NZTA admits national ticketing plan ‘overly ambitious’, delays rollout

The $1.4 billion national ticketing solution has been delayed to the end of 2027. Photo / Getty Images

By Nick James of RNZ

The $1.4 billion national ticketing solution (NTS) has been delayed by a year with a review finding NZTA’s original timings for the plan were “overly ambitious”.

The NTS would, for the first time, allow New Zealanders to easily tag on to buses, trains and ferries using contactless payments across the country.

It was meant to be on public transport across the country by the end of next year, but an independent review has been announced and the deadline pushed back to the end of 2027.

NZTA Waka Kotahi chief customer and services officer Sarina Pratley said the project’s review was launched in May and had resulted in 10 main recommendations.

Those included changes to the programme governance, leadership, delivery and decision making, as well as ensuring realistic resourcing commitments from all NTS partners.

“A new programme director has been appointed, the programme’s governance structure is being reviewed to strengthen decision making, a restructure of the programme is under way to ensure it has the right resources to be successfully delivered, and additional resource has been committed to the NTS programme.”

The review found the original timeframes for the project were overly ambitious, Pratley said.

“NTS is a complex programme to deliver. It is replacing four different ticketing systems that support five national and additional local concessions with one standardised national system.

“The challenge has been accommodating a broad range of localised requirements into one national technical solution. NZTA has used the review’s insights to get agreement for a more manageable incremental release plan for the technical solution.”

In July, Transport Minister Chris Bishop told RNZ that NZTA had been “overly optimistic” about its timeframes when a briefing from earlier that year said the NTS project was on target to be completed on time and within budget.

As part of the latest announcement, NZTA said the NTS would be rolled out to Christchurch in November.

Pratley said NTS equipment would start to be installed on buses and ferries in Christchurch this week.

“This is exciting news for Christchurch and for the broader NTS programme. By mid-November, bus and ferry passengers in Christchurch will be able to make fare payments using credit or debit cards.”

The revised national rollout plan for the NTS would be finalised this month.

– RNZ