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Old February 24th 08, 12:10 PM posted to uk.transport.london
MIG MIG is offline
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First recorded activity at LondonBanter: Jun 2004
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Default Oyster PAYG cap with railcard

On Feb 24, 10:40*am, Michael wrote:
In article
,

*MIG wrote:
Why wouldn't the latter still result in paying £3? *There seems to be
an implication that once any cap is reached, there can be no more
charge, but that would imply that you could reach the zone 1 - 2 cap
and then travel for free to zone 6, which is not the case.


It is the opposite assumption, that despite one cap being reach (the bus
cap) that it can still be converted to come under another cap
(Tube/DLR/Overground) when there are competing caps that could be
applied, which whichever combination works out cheaper winning.

For example if you travel out of zone from the ones at which you have *
already been capped then the system will compare the costs of existing
cap + single journey to the cap which covers all the zones you have now
travelled in, and the cheaper of the two being applied.


In such a case, there is never any need for the fare jumping
backwards, and the order of journeys doesn't make any difference.

I'm pretty sure that in any situation where a cap is reached or
subsequently broken, there is never any need for Oyster to do anything
other than add all or part of the single fare most recently undertaken
(I'd need to do a few calculations to prove that, but it just seems
right).



The issue here though is that the new railcard discount has created an
anomaly where the tube + bus cap is lower than the bus only cap.


I am not convinced of that, or do you know it to have happened?


The issue must be that the railcard isn't valid on buses, so if you
use buses in addition, why shouldn't the higher cap apply?


Because although you cannot use a railcard on buses directly, you can
use one to buy a travelcard at a reduced fare, which obviously includes
bus travel. *As the Tube/DLR/Overground cap limit is the Oyster
alternative to a Travelcard it covers the same forms of transport. *(Of
course excluding the non-Oyster NR services.)


That may be a bit wishful. Oyster PAYG capping is not equivalent to a
travelcard, it's just meant to be an alternative to it.

There's no more reason to expect a bus fare reduction on PAYG, just
because a reduction applies to a travelcard, than there is to expect
to use PAYG on NR, just because you can use NR with a travelcard.



Which is why I reckon if you only travel by bus the normal bus cap would
be applied, rather than the lower railcard discounted one. *Because you
cannot get a railcard discount on an all-day bus ticket (the bus cap)
but you can on a travelcard (the tube cap).

Michael.