
All your burgers
belong to us.
Coventry City fans are worried about the security of a cashless payment card introduced at the football club's Ricoh Arena stadium this season. The system, intended to reduce the time fans spend queuing at matches paying for food and beverages, is one of the first of its kind. However the technology behind the SkyBluePass is …
Ok, ticket touts are a pain, but while there isn't common cause for Cov tickets to sell out, I'm sure a 1/2 price skimmed season ticket would be a tasty offer to anyone who's thinking of shelling out the full whack. But then, anyone who is would be supporting the club, so would they bother at all?
Interesting to see if they role the scheme to the other areas in the venue (e.g. the casino..)
Anyway, it doesn't inspire confidence in your new product does it?
I have an Arsenal season ticket and I can't carry it in the same wallet as my Oyster card because of the clash.
However there is currently no option to load the season ticket with cash to buy stuff.
I suppose the main risk from cloning is having too many people inside the stadium and also some sort of touting fiasco but I assume that the same card can't be used to get into the stadium twice on the same day so a ticket-only scam has limited possibilities.
At the Amsterdam Arena where Ajax play they have a cashless food and drink concession system in which you buy a pre-paid card from a vending machine. You can use the card to buy stuff and it's all very quick because no cash changes hands. You can re-charge the card with more money if you are a regular and if you aren't then you end up with a nice little souvenir.
Also if you don't spend all you credit before you go the club trouser the surplus.
The main worry I had when I first started looking into it was not really so much to do with the possibility of nabbing free credit to use to buy drinks/snacks, but the fact the same cards are used for season ticket subscriptions. This being the case, you could theoretically clone another season ticket.
Also, with regards to the cloning of cash; the organised crime benefit would be that you are able to withdraw 'unused' cash from cards. If you cloned cards then withdrew the money, you could basically use the club as your own personal ATM...
It doesn't work like that - a cloned card would be loaded with a specified amount of cash and could be used independently of the "real" card unless the system is keeping track of card usage (inc. current amount on the card) and blocks both cards when it detects an anomaly - but if tracking is in use it would make cloning more difficult in the first place, so it's unlikely any such tracking is in fact in place.
Oh and Chelsea introduced RFID based ticket entry this season, but as far as I know Chelsea have no plans for cash payments.
Cloning someone elses season ticket is somewhat pointless unless you want to run the risk of a ruck when the real ticket owner turns up and gives you a good hiding. Although it's possible the real owner may be barred from entering the ground if the system has already seen his card for that game, which means the problem will be brought swiftly to the attention of the authorities and one very easy collar for the old Bill - East Stand Upper, Row 15, Seat 28 etc. Conversely some mong with a cloned card travels all the way to the game only to discover they can't get in. Whichever way you look at it, cloning a stadium season ticket is a pointless excercise and not a big deal!