Earl Purple wrote:

Mizter T wrote:
Though in the last example you only paid FCC for *part* of your journey
- the Moorgate to Finsbury Park portion. The Oyster system would have
allocated the rest of the journey and hence the rest of the revenue to
LU for a Piccadilly line journey from FP to Bounds Green. The Finsbury
Park to Bowes Park portion of your journey on FCC was therefore not
paid for.

Why should it assume I used that line at all? I might have taken the
Northern Line to Kings Cross then the Piccadilly Line from there.

True - the two most obvious routes for making such a journey are
basically either:
(1) by Underground all the way via Kings Cross, then on the Picc, or
Vic to FP and then Picc to Bounds Green
(2) or via the FCC Great Northern line then change at FP to the Picc
(or FCC GN to Highbury & Islington, Vic to FP, Picc to Bounds Green for
those who like cross-platform interchanges).

The exact way revenue is allocated will be very complex, but I'm sure
that assumptions regarding most-likely routes taken will be a factor.
Thus the Oyster system would make an assumption you've taken one of the
two routes above. How the money is actually split is a dark art, and
I'm sure multiple other factors come into play here (e.g. perhaps
whether the journey was made at the weekend or not is a factor, as
during the w/e there's no FCC GN service into Moorgate).

Don't get me wrong, I'm not having a go whatsoever, all I was doing was
just pointing out that it is incorrect to say that you had paid for the
whole journey you actually made.


And if I have an Oyster season, how would it allocate that?

More black magic. Seriously, there are very sophisticated and complex
formulas for the apportionment of money from the sale of Travelcards.
Whether usage statistics of Travelcards loaded on Oyster is part of
this calculation I don't know - I guess it could be, but remember that
National Rail journeys in London don't involve passing through gates so
such statistics would only be part of the overall picture. Holders of
printed season Travelcard holders are sent surveys to complete, whether
this happens with holders of season Travelcards on Oyster I don't know.
The results of these surveys are presumably factored in.


What might be useful, but I don't think it happens, would be that if
you buy an Oyster Season ticket which would have covered any journeys
you have already made that day, those journeys are automatically
refunded. eg I get a bus to the station (paying £1) then buy a season
ticket, the £1 would automatically go back onto the Oyster pre-pay.

That would have solved the problem of the journey from Pudding Mill
Lane to Canary Wharf, where I could have touched in and out, and
subsequently had the fare automatically refunded when I bought an
Oyster season later the same day.


I absolutely agree that such a facility would be really neat, I and
many others would find it very useful.

Perhaps, however, it is more complicated to implement than at first
seems - more complicated scenarios exist where a passenger has been
travelling all day all over the LU and bus network, perhaps hitting a
daily capping level but also having made peak-time LU journey(s) that
didn't contribute to the off-peak cap.

Calculating what should be discounted from the season Travelcard price
might thus prove difficult, especially if the passenger was purchasing
a season Travelcard that didn't cover all the zones in which they had
travelled during the day - if this was the case then to discount the
appropriate amount could involve the need for revised daily caps to be
imposed retrospectively.

If there was some rule about the discount for just one journey then
this would then be unfair on someone who had started and finished at
stations where they couldn't renew their season Travelcard.

If there are any such considerations then perhaps it is just easier to
not attempt to implement such a facility - i.e. keep it simple!

In addition remember that you can buy season Travelcards to collect
when passing through a specified LU or DLR station - you need to order
the day before and IIRC the ticket will be available for virtual
collection for seven days. Plus you can also buy season Travelcards on
Oyster in advance from both Tube ticket offices and newsagents,
something like up to 30 days before the start date (at least from Tube
ticket offices - not sure of what's on offer from newsagents).