Music lovers can keep cash and credit cards at home during this summer’s African National Festival. The RFID solution that the organizer will deploy in the event will allow payment and access control through wristbands, thus reducing waiting time and promoting potential sales.
There will also be beach events during the festival. The cashless payment system for beach events is provided by festicket and is known as “عبقري الحدث”. يوفر هذا الحل مجموعة متنوعة من الوظائف, including a cashless payment function called event genius pay. بحسب لورين ليتل, head of event genius operations, the system is designed to allow festival organizers to combine ticketing, السفر, الإقامة, وظائف التحكم في الوصول والتسويق.
“Our first contact with African countries was when we provided comprehensive services to Ghana,” Lytle recalled The company has deployed a software platform for tickets sold through ticket arena and ticket, as well as providing wristband tickets. Afro nation portal will benefit from the full range of event genius products, بما في ذلك حزم السفر, access control management and on-site cashless payment. هذا هو ثاني مهرجان بوابة الأمة الأفرو, but it is the first time to use RFID to pay without cash.
How the system works
Music fans first buy a paper ticket or receive an electronic ticket that can be provided at the venue. في وقت الشراء, fans will be invited to purchase credit vouchers in advance at the time of checkout, which is equivalent to the balance of advance from the credit card, so that customers can purchase goods without money.
Fans can change their paper or electronic tickets to event genius’s RFID wristband at the entrance of the venue. The wristband is equipped with NFC high-frequency RFID Mifare chip complying with ISO 14443 اساسي. Each ticket holder’s information is linked in the event genius software and applications, and has a unique ID encoded on its wristband RFID chip. If the holder chooses to use the cashless payment service, that information also includes the holder’s identification and prepaid account.
The staff will be equipped with a mobile NFC reading device that runs the event genius application based on Android. The app comes pre loaded with a menu for each vendor site (كل موقع لديه قائمة مختلفة تم تحميلها قبل الحدث), حيث يمكن للموظفين تحديد العناصر لوضعها في سلة, and then place the wristband on the device for payment. فمثلا, when a customer wants to buy a drink or a T-shirt, يمكن للموظفين تحديد المنتج من القائمة, the total cost will be displayed on the wrist strap holder, and the wrist strap will be tapped when the customer agrees to buy. Staff trained by the event genius pay operator can use the application to collect money on the device.
After the payment is successful, the staff uses the cashless mobile device to display the balance to the customer, ويمكن للعميل استلام الطعام الذي تم شراؤه, شراب أو سلعة. Lytle said the process reduces the waiting time of customers, بمتوسط وقت دفع يبلغ حوالي 7 ثواني.
The exact number of devices to be deployed on the Afro nation portal activity and the place of payment have not been determined. ومع ذلك, أ 10000 person Festival requires about five food vendors, ثلاثة قضبان كبيرة, several smaller bars and possibly paid rides. “We recently launched a cashless theme park project in the Middle East with 90 جولات مختلفة, all paid for with cashless wristbands,” قال Lytle
The system also includes a recharge station in the form of a self-service terminal, حيث يمكن لمستخدمي حزام المعصم إعادة شحن رصيدهم المدفوع مقدمًا. The recharge kiosk is equipped with a built-in NFC reader, which allows the user to tap his own wrist strap at the location indicated by the self-service terminal, then the NFC reader will capture the ID on the wrist strap label of the person, then access the person’s identity, and the touch screen will display information to allow the guest to recharge his / her balance from a credit card or bank account. يمكن للمستخدمين أيضًا عرض رصيدهم في كشك التعبئة.
Lytle predicts that the Afro nation portal event will host thousands of people and each ticket holder will receive a wristband. The wristband will also be used for access control management, so that participants can enter the activity site back and forth according to their own wishes. مع هذا الحل, customers do not need to carry cash or bank cards. This activity is likely to reduce queuing time and the risk of theft. Festicket reports that participants are likely to spend more money because of the short queue time. للموردين, this means that employees spend less time counting and checking cash.
Lytle said that the festival is essentially fast-paced and crowded, and event genius is designed for this special situation. ومع ذلك, such incidents can also pose challenges for technology companies. لاستخدام RFID, the challenge is to ensure that the equipment is deployed at the right time and place, and to provide training to employees within a few hours.
“Over the past year, لقد أكملنا أكثر من 50 cashless activities and encountered many strange and wonderful challenges,” قال Lytle. These challenges tend to be successful as projects start. So we won’t know what will happen until we achieve our goals, لكننا لم نفشل أبدا. A key point of this deployment is that there is always the necessary number of on-site operation and maintenance personnel to troubleshoot and communicate with other relevant parties. “
