Dave Arquati wrote:
It's a perplexing scenario at London Bridge mainline station for Prepay
users. Prepay is valid on Thameslink services to and from London Bridge.
Some friends were travelling with me to London Bridge from Farringdon
using Prepay (I was using a season Travelcard).

We touched in at Farringdon and walked to the platform 8 exit to get
off. They tried to touch out, but the barriers threw up an error; the
assistant at the barrier then told them that their Prepay wasn't valid
and that they needed to pay a fare. I then had a bit of an argument with
him about the validity of Prepay (something like this: "Prepay is valid
on Thameslink from Farringdon to London Bridge" "No it isn't" "Yes it is").

Luckily he called over another guy who knew what I was talking about,
who said that the barriers from that exit wouldn't understand Prepay and
that my friends had to touch out using the platform validators.

So we trooped back to the platforms and tried to touch out - but it
wouldn't work. We then went to a different exit (the main exit from
platforms 1-6) where the gates still wouldn't open; in the end another
barrier assistant just let us all out, but my friends then had
unresolved journeys and it screwed up their daily cap.

The problem is - how do you ever get out at London Bridge? Prepay
doesn't seem to work the exit gates, so are you supposed to touch out
using the platform validators first, and then the ticket gates will let
you out? It seems unlikely to me that the exit gates will be any more
capable of understanding a completed prepay journey than an uncompleted one.


I've not done this journey using PrePay myself, but I have seen posters
up at other Thameslink stations that read as follows (and I quote
directly):


"When getting on or off a train at London Bridge you must touch your
Oyster card on the card reader on the National Rail platform. If you do
not, you may be charged the wrong fare."


So perhaps the problem was that you didn't touch on the platform card
reader first, though like you I don't quite see why it didn't work
properly when your pal went back & 'touched' the platform reader then
went back to the gates.

There is scant publicity regarding this scenario, and it's a bad
situation that the platform staff didn't know the rules - though it
doesn't surprise me in the least either.

Perhaps an email to both Thameslink and Oyster customer services
wouldn't go amiss. Though saying that I haven't yet come across an
email address for Oyster customer services.