The city of Hamilton will stop accepting paper HSR tickets in September, hoping people use their PRESTO cards to ride the bus instead.

Pending city council approval, the city will stop selling paper tickets and paper monthly passes in June. Riders can still pay with coins, but nine months from now, HSR operators won't take paper tickets anymore.

The phase-out is happening so the city can follow through on an agreement with PRESTO to boost the number of people using the cards to 80 per cent.

It will mean a change for the roughly 2,500 adults and 700 students who use paper passes now, said Nancy Purser, manager of transit support services. About 100 stores also sell paper tickets.

"We want to provide a lot of notice," she said. "We understand this is a big change for our customers. They have been buying paper media in the form that they have for a very long time."

The city has a vested interest in boosting the number of PRESTO users. If Hamiton doesn't meet the target of 80 per cent of riders, Purser said, it will effectively be paying PRESTO for "no services rendered."

It can't bypass the PRESTO service either. The city has to participate to receive $11 million per year in provincial gas tax revenue.

Other GTHA municipalities, including Burlington, Oakville, Mississauga, Brampton, York and Toronto, have scrapped paper tickets too.

In exchange, PRESTO has eliminated the minimum $10 requirement when loading the card. And it can be done in person at every Shoppers Drug Mart and Fortinos, as well as the Ancaster, Stoney Creek and Dundas municipal centres, city hall and the Hunter Street GO station.

The city will also offer paper versions of special occasion bus passes, which can be used by charitable organizations that give out bus passes to participants.

The city has to pay commission to PRESTO too. In 2017, that was two per cent of PRESTO usage, amounting to $422,000. By 2029, that commission rate will be nine per cent, or $4,098,000.

City council's public works committee voted Monday to go the paperless route. But Chad Collins, Ward 5 (Centennial) councillor, wasn't impressed with PRESTO's heavy handedness.

It's "political blackmail," he said. "If you don't get everyone on the card, you're going to pay.

"I'm still a little disturbed about the tactics being used to get us on it."