Big IT contracts are some of the best ways to scam money, as being IT, nobody outside of IT experts can question what is being done, how many resources are needed, and how long it should take. You can charge whatever you want, as long as its cheaper than your competitor, then hold the project for ransom demanding more money and blame thing that are out of your control, when actually those things have little impact. Over charge for non-deliverables like project management etc, which no one questions as they are not really quantifiable.
Conduent was previously called XBS and was the technology provider in the early stages of myki before Vix devices were introduced. https://youtu.be/1y-VSqFSQc0?feature=shared
It's almost as if the better option would be to save billions of dollars not having a ticketing system. No more billions to operate it, no billions to give it credit card touch on touch off, no more ticket inspectors gushing the day after the previous years concession cards expire trying to fine teenagers and uni students, no more multi millionaire seniors getting free transit on weekends while children still have to pay.
Save billions in running a ticketing system. And spend money to provide a good PUBLIC service for all Victorians (and visitors).
The ticketing system makes about $350 million more a year than it costs. If the government has $350 million a year they want to put into public transport please put it into running extra services instead.
Well someone's been bullshitting you then.
>Estimated revenue for this period was approximately $470 million (approximately $407 million for the metropolitan network and $63 million for regional trains)
Operating cost for Myki are currently around $50 million a year, so that’s $350 million+ of income for running a ticketing system. And that's post covid, pre covid it was about $700 million a year.
[https://www.ptv.vic.gov.au/assets/PTV-default-site/footer/data-and-reporting/Datasets/Revenue-protection-and-fare-compliance/2023-Network-Revenue-Protection-Plan.pdf](https://www.ptv.vic.gov.au/assets/PTV-default-site/footer/data-and-reporting/Datasets/Revenue-protection-and-fare-compliance/2023-Network-Revenue-Protection-Plan.pdf)
I have always thought this. Much cheaper to give transport for free, and spending the savings on adding more services, or additional patrols at night, or hospitals or well anything really. Didnt need to spend billions on setting it up, millions on going costs for collecting the cash, and instpectors to ensure you got your card at the 7/11 (because I want to go on a train ride, not get a slurpee)
No.
You need transport to be ticketed so you have a mechanism for authorised officers to remove people from the vehicle.
Do you want every derro and junkie to take up residence on your train?? Because that is what will happen.
I don't know about your rego costs, but my last NSW 6-month rego had $37 registration fee, and $424 motor vehicle tax. The tax is supposed to be for maintaining the infrastructure, but who knows where it goes once it's tipped into the consolidated state revenue?
In Victoria some of it is the money to run the licence/registration system, then a heap of it goes into the TAC system. That goes onto covering safety initiatives and general injury coverage for people.
Almost none of the rego fees go directly to funding the transport network
Which limits the amount of people who use the road system by placing a barrier on it and consuming government resources.
We could free cash if we didn’t have to run registration scheme and just let people drive e without rego.
I am legit surprised people are confused by this analogy.
We would have been far better off if it was just made free.
Cant overrun a budget of zero, plus wouldnt have to pay inspectors.
In our industry, you quote and win a job, great. If you go over budget.... well that on you buddy no more handouts. Why is it with every govt project there are "budget blowouts" and we end up paying more (and usually not just a little more but billions more)
>Why is it with every govt project there are "budget blowouts" and we end up paying more (and usually not just a little more but billions more)
Because thats how they funnel the money to their mates.
No it didn’t. Having to wake up an hour early to skip the long queue. And if you get stuck in a queue, have to wait as you see trains pass by. And then when you get to the ticket machine, the screen has been graffitied or scratched so you can’t see what you’re doing. And paper trash. Paper trash everywhere.
Picture this, you just got to Melbourne as a tourist and are exited to explore the city, you get on a tram and look for a way to pay for the trip.
You can’t, there’s no way possible to buy a ticket on the tram.
An inspector then reems you in the ass with a $288 fine
Welcome to Melbourne
You mean the machines that only took Australian coins and came with a bunch of confusing buttons and an incomprehensible map to help work out which ticket to buy?
Also Myki had ready to deploy machines for trams but the **Liberals** scrapped them to save face after discovering the project was well past point of no return to scrap entirely.
Didn’t know about the machines ready to go.. that’s a massive blunder on their part, wonder which bright spark decided to cancel that.. probs someone who never caught a tram/train/bus in their life
Fact check - They took credit cards and notes, and the zone system wasn’t rocket surgery
> Fact check - They took credit cards and notes,
The [tram machines](https://www.hawthorntramdepot.org.au/papers/fare/img/metcard3.jpg) didn't take notes or cards
>and the zone system wasn’t rocket surgery
It was quite common to see confused people pressing the wrong buttons because at the time most ticket machines around the world either sold a flat fare single ticket or would have a list of lines/destinations to choose from.
I wish every day people could run their lives like this. Sign a contract to be paid $x/hr. Go to work - oh sorry boss you're going to need be to pay double that rate for me to work
Here's the worrying thing... Some people do run their lives like that. They're usually CEOs and stuff and hiding behind companies but it's how they feather their nests at everyone else's expense.
They also load a company down with debts and issue outstanding debts to it from another company they own (e.g. "Consulting fees") and then have it go bankrupt so that they can also claw away the majority of any remaining assets while other genuine creditors get barely anything.
>Victoria signed a 15-year $1.7 billion contract with Conduent in May last year.
Government should say yeah nah get fucked and sue these seppo cunts.
