Last year, customers on Tyne & Wear Metro who used Pop Pay As You Go to purchase travel tickets made a record 4.3 million journeys.

By purchasing tickets with Pop PAYG on Google Pay via Android smartphones or with a smart card, customers can save money on every trip compared with buying a paper ticket; they also save time through not needing to use a ticket machine.

During the last year passenger numbers have risen 13.5% as thousands of people find out the good value offered by Pop PAYG, together with Metro’s Take The Kids For Free price promise and £1 single fare for those aged 21 and under.

By using a Pop PAYG card, anyone over 21 can save money on every Metro journey compared to buying adult paper day and single tickets. The savings amount to at least 95p on single tickets and up to £1.35 on all-day tickets depending on which zones customers use.

For those customers aged 21 and under, by using a Pop Blue card they can take advantage of a flat fare of £1 that was introduced last year; Pop Blue cards can be obtained online from nexus.org.uk.

Pop PAYG cards are easy to use, card balances can be checked at any Metro ticket machine, and it is a simple process to tap the card or Android smartphone on the gates and validators at the start and end of a journey.

Pop is the largest smart travel system outside London, and when it was launched in November 2015 it became the first rail system outside London to offer the convenience of pay-as-you-go smart travel. It can also be used pay for bus travel on bus routes in North East England, as well as journeys on the Shields Ferry.

Huw Lewis, Nexus Customer Services Director said: “It’s fantastic to see Pop PAYG becoming more and more popular and we expect even more customers will be making the switch this year. A record 4.3 million Metro journeys were made with Pop PAYG 2023, with customers clearly recognising it’s the best way to get the cheapest single and day fares available.

“Moving to PAYG Go in Google Pay, or getting a free Pop card from nexus.org.uk, which now has a minimum top of just £5, means customers can save up to £1.35 every day, compared to paying for travel from a Metro ticket machine.

“The evidence is that Pop is encouraging our customers to travel more often as we have seen numbers grow 13.5% as Metro continues to recover towards pre-pandemic levels.

“I recommend that customers make the switch even if you travel only once a week or less – either by finding Pop in your Google Pay application or applying for a Pop card online from the Nexus website.”