ORCA autoload began failing for us after moving in late 2009. Paper forms submitted to Metro didn’t solve the problem, and I found that I could use orcacard.com to manually add money via the same credit card that we used for autoload. Our billing information showed up correctly on the website, but autoload kept failing with a “no match” error from the Address Verification Service (AVS). Worse, the bus ORCA autoload actually sort of loans you the money and just counts on the transaction going through later. If it doesn’t, you get a scary “ORCA autoload – problem with transaction” notice that sounds like it’s from a collection agency (full text below). Due to credit card regulations, the amount must be paid off in cash or check so I took a couple trips to the King Street Center customer service office.
Eventually I got in contact with Kathy Kelly, a Business and Finance Officer at Metro Transit, who mentioned that “one other Chase customer earlier this year with similar problems . . . decided that Autoload was not able to work for them” which gave me strong motivation to get this fixed! From my software development experience I know some bugs can be very tricky to reproduce, so I changed my autoload to just $5 to get a lot of transactions into the system. Kathy said the transactions “provided perfect examples to help us prove to the software vendor that there really is a bug in the update process for Autoload. Evidently, there are a number of fields that can be updated but the process does not take the information to all the tables where it is needed. What’s even better is the fact that they happened over the course of the month-end change so it wasn’t just a timing problem. It has also helped us escalate the problem several steps up the ladder where it will be fixed sooner rather than later.”
That was back in April, but I recently got the best news of all: “The vendor told us late last week that they have finally found a solution to the bug causing the address update problem. It’s scheduled to be fixed at the end of July when the new maintenance release is implemented.” I don’t know how often ORCA gets maintenance releases, or how many bugs or performance issues will be fixed, but I’m very glad that the autoload problem will be solved.
Here is the full text:
From: orcaautoload
Subject: ORCA Autoload – problem with transactionDear Customer,
Thank you for choosing the Autoload feature as a means to add transportation value to your ORCA card.
We regret to inform you that your bank has rejected the payment for your recent ORCA Autoload transaction(s) and will not cover the cost of your Autoload purchase. As a result, your Autoload agreement may be terminated and the autoload purse or pass may be blocked.
Please contact us as soon as possible to arrange a payment and to unblock the autoloaded element. After your payment has been made we may need to re-establish your Autoload agreement. If that is the case you may need to submit a new ORCA Autoload Authorization form online or by completing and mailing the printable form with new credit card information. Your pass or e-purse will be available to use as fare payment 48 hours after we receive payment.
For details on how much you owe and how to submit your payment, please contact [name removed].
Thank you.
The ORCA Regional Mail Center
I wonder how widespread this problem is. According to an ORCA report I got, very few people use Autoload. I added an Autoload two nights before my pass expired but when I actually used the card in the new month, nothing. I checked orcacard.com and my autoload was gone, as if I never created it. Thanks for writing this up. I should check with them whether my issue was a bug or intended behavior.
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