Pros and cons of presto card:-
Pros:
1. Presto card replaces the need to carry heavy tokens or coins for paying for the bus fares, street car fares or subway fares.
2. Instead of having to buy tokens at the subway station or from some convenience stores, you can simply load up on your balance online or at any of the presto card machine available at several location throughout the subway stations.
3. If you lose your presto card, you can put a halt on the account until you get a new replacement card. But if you lose a token or metro monthly pass, other people can still use the lost card or token. If you have monthly metro pass loaded into the presto card, and you lost your presto card, you can ask to have a new replacement presto card sent to you for a small fee. Whereas in the past, if you lost your monthly metro pass, there is no way to recover the card and all the money that you paid for them the remaining days of the month is lost with it.
4. Sometimes for whatever reason the presto card reader doesn't function in a bus or streetcar, and you don't have another token or coins to pay for your fares, the driver would usually make an exception to paying for the fares since the presto card reader wasn't working.
5. You can setup an alert system wherein when your balance in your presto card falls below a certain set amount, you will get a reminder to fill up on your balance if you want to continue using the presto card. Keep in mind though that the presto card system needs at least a 24 hours time to update your just refilled balance. If you just renewed and filled up on your presto card balance a few minutes ago and you want to pay for the bus fares or streetcar fares, the presto card reader will decline your card.
6. You can either check your presto card balance or refill your balance online at Prestocard.ca or at any of the presto card machine located at various subway stations.
Cons:
1. When we tap our presto card on the reader, it simply just show the green tick arrow accepted symbol but it doesn't display any card balance. Other countries from around the world have transit card reader which display the balance that you have on the card, so the user can decide whether to fill up on the balance or wait for some more time.
2. If your presto card is demagnetized due to whatever reason, it won't work properly when tapping on the presto card reader.
3. If you have a thick wallet containing all other credit cards or points card in the same wallet, chances are you will have to take out your presto card from your wallet and scan it on the presto card reader. You can't simply scan your entire wallet on the presto card reader thinking that it will scan through.
4. Sometimes if your presto card is bent to a certain degree, it will stop functioning. The only fix for bent presto card is to get a new replacement Presto card.