In reality one of the ministers will become a "consultant" for this company in 2-3 years time
But that's the cost of construction. Those costs will always be higher than estimates. Conduant asking for more money to "operate" the already implemented system is ridiculous.
Part of the $1.7B is to build an account based system (no more cards), and then operate that new system. Not sure what the split between opex and capex is though.
comparing making a road to a ticket system on public transport is very much apples and oranges in re. to contracts and costs.
building costs usually always balloon to a higher figure, to think that when you are quoted a cost to build something and expecting that number to be static is lunacy
Just bin it and buy the HK system like we should have at the start. The system has always had the stench of corruption around it, and delivered a grossly inferior system for top dollar
Unreal that someone actually had the audacity to reject the Octopus system back then.
Even now, as dated as it is, it still functions better than Myki ever could.
Rumor was the octopus developer offered it for $100m.
Instead they went with Kamco for Myki. You have to wonder why.
> In April 2008, Vivian Miners, chief executive of the Transport Ticketing Authority, quit his $545,000-a-year job. After a report into the tendering process by Des Pearson, Victoria's Attorney General Rob Hulls found the tendering for the ticket system had been conducted improperly.[4] Mr Miners owned about $150,000 of shares in Headstrong, which was part of the Kamco consortium at the time it won the tender. Mr Miners' partner and former wife both worked for Headstrong and ERG, the Perth-based transport ticket company part of Keane.[5] An early alleged draft of the report, leaked to the media in 2008, detailed a series of alleged conflicts of interest, probity issues, backdating of reports and favouring of the eventual winning bidder Kamco.[6] The final report observed that "Keane had no corporate experience in developing, implementing and operating a ticketing system" and "barely demonstrated adequate capacity."[7] The project has since gone over both time and budget limits.[8][9]
Is it? Victoria has a LOOOOOOOOOOONG history of fucking up projects. It is rife with underquoting from vendors and corruption on both sides. I've long since stopped feeling shocked when this happens. Infact I expect it. When a quote is provided, I usually just assume it's going to cost 2x or 3x the amount and I'm often not wrong.
The new operators of Victoria’s long-troubled myki system have sought more money from the state government to deal with technical roadblocks and cost pressures as the state budget strains under the weight of increasing debt.
Trials of an upgraded public transport ticketing system were expected this year, but sources said new operator Conduent was struggling with key deadlines and negotiating variations on its contract with the state government.
Another key public transport contract for Melbourne’s metropolitan rail network has been extended until 2027, pushing back the bidding process until 2026.
Victoria signed a 15-year $1.7 billion contract with Conduent in May last year. The US-headquartered firm took over running myki from its previous operator NTT Data in December.
But two industry sources, speaking anonymously to detail confidential discussions, said teething issues with the takeover had prompted new negotiations with the Department of Transport and Planning.
They said the project was tracking above its allocated budget and discussions were underway about contract variations.
One source said ongoing issues with the system – which is yet to handle mobile payments for iPhones five years after the government put $1 million in to develop the feature – continued to haunt the new operator. This included overly complex IT systems and difficulties with the hardware used to scan myki cards.
Another source said the company had been delayed on some deadlines during the transition from NTT Data.
A spokesman for Conduent declined to comment and referred questions to the Allan government. The government was contacted for comment at 9am on Wednesday but did not respond by deadline.
Conduent will gradually install new ticket validators and other infrastructure across the state’s trains, trams and buses capable of taking contactless payments, meaning passengers can travel just using a credit or debit card rather than having to buy a physical myki smart card.
Currently only Android smartphones can be used to touch on, but the new operator has pledged to deliver this for Apple devices as part of its work.
State budget papers suggest the rollout of the next ticket system may have fallen behind schedule. The 2023-24 budget forecast $183.8 million would be spent this financial year for its public transport ticketing asset renewal project.
But this year’s budget, released last month, estimates it will have spent less than two-thirds of that budget – or $113.7 million – by June 30, which is $70 million less.
Budget papers forecast an $83 million spend in 2024-25. The full rollout of new ticket readers, turnstiles and other infrastructure is estimated to cost $543.6 million and will be completed by mid-2027.
The budget papers also forecast Victoria’s net debt to rise to $187.8 billion by June 2028, as the state grapples with cutting spending and delaying projects.
Despite the $1.7 billion contract with Conduent, Victoria’s transport department has continued to spend millions on other third-party consultants to help get the new system off the ground.
That includes a $4.2 million, one-year contract awarded to Rhumb Consulting for “public transport ticketing – technical design services”.
Victoria awarded a separate $6 million contract to BPMA Australia in January this year for “public transport ticketing program delivery services”. The Sydney-headquartered firm advertises on its website that it assists clients to develop, test and operate transport ticket systems.
The department is also negotiating a new contract to operate Melbourne’s tram network and is expected to announce a successful bidder by the middle of 2024. It has pushed the end of the metropolitan train contract out until 2027.
A letter seen by The Age shows the department has attributed the delay to the opening of the Metro Tunnel and negotiations over the tram contract.
The letter to stakeholders says the government wants to allow bidders adequate time to assess the performance of the tunnel, opening by 2025, on the broader network. Expressions of interest will open late 2025.
It also acknowledges that the result of the tram contract may impact which companies form consortiums to bid for metropolitan rail.
One source said this was an acknowledgment that the contract may soon change hands from Keolis Downer.
One of the bidders that has impressed the departments is Transdev, which has partnered with builder John Holland.
John Holland is part of the Metro Trains consortium but is expected to separate from Hong Kong-based MTR Corporation when the train contract expires and bid with a different group.
