(English: Travelcard; formerly named Flexus) is an

electronic ticket An electronic ticket is a method of ticket entry, processing, and marketing for companies in the airline, railways and other transport and entertainment industries. Airline ticket E-tickets in the airline industry were devised in about 1994, an ...

system that was introduced on all

public transport Public transport (also known as public transportation, public transit, mass transit, or simply transit) is a system of transport for passengers by group travel systems available for use by the general public unlike private transport, typi ...

Greater Oslo Greater Oslo Region ("Stor-Oslo-regionen" in Norwegian) is a statistical metropolitan region surrounding the Norwegian capital of Oslo. The region includes the city of Oslo (population: 658,390), the entire county of Akershus (population: 573,326) ...

, in 2009 using

Thales Thales of Miletus ( ; grc-gre, Θαλῆς; ) was a Greek mathematician, astronomer, statesman, and pre-Socratic philosopher from Miletus in Ionia, Asia Minor. He was one of the Seven Sages of Greece. Many, most notably Aristotle, regarded ...

technology. The system may eventually replace all paper tickets on trips with

Ruter Ruter AS is the public transport authority for Oslo and Akershus counties in Norway. Formally a limited company – 60% of its shares are owned by the Oslo county municipality and 40% by that of Akershus – it is responsible for the administra ...

(formerly

Oslo Sporveier AS Oslo Sporveier is a defunct municipal owned company responsible for public transport in Oslo, Norway. It was created in 1924 to take over the city's two private tram companies. In 1927 its started with bus transport, including from 1940 to 19 ...

and Stor-Oslo Lokaltrafikk) and

commuter train Commuter rail, or suburban rail, is a passenger rail transport service that primarily operates within a metropolitan area, connecting commuters to a central city from adjacent suburbs or commuter towns. Generally commuter rail systems are cons ...

s around Oslo operated by the

Norwegian State Railways Vygruppen, branded as Vy, is a government-owned railway company which operates most passenger train services and many bus services in Norway. The company is owned by the Norwegian Ministry of Transport. Its sub-brands include Vy Buss coach s ...

. By the end of 2010, there were 340,000 active cards used by Ruter's customer, an increase from 82,000 in January same year. In 2011, the two companies using the Flexus cards decided to stop using the Flexus name and design, instead using different cards, but still with common technology and equal opportunity to buy the same tickets as before these changes in name and design. The cards are from that year named either ''NSB-kort'' for cards produced by NSB or ''Ruter Reisekortet'' (Ruter travel card) for cards produced by Ruter. The goal of the system is to ease and quicken the process of purchasing ticket, create better information about actual travel and reduce non-paying passengers. The system utilises RFID technology on smart cards and allows an electronic payment to be made via contactless communication between the card and a verifier. There is also devoped a system of one-time tickets called Impuls. There have been a lot of delays concerning the implementation of the system, that originally was to be taken into use in 2005. The system is partially copied from the Dutch

OV-chipkaart The OV-chipkaart (short for ''openbaar vervoer chipkaart'', meaning ''public transport chipcard'') is a contactless smart card system used for all public transport in the Netherlands. First introduced in the Rotterdam Metro in April 2005, it has ...

, where testing with the

technology started in

Rotterdam Rotterdam ( , , , lit. ''The Dam on the River Rotte'') is the second largest city and municipality in the Netherlands. It is in the province of South Holland, part of the North Sea mouth of the Rhine–Meuse–Scheldt delta, via the ''"Ne ...

in 2005. It is now fully operational in The Netherlands. Unlike the OV-chipkaart, Flexus does not provide an electronic purse with flexible fare calculation based on distance traveled - it only provides travel products like weekly and monthly passes that will only be valid in zones specified at time of purchase.

References

{{reflist Fare collection systems in Norway Contactless smart cards Public transport in Oslo Public transport in Akershus Oslo Sporveier Norwegian State Railways Smart cards introduced in 2009