VIA Rail Implements Cash Free Policy

Brian Teepell - Starting at the end of October 2019, VIA Rail Canada implemented a new cash free policy on several major routes. Impacted routes are the Ocean which runs between Halifax and Montreal, routes throughout the Quebec City-Windsor corridor and other regional service.

This means that passengers on these trains will only be able to make onboard purchases with a credit card or VIA Rail gift card.

Each year VIA Rail Canada carries millions of passengers throughout Canada on it's routes that span from coast to coast.  According to the VIA Rail Canada website, VIA Rail operates over 500 trains weekly throughout eight Canadian provinces traveling over 12,500 kilometers of track. While the cashless policy has only been implemented on certain trains, VIA Rail has indicated that over time it will expand to include more trains throughout the network. Karl-Philip Marchand Giguere, spokesman for Via Rail said, "By eliminating cash, Via Rail's onboard transactions will be more efficient, giving our staff more time to serve passengers." Passengers were made aware of the change during the ticket purchase process, but the new policy caught a lot of travelers by surprise. Some took the change in stride acknowledging that most do not use cash all that often, while others took to social media to voice their concerns.

The following is a list of VIA Rail routes that are affected by the cash free policy change as posted on the VIA Rail website: Quebec City - Windsor Corridor, Toronto - Niagara Falls, Montreal - Halifax, Sudbury - White River and Sennetere - Jonquière.
The current method of payment as of October 28, 2020 is Credit Card(VISA Mastercard and AMEX), Prepaid Credit Cards and VIA Rail Gift Cards. Cash is no longer accepted for onboard purchases.

According to the VIA Rail website the following routes STILL accept cash for onboard purchases: Jasper - Prince Rupert, Winnipeg - Churchill and Toronto - Vancouver(Canadian)
VIA Rail has indicated that these routes could change to a cash free environment in the future.