Dutch Bureaucracy Rant #1

Obtaining a Monthly Transit Pass

I decided that since I would be living in Amsterdam for over 3 months it might be a good idea to invest in a monthly transit pass like the ones they have in Vancouver. Obviously, when I decided this I had still only been in Holland for a couple of days or else I would never have presumed something like an easy way to pay for and access transit would exist, let alone that it would be available to someone like me.

I asked the nice man at the hotel I was staying at where I might buy such a pass and he stared at me blankly for a minute and said "well, you should probably go down to Centraal Station and talk to someone there." I was hoping for an answer more along the lines of "the convenience store at the end of the block", but I paid my 2.60 Euro for an hour's worth of transit time and made my way to Centraal Station.

When I got there I went to the information desk where they informed me I would need to go to another building that deals with Tram passes. I walked across the road to that building, took a number and waited for good 30 minutes before my number was called and I walked up to a desk with a stern looking Dutch woman sitting behind it:

Me: Hello! I've just moved to the city for 3 and a half months and was wondering if I could buy a monthly bus pass?

Mean Lady: ... You will need to fill out these forms (hands me a very thick envelope that turns out to be filled with many complex forms, all in Dutch), provide us with a copy of your residence permit and a passport photo taken in Amsterdam. You must then mail the forms back to us and we will mail you further instructions.

Me: For a monthly transit pass??

Yes.

I was informed that I might want to invest in an OV-Chipkaart instead, which you can load with money as you go and refill at machines located at most tram/metro stops as needed. I walked back to Centraal and went to one of the Chipkaart machines, since as far as I can tell there is no way to buy a Chipkaart directly from a human being or load it with money in that manner.

The first machine I walk up to takes cards and cash. I try my Visa, and it asks for a PIN number. My Visa doesn't have a PIN number, that one's out. I try my Mastercard, ditto. I try both of by debit cards, one with a chip which seems to be ever-important in this country and one without, and both are rejected. I decide it's time to try cash, when I notice the only cash the machine will take is in coin-form. As the Chipkaart costs 7.50 Euros and you apparently need to load it up with a minimum of 20 Euros (or maybe not, the machines kept telling me different things) this was annoying but pretty par for the course. I walked to the other side of the station where there were machines that would change bills into coins, so I walked back to the Chipkaart machine, plugged in 17.50 Euros worth of coins and hoped for the best. It said I needed a minimum of 20 Euro, which confused me, but when I asked the information woman she said it wasn't necessary.

Anyway, I now apparently had a way of paying for transit. The man at the hostel had warned me that if I bought a Chipkaart I needed to make sure I swiped it both when I got on AND when I got off the train in order to not be charged an excessive amount. I did this successfully once, I believe. On my second tram ride I of course forgot to swipe my card when I got off, realizing this only as the doors closed and the train pulled away. Thankfully just a little further down the platform there were free-standing swipers, so I went and swiped at one of those assuming the Chipkaart technology would be advanced enough to understand I had gotten on a tram at point A, then swiped 10 minutes later at point B, thus indicating I had travelled by tram between those two locations. Not so. The next time I swiped to get on a tram my card was rejected, apparently my 2 tram rides had drained the 10 Euro off my card due to my forgetting to swipe off.

I was annoyed, but decided to refill the card as everyone in and around Amsterdam appears to swipe pretty religiously, and while I'd never been checked I worried that the consequences for not having paid your transit fare might be dire. I went up to the Chipkaart machine at my tram station and, lo and behold, it didn't take cash. My cards were of course again rejected.

I ranted about my bad luck with transit passes a bit to a girl I met up at school who informed me that she had a friend who had the same problem with none of her cards working, and the only way to refill the Chipkaart with cash without going all the way down to Centraal Station was to get off at this one stop between school and the complex where we live, go to this one convenience store and explain the situation to the man running the store. He would then charge you a Euro and allow you to load the Chipkaart up with cash. Actually. So, desperate, I did exactly that after school. All the man did was make me pay him a Euro and the cash I wanted to put on the card, then use his bank card at the machine in his store to load up my Chipkaart. While I gave him 20 Euro he informed me that only 17 went onto the Chipkaart as I was at -3 Euro balance, I guess due to my forgetting to swipe and the tram ride which in the eyes of the Chipkaart officials was I suppose still ongoing at that point.

Needless to say, I completed about 2 successful tramrides before being distracted talking to a friend while disembarking and forgetting to swipe. I again tried swiping at the station, got the greeting message, no good. I waited for the next tram of the line I was on to come by, jumped on and attempted to swipe off, got the greeting message again. So I think at that point I was on 3 separate, endless tram rides in the eyes of the Chipkaart gods. Later that night when I attempted to use the tram my balance was of course at -2 Euro.

I realize what is set up with the Chipkaart is a workable system, if you have a credit or debit card that works in Europe and if you are a clever and aware person who is never distracted or forgetful when disembarking a tram. For me, the Chipkaart is the bane of my existence and I hate it more than words can describe. My new strategy is not paying for transit, as I've still yet to be checked. I'm sure the Dutch government is monitoring me via CCTV and my fare avoidance combined with my lackadaisical attitude towards registering with the municipality and applying for a working holiday Visa (both of which I'm sure will constitute Dutch Bureaucracy rants numbers 2 and 3 on this blog) are enough to get me deported in the coming weeks, but at this point my stubbornness and anger at falling prey to a system that exploits the forgetful and distractable make this worth it.