OCEAN CITY — The Town of Ocean City is moving forward with hand-held credit card readers in an effort to continue the momentum next year on the heels of the Boardwalk tram’s best year ever.
The Boardwalk tram grossed around $1.3 million and carried about 460,000 passengers, an increase of 51,000 over the prior year. With summer-like weather in September, the Boardwalk tram’s season was extended well into the month to include the weekends of Sunfest and Bike Week.
Not willing to rest on those laurels, Ocean City transportation officials began exploring ways to improve the service, increase ridership and enhance the tram experience. One issue debated was utilizing hand-held credit and debit card systems to accept payment. As it stands now, the Boardwalk tram is strictly a cash-only operation, but accepting credit and debit cards could increase volume, speed up the boarding process and eliminate the need to handle large amounts of cash.
Earlier this fall, the Transportation Committee encouraged staff to begin to explore the possibility of implementing the hand-held credit and debit card readers. Hand-held card readers are used for different resort services, so it was merely a matter of determining if it could work with the Boardwalk tram. At Tuesday’s Transportation Committee meeting, Acting Deputy Director of Transportation Wayne Prior said the research showed it could be done and the committee agreed to send a favorable recommendation to the Mayor and Council.
“The hand-held credit card machines have been tested and this can be done,” he said. “We went the entire length of the Boardwalk and we found good connectivity.”
OCPD Captain Kevin Kirstein said the tests were likely conducted in the offseason when there is less wireless traffic in and around the Boardwalk and advised Pryor and his staff to consider asking Verizon to review its connectivity prior to the summer season.
“Verizon might have to beef up their connectivity,” he said. “It’s great up there right now, but there are some issues in the summer.”
The committee agreed to move forward with a credit or debit card acceptance system for the Boardwalk tram. Pryor said the town would likely have to order eight of the card readers, including one for each of the eight trams and one each for the south end and north end stations. Mayor and Acting City Manager Rick Meehan urged Pryor and his staff to begin training the employees on the new readers as soon as possible.
“We want to get them up to speed as quick as possible,” he said. “This is very important and we want people to feel comfortable using them.”