by TCurtin
Here's a puzzler (although admittedly an accounting question rather than anything to do with rail operations)
According to the pricing that went into effect 1/1/11 when you purchase a Metro Card you get 7% bonus instead of the former 15%. With the former pricing the magic number to buy was $45.00, which with the 15% bonus gave you $51.75, EXACTLY 23 rides. Thus you could discard a used-up card without leaving any money on the table.
Now the bonus is 7%. A little work with a spreadsheet will show you there is NO amount you can buy a card for that will give you an EXACT number of rides with nothing left. The best you can do --- because the vending machines only accept whole dollar transactions --- is purchase a card for $61.00 that will give you 29 rides and leave $.02 on the table.
Anybody have any more clever ideas? There may be some way to make two successive purchases on the same card and have it come to an exact multiple of $2.25.
This is a not-so-subtle, intentional ploy to raise revenue --- all those odd cents left over on every metro card purchase will put quite a lot of additional revnue into the MTA's coffers over the course of a year!
This is the kind of stuff you think about when living in Manhattan on a retiree budget. The good news is that I only have to worry about it for another 7 months at which time I will qualify for a seniors-rate easy pay card.
According to the pricing that went into effect 1/1/11 when you purchase a Metro Card you get 7% bonus instead of the former 15%. With the former pricing the magic number to buy was $45.00, which with the 15% bonus gave you $51.75, EXACTLY 23 rides. Thus you could discard a used-up card without leaving any money on the table.
Now the bonus is 7%. A little work with a spreadsheet will show you there is NO amount you can buy a card for that will give you an EXACT number of rides with nothing left. The best you can do --- because the vending machines only accept whole dollar transactions --- is purchase a card for $61.00 that will give you 29 rides and leave $.02 on the table.
Anybody have any more clever ideas? There may be some way to make two successive purchases on the same card and have it come to an exact multiple of $2.25.
This is a not-so-subtle, intentional ploy to raise revenue --- all those odd cents left over on every metro card purchase will put quite a lot of additional revnue into the MTA's coffers over the course of a year!
This is the kind of stuff you think about when living in Manhattan on a retiree budget. The good news is that I only have to worry about it for another 7 months at which time I will qualify for a seniors-rate easy pay card.