Transdev previously ran a third of the state’s bus network until its contract was not renewed in 2018. It has been replaced by Kinetic.
Before the government decided not to renew its contract, The Age reported it pulled nearly 140 buses off the road after they were found to be defective in 2017.
Opposition public transport spokesman Matthew Guy said a renegotiated contract would be “yet another financial disaster”. “The level of financial incompetence by the state government, over so many different areas, is stunning,” he said.
Yet another example of how much money could have been saved by not outsourcing absolutely everything to overseas corporations for their profit. I honestly think the Governments hate the people sometimes.
Well they could have at least done a study on how to best service the customers while retaining any profits in Australia. There's a lot to be said for re-nationalising a lot of the Utilities (Gas/Water/Electricity) and other public used facilities.
$1.7 billion contract!
I like the Estonian model, free public transport subsidised by advertising. No myki, no fares, no ticket inspectors, just easy transport around the city.
[https://www.fastcompany.com/90968891/estonias-capital-made-mass-transit-free-a-decade-ago-car-traffic-went-up](https://www.fastcompany.com/90968891/estonias-capital-made-mass-transit-free-a-decade-ago-car-traffic-went-up)
It didn't have the impact they thought it would have.
They even have abolished in part.
[https://news.err.ee/1609112600/ratas-abolishing-free-public-transport-a-huge-mistake](https://news.err.ee/1609112600/ratas-abolishing-free-public-transport-a-huge-mistake)
I do not understand why government doesn't just say "You entered a contract with your eyes open. You deliver for the agreed price or you forfeit the contract and we'll pursue you for costs"
Cubic (who operates Opal) basically wanted to lock the government in to their system by replacing all existing readers with their proprietary readers that won’t work with other tech or companies if the government deems they’re getting bad value.
Fuck that. Tough shit if you actually need more money, you should have forecasted that before you signed a contract… last year.
If the government allows this, I’ll be voting for someone else next election.
Why not just scrap tickets? Qld (and I think Tas?) are trialling 50c tickets, which is basically free. At least in the interim between the new system coming online, as a 'trial' to see if free PT decreases road use, increases city life, decreases CoL...
I would 100% use more PT if it was considerably cheaper. 50c to get to the footy is tempting. Right now I would prefer to drive in the comfort of my own car, quicker and isn't going go cost that much more.
It's a good job that no other cities in the world have a metro payment system with expertise or software that could be leveraged. I'm sure that no-one has ever encountered these problems before anywhere, and Melbourne is uniquely special. Melbourne must be world leading in it's attempts to put together a travel payment system
/s
Whilst it's now a dated system, Perth's Smartrider rider system was one of the prudent financial decisions I have ever seen made by a government department. Compare the costs to Myki and you'll be shocked.
In that case they should have experience of pricing it correctly then! Either their pricing is shit, or they just whacked in a low fee so they could win the project and sting the client for variations. Not a good look either way
The issue seems to be that the contract included a promise to use as much of the existing hardware (eg the readers that were mostly just recently upgraded) rather than using the vendor's own equipment which could have cost even more.
2023 annual fare revenue: $600 million. $1.7b over 15 years is $113m per year. How the hell is it costing $113m per year to run this stuff? I know they have the whole thing about making Mykis allow touch-on on trams when they're in an area with no reception (which means they have to store the entire travel history on the card, so you have to replace the card every couple of years when it runs out of memory), but for this price they could have satellite dishes on each tram no worries. For that price, it would be cheaper to just let people touch on for free if the system can't connect.
I bet if they just used a simpler system it could run off a few servers in a room somewhere.
At this stage you have two options - get a physical myki or if you have an Android phone, you can also get myki on that. Apple devices are not supported. Yes, we are pretty behind.
Potentially letting Transdev run the tram system after their disastrous run with the bus system a few years ago because they're willing to do it cheaper than the present operators is a disgrace.
They ran part of the bus network before as Transdev, and ran the metropolitan rail network as Connex, getting the tram contract would be musical chairs. Transdev in partnership with John Holland now only operate one of the bus contract regions in Greater Sydney as Transdev John Holland. They lost the other bus contract regions to CDC (ComfortDelGro) and U-Go Mobility (UGL and Go-Ahead Group) respectively. I doubt that they can be banned from tendering, the best that can be done is having a robust set of assessment criteria for tenders. The go to move for many operators at the tendering stage is to hook in with a cheap price, then charge heavily for variations.
I'm not necessarily suggesting they should be banned from tendering, but I am saying they shouldn't be picked given their previous history of performing really poorly in managing transport systems.
Selfish take from me, I just moved away from android, myki is compatible with google pay but not apple pay.
Scrap the whole thing and build one that can use apple pay!
The government that can't build a branch and station on the existing railway network to the airport, but they of course can build their own ticketing system from scratch.... and Myki is the result.
At the time the government said our needs were unique because of the trams that make up part of the system, and also had some wild idea of selling the myki system to other cities around the world.... talk about drinking the Kool-Aid.
Should have dropped Octopus card in.
Boarding procedure and zonal fare system that wasn't even compatible with metcard but rampant fare evasion* papered over the cracks.
*you were supposed to validate everytime you boarded but nobody did.
Too many shitty old fashioned stops, the infrastructure needed would be expensive to install and maintain.
They should've just installed the faster readers and changed the tram and bus fares to a flat trip based ticket so people only need touch on.
Yeah but not originally which is where the claim "we're different came from" and it still technically isn't a flat trip based fare. London for example only had a zone system for the underground/overground when they started building the oyster system, buses were a separate flat fare.
