Chicago Transit Charges for Rides on Expired Cards, Class Action Claims

A class action lawsuit claims that the maker of the Chicago transit system’s fare system charges consumers for an unusable ride if they attempt to scan an expired transit card.

Plaintiff Tamara Stackpoole claims that software used by the Chicago transit system, made by Cubic Corporation and Cubic Corporations Systems Inc., charges riders for roughly the price of one ride if their monthly cards are expired, but then denies them entry to the transit system.

Stackpoole says she holds a 30-day pass for the Chicago transit system that gives her unlimited use of the system for a 30-day period.

She claims that she scanned her card to take a bus ride, not realizing that her card had expired. Stackpoole alleges that she was denied entry to the bus, and the attempted to replenish her card at a terminal.

In Stackpoole’s Chicago transit fees class action lawsuit, she claims that when she tried to replenish her card, the Ventra system notified her that there was a negative balance on her card that was equivalent to one bus ride.

Stackpoole says that when she replenished her pass for the next month, the charge did not go away. Allegedly, these charges to expired cards are called “fees,” but are roughly the same price as a single-ride rate.

The Chicago transit fees class action lawsuit goes on to claim that a few times, she unwittingly tried to use her 30-day pass after it had expired, and was repeatedly charged fees.

Allegedly, the charges stack on top of one another. Because the charges allegedly are not removed when a person replenishes their cards, the charges then accumulate, and eventually, will add up to an amount high enough that prevents them from using the system until it is paid off.

Stackpoole claims that she was once denied entry to the transit system even after replenishing her monthly card, because her negative balance, accrued from the accumulated charges, was higher than $10. Allegedly, the CTA system will not allow passengers who have a negative balance higher than $10 to use the transit system.

The Chicago transit fare system class action lawsuit states that “this effectively ruined [Stackpoole’s] plans for the day as [she] had to return home to get additional money even after her card had a valid, loaded, fully paid unlimited-ride pass.”

Allegedly, the makers of the Chicago transit system do not sufficiently warn passengers that these charges can accrue.

According to Stackpoole, “because unlimited-ride passes, such as 3-day passes, provide unlimited rides for an extended period of time, these passes, by nature, do not compel riders to track exactly when the pass expires’ nor do the defendants build in any safeguards to prevent or warn against any attempts to ride with a Ventra cards that has an expired unlimited-ride pass and lacks funds for a ride.”

The Chicago transit class action lawsuit seeks to stop Cubic corporations from charging the fees, and asks the judge to determine if Cubic has violated Illinois’ Consumer Fraud and Deceptive Trade Practices acts.

The plaintiff further seeks damages for herself and similarly affected Chicago transit system users — a Class of those whose cards were charged after they were denied entry, and a subclass of all users whose Ventra cards hold a negative balance accrued by scanning an expired transit pass.

Stackpoole is represented by Ilan Chorowsky and Mark Bulgarelli of Progressive Law Group LLC.

The Chicago Transit System Expired Card Fees Class Action Lawsuit is Tamara Stackpoole v. Cubic Corp., et al., Case No. 18 CH 7232, in the Circuit Court of Cook County, Illinois.