear up for the pilot, the LTA will be progressively upgrading the software in fare readers on buses and on the rail network islandwide, so that commuters taking part in the pilot will be able to pay for their fares using their contactless bank cards.

More details of the pilot will be announced at a later date.

The LTA will also be calling a tender in the next few months to appoint an acquiring bank, which will acquire fare payments made through contactless credit or debit cards.

One city that already allows the use of contactless bank cards is London, which has progressively introduced the option since 2012.

Currently, more than 10 per cent of unique cards used for travel on London’s bus and rail services are contactless bank cards. The remaining fare transactions use existing payment options such as the Oyster card. The LTA said there are more than 17 million CEPAS cards in circulation here.