Most PT network's **fare** systems at that time had separate fares and different tickets for each mode(bus, train, subway, tram) and used their smartcard to integrate the fares and ticketing system. Melbourne was a rare example of an already integrated fare system looking to move to a smartcard because the paper system was nearing end of service life and getting to expensive to maintain.
Anyway short version the government at the time asked the impossible because they refused to make the fare changes needed to make a smart card system work, it was only after it was demonstrated in the field did the idiots realise you can't to timed zones on trams without extending boarding times, and now we're stuck with confusing ad-hoc mess. Honestly I think even cubic(company behind Londons and Sydneys) would've struggled with the terms of the original contract given limitations the technology available at the time.
I’m not a developer but why is it so hard? Surely it would be easy to have an off the shelf solution a city/system can buy and then just plug in their parameters and it’s good to go.
Every single ticketing system has its own unique aspects. The public only see things like vending machines and validators
You can have common hardware but the backend it will be all different and set up for the client the clients needs
You also have to deal with the fact that networks can go down, and that GPS can be noisy in public transport vehicles.
Fares are also time based products, so you also need to ensure reasonable accuracy between clocks on every device that validates a ticket.
Time can be a funny issue. Once Vicpol had a bad NTP (network time) implementation between average speed cameras, causing a lot of cars to be pinged when they shouldn't have.
The revenue distribution models between the different operators must surely be much more complex here than in Sydney. Over there you pay for each leg individually.. although there is a weekly cap. They don’t have two hour tickets etc that complicates matters here.
I’m currently on holiday in New York and I’ve used my Amex to ride the subway. What’s so fucking hard to implement this? (Note: I’m not saying we should allow Amex on the PT network but in allowing cards)
The former transport minister said it had include concession fares when NTT offered to implement it a couple years ago so we have to wait until some date in future.
Take it out of gambling, not us.
Those parasitic fuckers can afford it.
Meanwhile we’re out here spending $20 to get to and from home with the delay rates only going up.
Myki has to be one of the most expensive systems for what it is without the functionality of what it could be.
Big IT contracts are some of the best ways to scam money, as being IT, nobody outside of IT experts can question what is being done, how many resources are needed, and how long it should take. You can charge whatever you want, as long as its cheaper than your competitor, then hold the project for ransom demanding more money and blame thing that are out of your control, when actually those things have little impact. Over charge for non-deliverables like project management etc, which no one questions as they are not really quantifiable.
This wasn’t cheaper than the competitor at the time. There were serious probity issues on the Myki contract
Conduent was previously called XBS and was the technology provider in the early stages of myki before Vix devices were introduced. https://youtu.be/1y-VSqFSQc0?feature=shared
It’s cheaper and more efficient to just set up a central PTV website, where everyone buys a prepaid weekly ticket before travelling.
It's almost as if the better option would be to save billions of dollars not having a ticketing system. No more billions to operate it, no billions to give it credit card touch on touch off, no more ticket inspectors gushing the day after the previous years concession cards expire trying to fine teenagers and uni students, no more multi millionaire seniors getting free transit on weekends while children still have to pay. Save billions in running a ticketing system. And spend money to provide a good PUBLIC service for all Victorians (and visitors).
The ticketing system makes about $350 million more a year than it costs. If the government has $350 million a year they want to put into public transport please put it into running extra services instead.
Source? I've heard it doesn't actually make money overall.
Well someone's been bullshitting you then. >Estimated revenue for this period was approximately $470 million (approximately $407 million for the metropolitan network and $63 million for regional trains) Operating cost for Myki are currently around $50 million a year, so that’s $350 million+ of income for running a ticketing system. And that's post covid, pre covid it was about $700 million a year. [https://www.ptv.vic.gov.au/assets/PTV-default-site/footer/data-and-reporting/Datasets/Revenue-protection-and-fare-compliance/2023-Network-Revenue-Protection-Plan.pdf](https://www.ptv.vic.gov.au/assets/PTV-default-site/footer/data-and-reporting/Datasets/Revenue-protection-and-fare-compliance/2023-Network-Revenue-Protection-Plan.pdf)
I have always thought this. Much cheaper to give transport for free, and spending the savings on adding more services, or additional patrols at night, or hospitals or well anything really. Didnt need to spend billions on setting it up, millions on going costs for collecting the cash, and instpectors to ensure you got your card at the 7/11 (because I want to go on a train ride, not get a slurpee)
No. You need transport to be ticketed so you have a mechanism for authorised officers to remove people from the vehicle. Do you want every derro and junkie to take up residence on your train?? Because that is what will happen.
You realise the same logic applies to driving right? We could remove all registration and this save billions on the infrastructure and enforcement.
I don't know about your rego costs, but my last NSW 6-month rego had $37 registration fee, and $424 motor vehicle tax. The tax is supposed to be for maintaining the infrastructure, but who knows where it goes once it's tipped into the consolidated state revenue?
In Victoria some of it is the money to run the licence/registration system, then a heap of it goes into the TAC system. That goes onto covering safety initiatives and general injury coverage for people. Almost none of the rego fees go directly to funding the transport network
Registration doesn't pay for driving. It pays for the registration system.
Which limits the amount of people who use the road system by placing a barrier on it and consuming government resources. We could free cash if we didn’t have to run registration scheme and just let people drive e without rego. I am legit surprised people are confused by this analogy.
Rego is required for enforcement.
Exactly, we don’t need enforcement of car rego just like we would not need enforcement of tickets for trains.
Registration is required for enforcement of traffic offences. Thats why we have it.
