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Clipper 2.0 Outage Tied to Unpaid AT&T Bill as Cubic Misses Deadline and Faces Remedies

Agencies keep the legacy Clipper system to preserve fares and service as they pursue contractual remedies after Cubic admitted the outage stemmed from an unpaid AT&T bill.

Overview

  • A roughly 27–30 hour outage on May 18 disabled BART ticket vending machines and gates when Cubic’s network circuit tied to AT&T lost service because a bill was not paid.
  • Cubic Chief Operating Officer Lalit Singh acknowledged the unpaid AT&T account at a Clipper Executive Board meeting, prompting sharp condemnation from BART General Manager Robert Powers and other agency leaders.
  • Cubic missed its self-imposed May 30 target to fix critical Clipper 2.0 problems, delaying bulk migration of rider accounts into late June or beyond and forcing case-by-case workarounds.
  • Boards approved short-term spending and extensions — including a $3.1 million extension for the legacy platform and a two-year, $124 million operations budget — to keep the old system running and staff customer service.
  • The Metropolitan Transportation Commission plans a closed-door meeting to consider contractual remedies and an after-action review, while transit leaders and riders press for accountability and possible separation from Cubic.