On May 21, 12:29*am, redcat wrote:
Hi! Just back from the UK. In London I remembered what someone mentioned
here -- that there's a little screen at the gates to the Underground
where you can see your Oyster balance as you're about to pass through.
Yes. And no. My first station had it. I was overjoyed (well...). After
that it was iffy. Some stations had screens, some had them but they
didn't work, and some didn't have them at all.

Newer style gates show the cost of the journey and balance info on the
large screen. Older style gates don't have this capability - however
next to the Oyster pad when exiting there is a little LED display
which shows this information, though the LED display is tiny and it's
pretty difficult to see it (and easy to overlook it even exists).


At Queensway one evening I hesitated while peering at the little screen
and then the gate wouldn't let me through. I compounded this sin by
touching the sensor with my Oyster again. I was still stuck, only now I
had about 100 tired commuters behind me saying to go see the station
master.

Really long story short, I got electro-charged 2 more fares by the time
I was liberated, but I had the money put back by the fare booth man up
the road at Bayswater. (Something told me to check my balance.) He
printed out a slip of paper with all my underground journeys!

It sounds as though you might have been hit by the out-of-station
interchange maximum journey time-out problem (sorry haven't the time
or energy to explain that one now, others here will know of what I
speak) - without knowing the details of your journeys on that day,
it's impossible to say what might have happened.


Trains ran very smoothly, btw, and I lucked out with timing, hardly
having to wait for them at all. Was I just fortunate? Or have things
improved? I notice the Oyster no longer works to save you money. It's
now L1.80 per journey (in zone 1&2 for me)each and every time. Last year
I seem to recall you wouldn't go over a certain amount of money on a
given day within your zones.

Daily price capping is still very much in effect - however the
potential problem I mentioned earlier might have meant that you ended
up paying more than the cap.

The daily price caps are shown on this rather epic page of fare
tables:
http://www.tfl.gov.uk/tickets/14416.aspx

On the Tube, zone 1 journeys are UKP1.80 at any time, zone 1&2
journeys are UKP2.30 peak and UKP1.80 off-peak - note that the peak
times for PAYG fares include an evening peak on weekdays, though for
capping purposes only the morning peak counts. Confused?