On Thu, 15 Jun 2006 08:59:52 +0100, Richard M Willis wrote:

I have been thinking about some flaws in the Oyster system and was
wondering
if anyone knew the legal situation in the following case.

If I have a zone 2-6 travelcard and travel from Highbury & Islington to
Richmond via the North London Line I am staying within my zones so no
money
is deducted - no problem.

It is my understanding that the Oyster Fare between any two stations on
the LUL network is the cheapest, even if you go out of zone to get there.
E.g. I've been told that Boston Manor to Uxbridge does not need to involve
zone 1 and so doesn't, even if you do go via Baker Street.

Not necessarily. I gather that the system is hardcoded with the zones
required for a journey between each pair of stations. For example, it
reckons Harrow-on-the-Hill to Barons Court requires Z12345. It thinks
Harrow-on-the-Hill to Ravenscourt Park requires Z2345. In the former
case, you'd be charged for going via Z1 even if you went via Rayners
Lane. In the latter case, you wouldn't be charged for going via Z1
even if you did (I don't know what happens if you go via Marylebone,
which involves an out-of-station interchange).

On p20 of the TfL 2006 fares leaflet, where it discusses Capping, it
says the following: "Some journeys have been defined as requiring
travel via Zone 1 and will be charged and capped accordingly,
irrespective of the actual route taken."

Oyster allows greater possibility for fare-evasion because you don't have
to have "the correct ticket BEFORE you travel": the money is only deducted
at the point of leaving the system. I've often gone from say, Baker street
to Krapy Rubsnif, to get a WAGN/FCC service, but could easily have not
touched-out
at the Krapy Rubsnif interchange (I already had a valid FCC/WAGN ticket)

so, indeed, how do they know ? All anyone can see who looks at the logs will
see "unresolved journey" without knowing whether it was a simple intra-Zone1
journey, or a Z1-Chalfont+L.

At some point they may start charging the maximum fare, or some kind
of penalty, for having an unresolved journey. At the moment it would
just be the Z1 fare, but they're already charging a £5.00 penalty for
every unresolved PAYG journey at the NR termini where PAYG is valid.

I was also told at an LU ticket office that your card might be
disabled if you have too many unresolved journeys.

Question: If I were to travel from Highbury to Richmond via Zone 1 on a
daily basis, knowing full well I was not being charged the correct fare, is
this fare evasion? Or could I say that as I am following the instructions by
touching in and out correctly it is not my fault that the money is not being
deducted correctly. With a paper ticket there is always the small risk of a
ticket inspection within zone 1, but if I have a validated Oyster with
sufficient Prepay on it there is nothing a ticket inspector could do.

Question 2: If I am honest and want to pay the extra £1.50 to go via zone 1,
how would I do this? The only way would seem to be to touch a validator on a
platform in zone 1, however there aren't any at most stations.

I don't think you could pay the "correct" fare even if you wanted to.
Even if you managed to find and touch a validator in Z1, I don't think
the system contains the logic to charge you the "correct" fare in this
case.

I'd like to know the answer to your first question, particularly in
light of this, but I think we're unlikely to get a definitive one.

I think that this problem will only get worse when Oyster is rolled out to
National Rail services as there will then be many possible routes for a
given journey.

Actually, it's sort of moving closer to the current NR system, where
you pay a fixed fare to travel between two named stations, although
several routes may be available.

That's the reason it's not being rolled-out so quickly onto NR: they
are waiting for OysterNextGen where the cards can be read at a distance of
several meters without a touch in/out and without the passenger knowing
they've been read. In this way, they can check for invalid routings if
wanted.

Better keep your Oyster card in a tin foil wrapper ;-)