Why some Bay Area commuters got a free ride

Why some Bay Area commuters got a free ride

Clipper card service was down on Tuesday so many Bay Area commuters got a free ride.

SAN FRANCISCO - Bay Area commuters using Clipper cards got a free ride Tuesday morning. 

That's because Clipper service was down for several hours, even though the transit systems were up and running.

Clipper Bay Area posted on social media at about 7:15 a.m. that the system was experiencing an outage and telling customers to be prepared to pay for their rides using an alternate method. But, it appears most, if not all transit systems, instead, offering free rides for customers.

BART's fare gates were open; signs said it was free to enter the system. Same with Muni.

Customers like said it was a welcome surprise. One man said he was going to make a trip to San Jose, which would save him $11. 

Officials said that Clipper was rolling out a fix at about 10 a.m. 

The outage comes at a time when many transit agencies are facing financial hardships with ridership down since the pandemic.

One transit agency said that there is a recovery process for the agencies to recover any lost revenue since hundreds of thousands of rides were free. 

It's unclear what caused the outage in the first place.