On Jun 17, 4:42*pm, "John Salmon" wrote:

"Mizter T" wrote:
When Oyster PAYG is eventually rolled out across National Rail in
London, then one should be able to buy Travelcards loaded on Oyster
(or indeed just top-up Oyster PAYG) at station ticket offices (not
sure about any plans for modifying self-service ticket machines). Then
one simply needs to buy the required Travelcard on Oyster, and voila -
problem solved. Except if you don't want your Travelcard to be on
Oyster, in which case whatever.

As a matter of interest, is it known whether the current situation with
respect to One-day (specifically Zones 1-6) Travelcards will remain when
Oyster PAYG is rolled out across National Rail in London, i.e. will it still
not be possible to load a One-day Travelcard on Oyster but will the same
effect (with a small discount) still be achievable by using PAYG? *I often
use a Travelcard on day trips to London, but at the moment I can't sensibly
use Oyster PAYG on these occasions because much of my travel tends to be on
National Rail - or, to be more precise and to anticipate any pedantic
replies, it tends to be on the parts of National Rail on which Oyster PAYG
is not currently accepted.

It's unclear exactly how things will transpire, however I find it hard
to imagine Day Travelcards - that is, stnadalone tickets sold on paper/
card - being totally withdrawn.

A few thoughts - at the moment it seems quite possible that the
farescale used for PAYG on NR in London will simply match the current
pan-London NR farescale, which was introduced across all TOCs in 2007
and prices fares for London rail journeys on a zonal basis (though
tickets are still issued on a point-to-point basis). *If* this is how
things turn out, then it'll be interesting to see if there might be
two capping levels - a slightly cheaper (i.e. 50p less) one for TfL-
only journeys, and one that precisely matches the Day Travelcard price
when there are also NR journeys made.

Other options would be the slightly cheaper daily capping rates being
abandoned, or for there to only be one capping level inclusive of NR
journeys which remained as 50p cheaper than the quasi-equivalent Day
Travelcard.

However, whilst it's certainly not impossible to imagine inboundary
Day Travelcards being withdrawn altogether - logic being that PAYG
with daily capping does the same job - I doubt that will come to pass.
Day Travelcards would remain attractive to visitors and other Oyster-
less folk - if there wasn't an easily accessible day pass for public
transport in London available for all comers then someone would want
to invent one!

Also, being a bit cynical, I suspect that the TOCs won't really
promote Oyster PAYG all that much, quite unlike TfL - the logic being
that the TOCs have to wait for PAYG-derived monies to filter through
the revenue reconciliation system (or whatever one should call it),
whereas with 'normal' rail ticket sales they'd get it quicker through
the RSP system (in effect I think they get the money instantly over
the counter and then have to reconcile things later - with Oyster
PAYG, money handed over for Oyster top-ups would have to go to the
'Bank of TfL' more or less immediately).

The one thing I can perhaps imagine happening is that the many
newsagents and other shops that sell TfL ticketing products (which are
called "Oyster Ticket Stops") might perhaps stop selling Day
Travelcards. In ye olden days, they issued them (plus season
Travelcards and bus passes) by simply stamping a date on the
appropriate pre-printed ticket stock. Then, in the mid/late 90's, they
got turquoise machines that printed tickets - these were also 'Oyster-
ready'. In the last year or so these have been phased out and replaced
by simply Oyster pad arrangements (AIUI internally they are known as
"Pearls") which are I think just connected to an appropriate/
compatible EPOS machine - point being, the printing mechanism has
disappeared. So shopkeepers are back to using a date stamp and ink to
put the date on pre-printed Day Travelcards - though they sell fewer
of them these days now that Oyster PAYG is around. When Oyster PAYG
eventually goes live on NR in London, I can see why TfL might want to
ditch offering this.


How, if at all, will Outboundary One-day Travelcards fit into this scenario?

They'd be unaffected.