Emerson College Students Can Now Use IDs to Take Cabs

Students at Emerson College have become some of the first in Boston to be able to pay for cab rides with their student IDs. And if the current trends towards allowing students to use their IDs off-campus continue, they won't be the last. 

Creative Mobile Technologies, which provides the credit card machine terminals inside of two-thirds of all cabs in Boston, arranged with Emerson College and Suffolk University to accept student ID cards last month. 

Students all over Boston regularly use their student IDs as debit or credit cards to buy food from pizza joints or other goods and services like textbooks and even clothing. Parents or guardians at most colleges can fill up the ID cards in advance like a debit card, or get stuck with the bill afterwards, like a credit card. 

Creative Mobile Technologies CEO Jason Poliner told the Boston Herald the main concern was providing safe rides home for students.  

 “They want to prevent students who are low on cash after exiting a bar from making bad decisions on how to get home," he told the Herald.

John Silveria, assistant dean of students at Suffolk, told the Herald 150 students have already used their student ID, or Ram Card, to pay for cab fare.

“It’s pretty evident that our students are using it and finding it to be a good service,” he told the Herald.