On Aug 23, 12:34 pm, Ian Jelf wrote:

Perhaps because the concept, the "way" in which Oyster works, it does
confuse people and you're not alone. If I gave any advice to anyone,
I'd suggest they load up a card at a machine, a ticket office or a
newsagent and take it from there.

I rang them and they're refunding the cost of the "ghost" journey so
at least I won't lose anything. As I usually only use the card when
coming back to the country and travelling via London, topping up on-
line is preferable as it's always possible that the machine won't be
working and the ticket office closed. Knowing my luck "it's always
possible that" is redundant in that statement ;-)

I'm glad it's not just me that they've confused - from the casual user
viewpoint the inconsistency of use between means of transport is
inexcusable. Maybe it's down to the system infrastructure, though why
validation should only be possible at certain points is beyond me. My
guess is it's probably a security issue - the functionality of the
devices appears to be the same.

The fact that you can't validate your top-up without making a journey
is poor design - either validation is a discrete function or it
isn't.

Cheers

David