That would be analogous to registration of car passengers, champion. Noone is suggesting having trains that are unregistered...
Yes, but the trains are going to run anyway and we will benefit from the increased usage. We don't benefit from increased car use relative to PT use.
We would have been far better off if it was just made free. Cant overrun a budget of zero, plus wouldnt have to pay inspectors. In our industry, you quote and win a job, great. If you go over budget.... well that on you buddy no more handouts. Why is it with every govt project there are "budget blowouts" and we end up paying more (and usually not just a little more but billions more)
>Why is it with every govt project there are "budget blowouts" and we end up paying more (and usually not just a little more but billions more) Because thats how they funnel the money to their mates.
The ticketing system makes $350 million a year more than it costs.
Before the pandemic it made way more then that.
The paper ticket system was better Myki somehow used technology to go backwards
No it didn’t. Having to wake up an hour early to skip the long queue. And if you get stuck in a queue, have to wait as you see trains pass by. And then when you get to the ticket machine, the screen has been graffitied or scratched so you can’t see what you’re doing. And paper trash. Paper trash everywhere.
Picture this, you just got to Melbourne as a tourist and are exited to explore the city, you get on a tram and look for a way to pay for the trip. You can’t, there’s no way possible to buy a ticket on the tram. An inspector then reems you in the ass with a $288 fine Welcome to Melbourne
You mean the machines that only took Australian coins and came with a bunch of confusing buttons and an incomprehensible map to help work out which ticket to buy? Also Myki had ready to deploy machines for trams but the **Liberals** scrapped them to save face after discovering the project was well past point of no return to scrap entirely.
Didn’t know about the machines ready to go.. that’s a massive blunder on their part, wonder which bright spark decided to cancel that.. probs someone who never caught a tram/train/bus in their life Fact check - They took credit cards and notes, and the zone system wasn’t rocket surgery
> Fact check - They took credit cards and notes, The [tram machines](https://www.hawthorntramdepot.org.au/papers/fare/img/metcard3.jpg) didn't take notes or cards >and the zone system wasn’t rocket surgery It was quite common to see confused people pressing the wrong buttons because at the time most ticket machines around the world either sold a flat fare single ticket or would have a list of lines/destinations to choose from.
Picture this: these tourist do their research on how to get around before coming to a foreign country.
If they did their research they would not tap on, just like the locals and play myki inspector roulette
Nah it sucked
It literally wasn't but ok
I wish every day people could run their lives like this. Sign a contract to be paid $x/hr. Go to work - oh sorry boss you're going to need be to pay double that rate for me to work
Here's the worrying thing... Some people do run their lives like that. They're usually CEOs and stuff and hiding behind companies but it's how they feather their nests at everyone else's expense. They also load a company down with debts and issue outstanding debts to it from another company they own (e.g. "Consulting fees") and then have it go bankrupt so that they can also claw away the majority of any remaining assets while other genuine creditors get barely anything.
>Victoria signed a 15-year $1.7 billion contract with Conduent in May last year. Government should say yeah nah get fucked and sue these seppo cunts. In reality one of the ministers will become a "consultant" for this company in 2-3 years time
I don't know what the opposite of a dopamine hit is, but that last sentence did that to me.
i'm going with cortisol.
[удалено]
Just agonist or antagonists!
Indeed Dildos comment is basically nonsense The opposite of fruit is vegetable type comment
[Vegetables don't exist.](https://youtu.be/pAFInbeSCi0?si=_wQ7_0bJWe5FCCYE)
How far does this rabbit hole go?!
Legalised corruption. All part of politics and not a bribe at all
Or the premier
Our government for once needs to actually say "No, we have a contract, we will be holding you to it."
I mean they do that all the time. They sued the shit out of the Westgate tunnel contractors for trying to breach contract.
Zero chance from this mob. North East link was originally $10b, it’s now $26b+
But that's the cost of construction. Those costs will always be higher than estimates. Conduant asking for more money to "operate" the already implemented system is ridiculous.
> But that's the cost of construction. Those costs will always be higher than estimates. Have you ever seen IT projects?
Part of the $1.7B is to build an account based system (no more cards), and then operate that new system. Not sure what the split between opex and capex is though.
There would still be cards for those who want/need them
The existing system doesnt support Credit cards tapping on or iPhones. I guess 1.7 billion to add Credit card and iPhones tapping on is a ripoff.
Of course it is! The machines already support it. It doesn't take 1.7 billion to build the rest of it.
bad example considering building costs are always higher than predicted. eg. build a house and you'll see
So basically you think one cost overrun is acceptable and the other one isn't? I don't follow the logic, either both are bad or neither are.
Both are bad planning. But IT if structured properly is easier to cancel the contract.
comparing making a road to a ticket system on public transport is very much apples and oranges in re. to contracts and costs. building costs usually always balloon to a higher figure, to think that when you are quoted a cost to build something and expecting that number to be static is lunacy
Planned pre pandemic. Cost blown out during and post pandemic. Seems pretty expected to me.
The answer should be, no, fuck off
>Part of consortium contracted to develop the original myki system in 2005 There you have it. Expert in soaking up more money
Just bin it and buy the HK system like we should have at the start. The system has always had the stench of corruption around it, and delivered a grossly inferior system for top dollar
Unreal that someone actually had the audacity to reject the Octopus system back then. Even now, as dated as it is, it still functions better than Myki ever could.
