MIG wrote:

time for some snipping

Refusing to put one-day travelcards on Oyster in general, not
necessarily by the means suggested above, seems to be pure
obstructiveness. If the argument works for period travelcards, it
works for one-day travelcards.

But the day ticketing product on an Oyster card is daily price
capping, whilst there is no weekly or monthly price capping product -
and as has been discussed before on here that would be practically
impossible to implement.

Please tell me what on earth would be gained by being able to load a
Day Travelcard onto an Oyster card?

Daily price capping is not in any sense equivalent to a day
travelcard, because it isn't valid for the same set of services. It's
really simple.

Oyster price capping is _the_ daily ticketing product on Oyster, and
is one in which could be valid on all rail services in London if the
TOCs decided to make it so. That is what TfL wants - indeed it is what
passengers want, and as Oyster is TfL's system they decide what
tickets go on it and what don't. If Day Travelcards were to be offered
on Oyster it would destroy a whole part of the attraction of Oyster,
which is that you only pay for what you use until you reach a cap, and
would thus be going against their aim of getting all TOCs in London
onto accepting Oyster PAYG.

Plus it would be very confusing - it really would, and that is a
crucial point.


So, given that it's a totally different product for which a demand
remains, why on Earth shouldn't it be stored on an Oyster card?

But how would anyone benefit from this? The only difference would be
the ticket was on a smartcard as opposed to a bit of paper.

With Oyster PAYG, as long as you're not travelling on most National
Rail routes then you don't need to decide at the beginning of the day
where you are going - one of the great benefits of the system.

With Day Travelcards, the passenger has to consider when they buy
their ticket where they are going that day, and so they buy it for the
correct zones.

The idea that a Day Travelcard could then be combined with Oyster PAYG
is pretty absurd as it would be so complicated, and would lead to lots
more confusion as passengers got in a muddle over which routes they
could automatically extend their journey on (such as LU, DLR, LO and a
few NR routes) and which they couldn't (the majoroty of NR routes).

Yes, the same could be said for season Travelcards - but holders of
season Travelcards are far more likely to be acquainted with the
situation than holders of Day Travelcards - even so, there are plenty
of season Travelcard holders who get confused by the current
arrangement too.

The answer is simply to get Oyster PAYG accepted across National Rail
in London, rather than some unnecessary and confusing foray into
offering Day Travelcards on Oyster.

Seriously, how would the vast majority of Day Travelcard users benefit
from such a move, apart from having a ticket that goes "beep" when
they use it?