wrote:
Oh dear! Its complicated isnt it!
Unfortunately so, yes. Thankfully Oyster Pre-Pay will be implemented on
National Rail across London, but not until 2008 at the earliest. This
isn't Mayor Ken's fault, but instead is courtesy of the intransigence
of the private train companies along with the past
indifference/timidity of the Department for Transport, who are
ultimately responsible for ticketing policy on National Rail.
I think its become a mute point as I commute between Orpington (zone 6)
and Victoria (zone 1) and I dont think Orpington can take prepay
(although it does have Oyster readers?)
In your case it is a moot point. Basically there are only a very few
routes where you can use Pre-Pay on National Rail [1] - and south
London doesn't have any.
The Oyster readers that exist on the gates at Orpington do have a
purpose. Oyster cards can also have season Travelcards loaded on them.
Anyone who uses an Oyster card to get in or out of Orpington will have
a weekly or longer Travelcard loaded on that Oyster card.
Thus one can use an Oyster card in it's season Travelcard guise at
Orpington, but *not* in it's Pre-Pay guise.
You too could have your annual Travelcard loaded on an Oyster card
(you'd still benefit from the Gold Card benefits that an annual season
ticket affords). To do this you'd basically have to buy one from a TfL
outlet - i.e. an LU station, a travel information centre (such as that
at Victoria), from the Oyster website or from the Oyster sales line.
There are a few National Rail stations that sell Travelcards on Oyster
- the only Southeastern one I'm aware of is at New Cross.
You wouldn't benefit from any Southeastern Passengers Charter discounts
(for poor performance) if you didn't buy it from Southeastern though.
Given that you buy an all-zone Travelcard, there's no benefit from
buying it on Oyster over buying a paper ticket apart from the
convenience of having an Oyster card (i.e. you don't have to take the
ticket out to put it in the ticket machine).
If, for example, you had a zone 1-3 season Travelcard, the advantage of
Oyster would be that if you're travelling out of your covered zones *on
the Underground* (e.g. going out to Heathrow) it automatically deducts
the required excess fare (i.e. from zone 4 to 6) from your Pre-Pay
balance - so on such a journey an Oyster card would be acting in both
it's Travelcard guise *and* it's Pre-Pay guise. Of course if a zone 1-3
Travelcard holder wanted to go out to Orpington (zone 6) they would
still need to buy a paper ticket extension from a ticket office as
Pre-Pay is not valid on National Rail.
That's probably clear as mud, but I thought I'd explain it all rather
than keep it simple and miss out things.
I currently pay £1083 for an annual season ticket, but figured out
that last year I only used the ticket on 135 days and so it cost me £8
per day.
Was just wondering if an annual season ticket was still the cheapest
way?
I presume you travel by Underground once you get to Victoria, and
perhaps you use the bus in Orpington, hence the need for a Travelcard
as opposed to a straightforward Orpington-London season ticket.
If you're travelling before 0930 on weekdays then I don't think you'll
get a better deal by doing anything else - the standard single
Orpington-London fare is £3.60, the standard return is double that at
£7.20 (the cheap-day return at £4.20 doesn't kick in until after
0930).
If you were travelling after 0930 then buying a cheap-day return plus
using Oyster Pre-Pay for two Underground journeys would work out at
£7.20 a day. There would of course be the hassle factor of having to
buy the cheap-day return every day.
The other option would be to consider buying an Orpington-London rail
season ticket (an annual costs £1216) then using Oyster Pre-Pay once
in town. Links to Pre-Pay fares are below.
Hope something in the epic ramble above might be remotely helpful.
[1] Oyster help answer - Limited Oyster Pre-Pay acceptance on National
Rail
http://snipurl.com/Oyster_Pre_Pay_on_NR
Oyster Pre-Pay fares on Tube/DLR:
http://www.tfl.gov.uk/tfl/fares-tick.../tubedlr.shtml
Oyster Pre-Pay fares on buses/trams:
http://www.tfl.gov.uk/tfl/fares-tick...bustrams.shtml