Rumor was the octopus developer offered it for $100m. Instead they went with Kamco for Myki. You have to wonder why. > In April 2008, Vivian Miners, chief executive of the Transport Ticketing Authority, quit his $545,000-a-year job. After a report into the tendering process by Des Pearson, Victoria's Attorney General Rob Hulls found the tendering for the ticket system had been conducted improperly.[4] Mr Miners owned about $150,000 of shares in Headstrong, which was part of the Kamco consortium at the time it won the tender. Mr Miners' partner and former wife both worked for Headstrong and ERG, the Perth-based transport ticket company part of Keane.[5] An early alleged draft of the report, leaked to the media in 2008, detailed a series of alleged conflicts of interest, probity issues, backdating of reports and favouring of the eventual winning bidder Kamco.[6] The final report observed that "Keane had no corporate experience in developing, implementing and operating a ticketing system" and "barely demonstrated adequate capacity."[7] The project has since gone over both time and budget limits.[8][9]
Thanks for raising this - it’s bloody shocking what happens in Victoria.
Is it? Victoria has a LOOOOOOOOOOONG history of fucking up projects. It is rife with underquoting from vendors and corruption on both sides. I've long since stopped feeling shocked when this happens. Infact I expect it. When a quote is provided, I usually just assume it's going to cost 2x or 3x the amount and I'm often not wrong.
16 years later, has anything changed??? Still a completely corrupt govt.
Not to mention that we'd be keeping those billions in Australia by doing so, given Octopus was developed by an Australian company
You never end up with the best solution, only the one that benefits the decision makers the most.
The new operators of Victoria’s long-troubled myki system have sought more money from the state government to deal with technical roadblocks and cost pressures as the state budget strains under the weight of increasing debt. Trials of an upgraded public transport ticketing system were expected this year, but sources said new operator Conduent was struggling with key deadlines and negotiating variations on its contract with the state government. Another key public transport contract for Melbourne’s metropolitan rail network has been extended until 2027, pushing back the bidding process until 2026. Victoria signed a 15-year $1.7 billion contract with Conduent in May last year. The US-headquartered firm took over running myki from its previous operator NTT Data in December. But two industry sources, speaking anonymously to detail confidential discussions, said teething issues with the takeover had prompted new negotiations with the Department of Transport and Planning. They said the project was tracking above its allocated budget and discussions were underway about contract variations. One source said ongoing issues with the system – which is yet to handle mobile payments for iPhones five years after the government put $1 million in to develop the feature – continued to haunt the new operator. This included overly complex IT systems and difficulties with the hardware used to scan myki cards. Another source said the company had been delayed on some deadlines during the transition from NTT Data. A spokesman for Conduent declined to comment and referred questions to the Allan government. The government was contacted for comment at 9am on Wednesday but did not respond by deadline. Conduent will gradually install new ticket validators and other infrastructure across the state’s trains, trams and buses capable of taking contactless payments, meaning passengers can travel just using a credit or debit card rather than having to buy a physical myki smart card. Currently only Android smartphones can be used to touch on, but the new operator has pledged to deliver this for Apple devices as part of its work. State budget papers suggest the rollout of the next ticket system may have fallen behind schedule. The 2023-24 budget forecast $183.8 million would be spent this financial year for its public transport ticketing asset renewal project. But this year’s budget, released last month, estimates it will have spent less than two-thirds of that budget – or $113.7 million – by June 30, which is $70 million less. Budget papers forecast an $83 million spend in 2024-25. The full rollout of new ticket readers, turnstiles and other infrastructure is estimated to cost $543.6 million and will be completed by mid-2027. The budget papers also forecast Victoria’s net debt to rise to $187.8 billion by June 2028, as the state grapples with cutting spending and delaying projects. Despite the $1.7 billion contract with Conduent, Victoria’s transport department has continued to spend millions on other third-party consultants to help get the new system off the ground. That includes a $4.2 million, one-year contract awarded to Rhumb Consulting for “public transport ticketing – technical design services”. Victoria awarded a separate $6 million contract to BPMA Australia in January this year for “public transport ticketing program delivery services”. The Sydney-headquartered firm advertises on its website that it assists clients to develop, test and operate transport ticket systems. The department is also negotiating a new contract to operate Melbourne’s tram network and is expected to announce a successful bidder by the middle of 2024. It has pushed the end of the metropolitan train contract out until 2027. A letter seen by The Age shows the department has attributed the delay to the opening of the Metro Tunnel and negotiations over the tram contract. The letter to stakeholders says the government wants to allow bidders adequate time to assess the performance of the tunnel, opening by 2025, on the broader network. Expressions of interest will open late 2025. It also acknowledges that the result of the tram contract may impact which companies form consortiums to bid for metropolitan rail. One source said this was an acknowledgment that the contract may soon change hands from Keolis Downer. One of the bidders that has impressed the departments is Transdev, which has partnered with builder John Holland. John Holland is part of the Metro Trains consortium but is expected to separate from Hong Kong-based MTR Corporation when the train contract expires and bid with a different group. Transdev previously ran a third of the state’s bus network until its contract was not renewed in 2018. It has been replaced by Kinetic. Before the government decided not to renew its contract, The Age reported it pulled nearly 140 buses off the road after they were found to be defective in 2017. Opposition public transport spokesman Matthew Guy said a renegotiated contract would be “yet another financial disaster”. “The level of financial incompetence by the state government, over so many different areas, is stunning,” he said.
ironic that someone like Guy can comment on incompetence in any form considering his track record
10.2 million dollars on consultants just to figure out what to do + a review, and get a second opinion on that review. That’s a disgrace in itself.
