Good morning. It’s Friday. Today we’ll look at the hiccups plaguing OMNY, MetroCard’s contactless successor, according to a survey that came out yesterday. We’ll also look at why 31 police officers were fired.
The token and the MetroCard each had a long run, and each, in its own way, became a symbol of the subway system. OMNY, the new tap-and-go payment system that is permanently replacing MetroCard at the end of this year, has a lot to live up to — and so far, some straphangers aren’t happy. Reports abound of overcharging, poor communication and other glitches, according to a survey released on Thursday by a Metropolitan Transportation Authority watchdog. My colleague Stefanos Chen, who covers transit, reported on the survey’s findings. Below, the takeaways. Glitches abound, survey saysAlmost three-fourths of OMNY users have reported some kind of problem with the payment method, the survey from the Permanent Citizens Advisory Committee to the M.T.A. found. The most common issue respondents raised was a payment error: Nearly a third of survey respondents believed OMNY had overcharged them. Such was the case with Teresa Liao, a product manager for a tech company. On one day, when she used OMNY to pay for two rides, she received an onslaught of pending charges to her account — a whopping 14, to be precise. Liao, 42, said the additional charges were later removed, but the experience made her leery of OMNY. “I feel like I need a spreadsheet to keep it straight,” she said. Sometimes, respondents reported, the sensor would not detect a payment, forcing riders to tap their phones or physical OMNY cards several times to ensure entry through the turnstile. Riders who relied on employee-benefit cards and debit or credit cards complained the most, the survey found. One straphanger, Greg Remsen, an urban planner, gets pretax commuter benefits on a debit card through his job. But the OMNY website, he said, doesn’t allow him to pay for trips with his benefits card, forcing him to use a credit card instead. Remsen, 29, told Stefanos he had other convenience-related grievances with OMNY. He wondered why OMNY could not also be used as payment on the M.T.A.’s other regional transportation, like the Long Island Rail Road and Metro-North. Just how popular is OMNY?Right now, more than 75 percent of riders are using OMNY to pay their fares. Even before the announcement that MetroCard was going the way of the token, many had taken to the contactless payment method. Postpandemic New York has become a tap-your-card kind of city and, despite OMNY’s technological hiccups, tapping your phone or card to the screen installed in each fare gate is generally faster than swiping a physical card. Jessie Lazarus, the M.T.A.’s deputy chief for commercial ventures, said that OMNY had captured nearly 2.8 billion taps since it was rolled out in 2019. And Thursday’s survey found that users gave OMNY a positive average rating, with over half of respondents giving the system a 4 or 5 out of 5. But “there is a lot left to be desired in terms of communication,” according to Brian Fritsch, the watchdog’s associate director. Sixty-eight percent of survey respondents who filed complaints pointed to OMNY’s poor customer service, saying their issues had not been resolved when they called for troubleshooting. Why was the MetroCard retired?Despite its three-decade tenure as the principal payment method of the subway system, MetroCard is just not cost-effective for the M.T.A. Janno Lieber, the chief executive of the M.T.A., said OMNY’s implementation could save the agency upward of $20 million annually in card-production and distribution costs. Neither is MetroCard cost-effective for subway riders — another reason for the switch to OMNY, Lieber said. About $40 million a year in unused balances is left unspent on straphangers’ MetroCards, according to the M.T.A. But persuading riders to embrace the changes will be another undertaking. For one thing, the MetroCard’s yellow-and-blue design is hard to beat. OMNY’s black-and-white color scheme doesn’t seem to be doing the trick just yet. Fritsch agreed that OMNY’s aesthetics needed to be more eye-catching. “It should be an iconic N.Y.C. symbol like the subway token and MetroCard before it,” he said. WEATHER Expect fog in the early morning, followed by possible showers and thunderstorms in the afternoon. Morning temperatures are expected to hit 85, while tonight will be partly cloudy with a low around 73. ALTERNATE-SIDE PARKING In effect until Aug. 3 (Tisha B’Av). The latest New York news
We hope you’ve enjoyed this newsletter, which is made possible through subscriber support. Subscribe to The New York Times. N.Y.P.D. moves to fire officers it says shouldn’t have been hired
The Police Department did a sweep Thursday, moving to fire more than 30 police officers and recruits who should have gotten the boot before joining the training academy. The department reviewed the cases of 80 officers who failed psychological exams, but had those results overruled by a commander who was in charge of hiring, according to my colleagues Maria Cramer and Chelsia Rose Marcius. As part of that review, the department said that 31 of those police officers who joined the department in the past two years had lied about their criminal history, drug use, employment history and if they had driven with a suspended license. As a result of the findings, the department said they were “forced to inform the officers that they could no longer continue as members of the N.Y.P.D.” Among the sea of fired officers, one was convicted four times for motor vehicle violations, including driving 100 miles per hour in a 50 m.p.h. zone and striking a pedestrian, according to a law enforcement official. The officers were greenlighted by Inspector Terrell Anderson, who was the commander of the Candidate Assessment Division. The Police Benevolent Association, which represents about 22,000 officers, isn’t letting up on the department’s role in the matter. On Thursday evening, the union was granted an injunction in State Supreme Court in Manhattan to halt the decision to fire the officers. A hearing is set for Tuesday. “These police officers aren’t responsible for the N.Y.P.D.’s broken hiring process or the supervisors who made these decisions, in some cases more than a year and a half ago,” Patrick Hendry, the president of the P.B.A., said in a statement. Some say that race factors into the psychological evaluations that candidates receive. Patrick Gordon, a lieutenant and the president of the Guardians Association, a group for Black officers, said that a Black candidate was considered “paranoid” after saying he felt monitored while walking through certain neighborhoods. Gordon argues that the evaluation process is “subjective and needs to be fixed.” — Samantha Latson METROPOLITAN DIARY Bagel banter
Dear Diary: I was coming up the stairs at the 79th Street subway station on my way to Zabar’s. There was an older gentleman in front of me who was climbing slowly, one step at a time. I asked if he wanted any assistance. “No,” he said. “I’m fine.” I decided to keep him company as he made his way up the stairs. He turned toward me. “Where are you going,” he asked. “Zabar’s,” I said. “So, what are you going to get?” “Smoked fish.” “So, what kind?” “Sturgeon.” “On a bagel or rye bread?” “You know,” I said, pausing for a moment, “just a plain bagel.” By now, we had gotten to the top of the stairs and were walking toward the market, and he wasn’t done with the questions. “Cream cheese?” he asked as we went inside and prepared to part ways. “I like to spread the fish on a bagel without anything,” I said, “so I get the full flavor of the fish.” “Oh,” he said. “A perfectionist.” — Art Resnikoff Illustrated by Agnes Lee. Tell us your New York City story here and read more Metropolitan Diary here. Glad we could get together here. — T.R. P.S. Here’s today’s Mini Crossword and Spelling Bee. You can find all our puzzles here. Davaughnia Wilson and Ed Shanahan contributed to New York Today. You can reach the team at nytoday@nytimes.com. Sign up here to get this newsletter in your inbox.
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