‘Zero Credibility’: Major Clipper Outage Caused by Cubic’s Failure to Pay AT&T Bill

“That’s when we figured out that we have multiple accounts with AT&T. On one of the accounts, the payments were not made, and we couldn’t find where the circuits, which are in support of the BART system, were because they were not in our account system,” Singh said.

The admission brought a strong admonishment from BART General Manager Robert Powers.

”Cubic not paying their bill? Are you kidding me? That’s ridiculous. BART is so done with Cubic right now. You have zero credibility, Cubic. Zero,” Powers said.

The news came as Cubic missed a self-imposed target date of May 30 to resolve critical issues with a long-awaited upgrade to the fare payment system, known as next-generation Clipper or Clipper 2.0. Nearly six months after its launch date, the upgrade continues to cause problems for riders and transit agencies alike, with agencies reporting inconsistencies with financial reconciliation, fare inspection devices and customer service software, to name a few.

With frustration growing, Metropolitan Transportation Commission Executive Director Andrew Fremier announced Monday that the commission was preparing for a closed-session meeting later this month to “discuss contractual remedies.”

While the program has been riddled with setbacks, Fremier did note some of its accomplishments. Since Dec. 10, 1.7 million Clipper cards have been converted to Clipper 2.0, and 45% of Clipper fares are paid with Clipper 2.0 accounts, Fremier said.

But the depth of issues with Clipper has so far prevented Cubic from completing bulk-upgrades of accounts to Clipper 2.0, instead resorting to addressing issues with the new system on a case-by-case basis. Cubic had previously identified May 30 as the target date for beginning bulk migrations, but was unable to realize that due to delays.

“Even just this morning, there was another back-office database issue that impacted Clipper sales channels for approximately one hour before Cubic restored operations,” said Angus Davol, assistant director of Clipper development and budget.

On Monday, the board also approved a 2-year, $124 million budget funding Clipper operations, which carries increased costs due to the Clipper 2.0 rollout requiring additional customer service center staff and the need to keep the prior version of Clipper running longer than expected.

Oakland resident Bryan Culbertson implored the board to sever ties with Cubic during public comment.

“ So that we have a future where we’re not having these meetings over and over and over again of Cubic failing transit riders,” Culbertson said.

Fremier said the Metropolitan Transportation Commission is also planning an after-action review to “learn more about the factors that have contributed to these challenges.”

Representatives from transit agencies also stressed the need to resolve issues with financial reconciliation promptly, as the end of the fiscal year for many agencies nears.

“ Cubic is impacting BART’s ability to provide high-quality public transportation, and that’s a problem. My board members are saying, ‘How much longer are you gonna take this?’” Powers said, adding that “BART engineering is looking at what my options are.”

Due to an unsuccessful attempt at fixing critical issues last weekend, Cubic’s target date for resolving major problems with Clipper 2.0 now stretches into the end of this month, at least.