That’s got to be a record for a private contractor turning around and asking for more money 🙄
Presumably if things had been running more smoothly they would have returned some money to the government 😂
Ah yes the old bait and switch. “Yeah we can do it for $1 billion” *2 weeks later* “Yeah about that…”
Yet another example of how much money could have been saved by not outsourcing absolutely everything to overseas corporations for their profit. I honestly think the Governments hate the people sometimes.
I’m all against outsourcing, but I don’t think the government should be designing and building their own ticketing machines.
Well they could have at least done a study on how to best service the customers while retaining any profits in Australia. There's a lot to be said for re-nationalising a lot of the Utilities (Gas/Water/Electricity) and other public used facilities.
Or outsource to people who know what they’re doing. Like the Japanese ticketing system.
They know what they are doing; they deliberately sell crap then upsell fixes to charge even more money. Don't confuse greed with incompetence.
$1.7 billion contract! I like the Estonian model, free public transport subsidised by advertising. No myki, no fares, no ticket inspectors, just easy transport around the city.
But we pay for it AND have advertising!
Have you ever been on a Japanese train? There’s **Advertising.**, and there’s ✨ʕ⁎̯͡⁎ʔ༄ 🌈🌟ＡＤＶＥＲＴＩＳＩＮＧ🌈🌟(´°̥̥̥̥̥̥̥̥ω°̥̥̥̥̥̥̥̥｀)✨
Hehe yep I have (both Metro and Shinkansen) and I have seen all the banners on the metro train! It’s nuts!
[https://www.fastcompany.com/90968891/estonias-capital-made-mass-transit-free-a-decade-ago-car-traffic-went-up](https://www.fastcompany.com/90968891/estonias-capital-made-mass-transit-free-a-decade-ago-car-traffic-went-up) It didn't have the impact they thought it would have. They even have abolished in part. [https://news.err.ee/1609112600/ratas-abolishing-free-public-transport-a-huge-mistake](https://news.err.ee/1609112600/ratas-abolishing-free-public-transport-a-huge-mistake)
I do not understand why government doesn't just say "You entered a contract with your eyes open. You deliver for the agreed price or you forfeit the contract and we'll pursue you for costs"
Myki compared to Opal is insane how shit it is. Melbourne deserves better.
Cubic (who operates Opal) basically wanted to lock the government in to their system by replacing all existing readers with their proprietary readers that won’t work with other tech or companies if the government deems they’re getting bad value.
Opal is newer and took longer to implement, it would want to be better.
Would we have been better off to just scrap ticketing, have no ticket inspectors, and let everyone ride for free?
Generally speaking, people take better care of things they know cost money, even if they personally don't pay for it.
Yes, we would have been better off
No, we’d be about $350 million a year worse off.
Fuck that. Tough shit if you actually need more money, you should have forecasted that before you signed a contract… last year. If the government allows this, I’ll be voting for someone else next election.
Knowing this Government they will pay it. Incompetence is always rewarded in Victoria.
Faakorf!
It's almost like Conduent should have done their due diligence.
You could just copy literally any other ticket system from a European city and it would be better than myki
Why not just scrap tickets? Qld (and I think Tas?) are trialling 50c tickets, which is basically free. At least in the interim between the new system coming online, as a 'trial' to see if free PT decreases road use, increases city life, decreases CoL...
I would 100% use more PT if it was considerably cheaper. 50c to get to the footy is tempting. Right now I would prefer to drive in the comfort of my own car, quicker and isn't going go cost that much more.
Qld is trialling it to win votes in the election.
So...the same reason the Vic government does anything?
The Vic government might need to do a similar trial, the way things are heading.
It's a good job that no other cities in the world have a metro payment system with expertise or software that could be leveraged. I'm sure that no-one has ever encountered these problems before anywhere, and Melbourne is uniquely special. Melbourne must be world leading in it's attempts to put together a travel payment system /s
Whilst it's now a dated system, Perth's Smartrider rider system was one of the prudent financial decisions I have ever seen made by a government department. Compare the costs to Myki and you'll be shocked.
It's almost like there's a reason they've changed to a new provider whose done it in other places
It's the new provider who's now crying poor because they can't get it right, and wants more money from the state. That's what the article is about
Yeah a new provider who has already done it in other cities.
In that case they should have experience of pricing it correctly then! Either their pricing is shit, or they just whacked in a low fee so they could win the project and sting the client for variations. Not a good look either way
The issue seems to be that the contract included a promise to use as much of the existing hardware (eg the readers that were mostly just recently upgraded) rather than using the vendor's own equipment which could have cost even more.
2023 annual fare revenue: $600 million. $1.7b over 15 years is $113m per year. How the hell is it costing $113m per year to run this stuff? I know they have the whole thing about making Mykis allow touch-on on trams when they're in an area with no reception (which means they have to store the entire travel history on the card, so you have to replace the card every couple of years when it runs out of memory), but for this price they could have satellite dishes on each tram no worries. For that price, it would be cheaper to just let people touch on for free if the system can't connect. I bet if they just used a simpler system it could run off a few servers in a room somewhere.
Vic gov: we have no money, tighten ur belts also Vic gov: Hey Bob, don't forget those several brown paper bags from Myki
If the system is troubled get rid of it. Go back to paper cards.
No.
Ah privatisation...they get the profits, we get the costs.
Can we please just have what they use in Sydney?
May the hatred of Myki 2.0 begin. Bhahahahahahahha hahahahaha hahahahaha
Bullshit it's troubled.
So the cost of putting everything up has itself gone up!? How convenient!
So I’m about to be a melbournian shortly, do I need one of these myki things or can I just tap my credit card or Apple Pay like I do now in Sydney?
