Touch n Go Reload Machines

I’ve been meaning to write this for a while and when I saw the issue had been mentioned in the timeout KL’s blog I thought I’d better get this finished.

Like many people in KL I have a Touch n Go card and often despair at how crap the card and associated systems are.

Some of my key frustrations are as follows:

• No discount on public transport unlike many other countries
• When using it to pay for other services such as car parking the vendors often add a fee on top so things actually cost more using TnG
• Unless you top up at a toll or the LRT you incur a service charge
• The top up system often seems to be offline
• Top up is only available at LRT stations between certain hours
• A top up fee is charged when auto reload is used

Rapid KL recently introduced some rather poorly design top up machines at many stations and I thought for a moment that a step forward was being taken. After a very protracted installation I find that the machines are always broken or just displaying Tiada servis’ (no service).


In the rare event that I do find a machine working there is never a queue to use it because most people have given up looking to see if they work and secondly the machines confuse the hell out of most poeple.

If Rapid KL really wants to improve it should fire the people who decided buy these crap machines and hire some people from a place which knows how to run a public transport and smart card system. The Man In Seat 12A has a good suggestion which is to look 330km southeast to a small island called Singapore!

Now finally I think the Timeout KL blog entry really sums up this issue well.