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ACTV's 'Tappy' ticket and payment scanners

"Tappy" is the Venice transportation agency's latest generation of electronic ticket scanners. The tap & go validators also let you pay fares on the spot with a credit or debit card, even when no ticket booth or vending machine is available.

ABOVE: A motoscafo public water bus approaches an ACTV station on the Cannaregio Canal.

By Durant Imboden

October 28, 2024

ACTV  or AVM, Venice's public transit agency, has introduced some 2,200 new ticket scanners for traveling around the city on water buses, land buses, trams, and the People Mover. Here's how to use the new valicators:

• If you've bought a paper ticket or have the Venezia Unica tourist pass, using the new "Tappy" scanners is a no-brainer: Just hold your ticket against the bottom of the scanner and wait for the confirmation message.

• If you've bought an electronic ticket with the AVM Venezia app or Chat & Go (WhatsApp), scan the QR code on your phone.

But wait, there's more!

• Tappy also lets you pay fares on the spot (e.g., at a vaporetto station) with a credit or debit card. This is convenient if you're at a location without a ticket booth or vending machine, since you can just tap your credit or debit card against the bottom of the Tappy ticket validator on the waterbus platform, on the land bus or tram, or in the People Mover station. The system will automatically deduct the fare from your bank card's account (although it may take a few days for the charge to show up on your bank statement).

Also (and this won't apply to most visitors):

• If you have the Venezia Unica card for frequent users, as opposed to the Venezia Unica tourist pass that we mentioned above, you can use Tappy to deduct your card's stored fares.

For more information:

• See the AVM's Introducing Tappy and its related pages on using the system.

About the author:

Durant Imboden has written about Venice, Italy since 1996. He covered Venice and European travel at About.com for 4-1/2 years before launching Europe for Visitors (including Venice for Visitors) with Cheryl Imboden in 2001.

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