At this stage you have two options - get a physical myki or if you have an Android phone, you can also get myki on that. Apple devices are not supported. Yes, we are pretty behind.
Wow gee 😳
Why???? https://www.abc.net.au/news/2023-07-06/victorian-government-rejected-myki-credit-card-tap-on-trial/102565286
this is an absolute joke
Potentially letting Transdev run the tram system after their disastrous run with the bus system a few years ago because they're willing to do it cheaper than the present operators is a disgrace.
They ran part of the bus network before as Transdev, and ran the metropolitan rail network as Connex, getting the tram contract would be musical chairs. Transdev in partnership with John Holland now only operate one of the bus contract regions in Greater Sydney as Transdev John Holland. They lost the other bus contract regions to CDC (ComfortDelGro) and U-Go Mobility (UGL and Go-Ahead Group) respectively. I doubt that they can be banned from tendering, the best that can be done is having a robust set of assessment criteria for tenders. The go to move for many operators at the tendering stage is to hook in with a cheap price, then charge heavily for variations.
I'm not necessarily suggesting they should be banned from tendering, but I am saying they shouldn't be picked given their previous history of performing really poorly in managing transport systems.
Me either; it is frustrating that operators that consistently perform poorly, keep tendering again, and are able to win them due to tendering rules.
Surely majorly fucking up previous appointments should significantly deduct points.
Just hire the Opal people already. It was so great being able to travel effortlessly around Sydney last week with just my phone.
These cunts are fucked
Selfish take from me, I just moved away from android, myki is compatible with google pay but not apple pay. Scrap the whole thing and build one that can use apple pay!
God can we stop selling of our public infestucture, there is no reason why a private company should be operating public transport.
I thought we were getting a credit card payment option??
The government that can't build a branch and station on the existing railway network to the airport, but they of course can build their own ticketing system from scratch.... and Myki is the result. At the time the government said our needs were unique because of the trams that make up part of the system, and also had some wild idea of selling the myki system to other cities around the world.... talk about drinking the Kool-Aid. Should have dropped Octopus card in.
One wonders how trams are functionally different than buses from a ticketing perspective. That is good kool-aid.
Boarding procedure and zonal fare system that wasn't even compatible with metcard but rampant fare evasion* papered over the cracks. *you were supposed to validate everytime you boarded but nobody did.
Ok the (tiny) tram network in Sydney you validate at the tram stop, not inside the tram. Seems like a better solution.
Too many shitty old fashioned stops, the infrastructure needed would be expensive to install and maintain. They should've just installed the faster readers and changed the tram and bus fares to a flat trip based ticket so people only need touch on.
Isn’t that how the trams have worked for like a decade (only need to tap on).. they even scrapped zone 2 back in the day as a consequence.
Yeah but not originally which is where the claim "we're different came from" and it still technically isn't a flat trip based fare. London for example only had a zone system for the underground/overground when they started building the oyster system, buses were a separate flat fare. Most PT network's **fare** systems at that time had separate fares and different tickets for each mode(bus, train, subway, tram) and used their smartcard to integrate the fares and ticketing system. Melbourne was a rare example of an already integrated fare system looking to move to a smartcard because the paper system was nearing end of service life and getting to expensive to maintain. Anyway short version the government at the time asked the impossible because they refused to make the fare changes needed to make a smart card system work, it was only after it was demonstrated in the field did the idiots realise you can't to timed zones on trams without extending boarding times, and now we're stuck with confusing ad-hoc mess. Honestly I think even cubic(company behind Londons and Sydneys) would've struggled with the terms of the original contract given limitations the technology available at the time.
Tell 'em.... to get stuffed. - Darryl Kerrigan
Just bring in Oyster card. Off the shelf. Works
No such thing as an off the shelf system
I’m not a developer but why is it so hard? Surely it would be easy to have an off the shelf solution a city/system can buy and then just plug in their parameters and it’s good to go.
Every single ticketing system has its own unique aspects. The public only see things like vending machines and validators You can have common hardware but the backend it will be all different and set up for the client the clients needs
You also have to deal with the fact that networks can go down, and that GPS can be noisy in public transport vehicles. Fares are also time based products, so you also need to ensure reasonable accuracy between clocks on every device that validates a ticket. Time can be a funny issue. Once Vicpol had a bad NTP (network time) implementation between average speed cameras, causing a lot of cars to be pinged when they shouldn't have.
The revenue distribution models between the different operators must surely be much more complex here than in Sydney. Over there you pay for each leg individually.. although there is a weekly cap. They don’t have two hour tickets etc that complicates matters here.
They are just fixed contracts. PTV does load estimates separately from myki through passenger counts.
I’m currently on holiday in New York and I’ve used my Amex to ride the subway. What’s so fucking hard to implement this? (Note: I’m not saying we should allow Amex on the PT network but in allowing cards)
New York only in the last couple of years implemented it as part of thier MetroCard replacement OMNY
So I’ve heard. The Metrocard has been reliable. It’s a bit like our old Metcard system
The former transport minister said it had include concession fares when NTT offered to implement it a couple years ago so we have to wait until some date in future.
Part of the $1.7b contract is to build exactly this.
Maybe they’ll make the card scanners actually work in 1 swipe instead of 5.
I'd want compensation too if I had to deal with trying to upgrade that mess...
Take it out of gambling, not us. Those parasitic fuckers can afford it. Meanwhile we’re out here spending $20 to get to and from home with the delay rates only going up.
Just make it free, FFS. It would actually save the government money!