On Monday, 7 August 2017 18:43:34 UTC+1, wrote:
I thought when the Mayor wanted to extend Oyster to National Rail route in
London ATOC insisted that railcards had to be recognised and discounts
given. So the system to register railcards on Oyster cards was somewhat
haphazardly introduced. For example you couldn't check railcard registration
status at a ticket machine. It was only when they decided to close all the
ticket offices that they had to make it possible as it now is.

But for people living outside London who aren't regular visitors contactless
became a much better option when introduced unless you are a railcard holder
because, although Oyster cards have to be registered to get railcard
discounts, they have not enabled railcard discounts against Contactless
travel.

So NR passengers can't get their railcard discounts using contactless. My
question is why ATOC put up with this? It seems to go completely against
their agreement to allow Oyster to NR routes.

Since when can Rail Delivery Group dictate how TfL establish their own ticketing technology? It was up to the TOCs as to whether they accepted the use of Contactless technology on their services in Greater London. If you recall they initially refused. I can only assume they expected to repeat their trick of not accepting Oyster and waiting for the Mayor to deposit a wheelbarrow of money on their doorsteps. Unfortunately this time there were no wheelbarrows of cash just a load of very predictable (and probably partly orchestrated) criticism in the London media and from a range of London politicians. After suffering a barrage of negative publicity and social media commentary they changed their minds.

There is a very practical issue that there is absolutely no way to verify a railcard holder is in possession of any given contactless payment card (CPC). The discount also cannot be set in the chip on any CPC. With Oyster the discount can be set at a station and on the Oyster card. I suspect the banks do not want any TfL staff having to handle bank cards in respect of online accounts or discounts. In the event of any payment issues people are directed to their banks and not TfL. I do understand your complaint but this is a difficult area to resolve when you place the "travel medium" in the hands of a third party as TfL have opted to do with contactless. The non existence of ticket offices also creates a further issue not that they (AFAIK) had direct access into the customer Oyster card database. All that ever happened were transactions that were later verified and consolidated against customer accounts (where they exist).

I wonder whether railcard discounts are available for mobile ticketing or the various TOC specific smartcard schemes that exist? I've not specifically checked but I am sceptical that RDG have ensured railcard acceptance even on rail industry only smart / mobile technology like the Key. If they can't manage their own affairs then it's a stretch to expect them to force TfL to do anything when TfL is under no obligation to accept railcards anyway. The offer of discounted PAYG fares for Railcard holders on TfL services is a fairly recent and generous concession which was never part of the scheme in the days of magnetic or paper ticketing (except ODTCs and a few specific flows where LU sold tickets on NR routes).

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Paul C
via Google