Earlier this month, KTM officially rolled out support for MyDebit at all of its train stations for its Komuter service, giving commuters a more convenient and universal option to pay for their fare. However, the new payment method comes with a RM30 pre-authorisation hold, which has irked many of its users.
To address this, the train operator announced that its automated gates will soon add support for several other payment methods alongside the four existing ones. While its system currently only supports MyDebit, KTM Wallet, Komlink cards, and Touch n’ Go, KTM will also expand to the use of Apple Pay and Samsung Pay early next year.
In addition, its stations will even accept credit cards by the end of November 2023, which lets users with a credit card bypass the pre-authorisation hold issue. The company has made no mention of support for prepaid debit cards that are not part of the MyDebit scheme such as the TnG Visa, CelcomDigi Beyond Card, Malaysia Airlines EnrichMoney Visa, and more.
Part of why many users are upset with the temporary fee could be due to the fact that it takes between one to three days for the amount to return to your account. Moreover, you could even be charged more than once a day if the remaining pre-authorised balance falls below RM10.
Addressing the criticism towards the RM30 hold, KTM defended itself by saying that it was necessary to ensure that the card has enough funds for the fare. To that end, if a pre-authorisation hold cannot be obtained from a debit card, the card will be blacklisted until the user settles the issue through its customer service counters.
(Source: KTM)
