In article
,
(Mizter T) wrote:

Surely the first thing the system should do if a journey involving an
OSI times out is to check if undoing the OSI assumption makes the
journey appear logical? In the OP's example the clue is that what it
thinks is one journey starts and ends at the same station!

I'm not sure the system architecture has the capacity to untangle
things like that - ultimately though I dunno, I'm just an observer.

Isn't it high time it did, at least to some extent, though?

--
Colin Rosenstiel

Mizter T wrote

journey is not accurate (IMO). That's not to say the passenger was
doing anything wrong as they were simply following the instructions
for touching-in and out.

I do hope that such problems can be addressed somehow - I dunno how
much flexibility there is to change things, and how much of the
underlying infrastructure w.r.t. the Oyster system is set in stone.

All I will say is that such problems seem rather more likely to occur
to people who are out for a 'joy ride' (or however you want to
describe it). Pretty much everyone I know uses the public transport
system to get from A-to-B - I'm the exception!

But the problem was first reported for a ordinary journey but a "quick
return" (Bow Church and return from Bow Road after picking up a shoe
repair IIRC).

So if there is a legitimate return journey that, on the return, uses a
different set of barriers at say Paddington NR or Liverpool Street NR
or King's Cross St. Pancras (LU) you could generate a fail every time
without being a joy rider provided the timeout occured well after
reentering the system.

Would Cannon Street to King's Cross St. Pancras Met (LU), return by
same route but King's Cross St. Pancras Northern line entrance do ? If
you had to return to Monument due to the closing time of Cannon Street
it would be still less clear that it was two journeys.

--
Mike D

MIG wrote:

On 28 Feb, 23:33, "solar penguin"
wrote:
MIG wrote:

The more I think about it, the more the excuses don't wash. Think
about what actually happens.

A punter makes a number of journeys, always touching in and out
according to the rules, all journeys resolved. The system "knows"
exactly where the punter has been the whole time. All touches are
recorded.

Then the system actively intervenes and deems the whole series of
journeys to be one journey.

Unfortunately, that's not what happens. It's not a case of the
system _actively_ intervening to make them one journey. Just the
opposite. The punter travels around, touching in and out, but the
system _passively_ thinks of all this as one journey by default,
unless something actively intervenes (e.g. a time out or touching
out at a non-OSI station) and splits it into a whole series of
journeys.

Well, not really. When one touches out, the first journey is resolved
and a fare is calculated. This doesn't wait for a timeout.

Only when you're touching out at a non-OSI station. If you touch out at
an OSI, the fare is calculated but the journey is _not_ fully resolved
until the OSI's interchange time limit is up.

This topsy-turvey machine logic goes against good old human common sense
which thinks of the journey as over as soon as we touch out. That's the
problem.


When one touches in again, the system records a touch in. It can
surely only be defined as a continuation after some calculation
involving time and place of last touch out, so this must logically be
after the touch in.

All touches are recorded, and prove the punter to have followed the
rules, but these records are disregarded in order to charge a false
fare.

I am not interested in the excuses for how it works. It's absolutely
clear to the system that no journey is unresolved, and yet that's what
is charged for. It's fraud, whatever the mechanism.


I agree. And I'm not making excuses for how it works. (I'm the last
person who'd make excuses for Oyster!) I'm just trying to describe the
problem as accurately as possible, and that means getting to grips with
the looking-glass logic the system uses.

--
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| '_ \/ -_)| ' \ / _` || || || || ' \
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|_| |___/

In message of Sun, 28 Feb 2010
14:26:18 in uk.transport.london, Walter Briscoe
writes
In message
.com of Sun, 28 Feb 2010 01:44:00 in uk.transport.london, MIG
writes
On 28 Feb, 08:32, Walter Briscoe wrote:
On 24/02/10, I entered Moorgate at 16:30 and left Euston at 16:43.
I entered Euston Square at 16:49 and left Moorgate at 17:10.
I was charged 5.80 for Euston Square entry and 6.00 for Moorgate exit.
I had already capped travel in Z1-2 on my registered Oystercard.
On 28 February 2010 03:22:49, TfL sent me an email "... Due to an
operational issue, we calculate that you are due a refund of 11.80.
This is now ready for pick-up at Moorgate. ..."
I am a little impressed.
Weekend mornings are good times for Oyster help on 0845 330 9876.
I was unable to get an explanation for the systemic failure.

This isn't the typical OSI problem that people have talked about
though, is it?


Below, I show a second scenario where Oyster does as well as can be
expected. Can somebody else construct a third which Oyster does not
auto-correct, given the opportunity to do so?

It just looks like the system was charging completely the wrong fares
to everyone and they couldn't miss it.

So I don't infer that the inexcusable situation where people are
repeatedly getting overcharged, because the system strings separate
resolved journeys into one and then decides that the resulting journey
is too long and splits it into unresolved/unstarted journeys, is
likely to be addressed in such a helpful way.

I agree I showed a failure that has been addressed less frequently.
It is also inexcusable because there is no automatic mechanism for
charging the correct fare to an unregistered card.

It is harder to demonstrate the other sort of failure.
http://www.tfl.gov.uk/tickets/oysteronline/12421.aspx (obscurely)
documents those time limits. You can also get there by navigating
http://www.tfl.gov.uk/, "Tickets", "What is Oyster?", "Pay as you go"
and search for "Maximum journey times".

It is harder to construct a charging failure involving an OSI without
doing something "perverse" since the Within Zone 1 or 2 limit was upped
to 90 minutes.

I suppose I could do something like

[snipped fanciful journey]

I am afraid it happened again.

On 02/03/10, I entered at Moorgate at 09:05, exited Kings Cross (Nthn,
Vic, Picc Lines) at 10:06, entered Kings Cross (Met, Circle, H&C) at
10:19 and exited Barbican at 10:41. As expected, I was charged for one
normal entry and exit between Moorgate and Kings Cross (Nthn, Vic, Picc
Lines), an incomplete journey starting at Kings Cross (Met, Circle, H&C)
and an unstarted journey at Barbican.

A refund notification email was sent at 06 March 2010 03:21:57.
The effect of it is that I was charged for a Zone 1 journey starting at
09:05 and ending at 10:41 - a 96 minute journey where the maximum
journey time is 90 minutes. I am happy with that charge, but unhappy
with the details.

I intend to email to get an
explanation of the systemic problem. If the answer is unsatisfactory, I
will take it to London Travelwatch.
--
Walter Briscoe