"Scott" wrote in message
...
On Fri, 06 May 2011 11:31:12 +0100, Clive Page
wrote:

On 04/05/2011 21:31, Scott wrote:
To be fair, it is not unreasonable to expect the users to operate the
system correctly and to touch in and out on each journey as required.

Yes, but if you are a foreign visitor, finding out all the arcane rules
and then finding all the oyster pads can be pretty difficult. Is it
obvious that on tubes you have to touch in and out, but on buses just
touch in. Then what do you do on a tram? And does the answer depend on
whether you take the tram from a boarding point with a gate-line like
Wimbledon, or one without? What about Overground and suburban rail,
where the Oyster pads are often quite hard to find. And what's the
distinction between pink and yellow pads? We know the answers, but can
a visitor find them easily?

If even we natives get caught out from time to time with an uncompleted
journey or two, is it surprising that visitors get caught out quite
often? And if you are just in London for a day or two, you really don't
want to spend hours on the phone or web to fix an unresolved journey on
your Oyster card.

I have to say, that I use Oyster in London reluctantly, and only when a
paper One-day travel card is unavailable or much more expensive. And
when visiting cities abroad I'm extremely reluctant to take out an
Oyster-equivalent card unless I can find out in advance exactly what I'm
letting myself in for. In Paris, for example, the carnet of 10 tickets
is still available, and that works for me.

I am not a foreign visitor (although after the election results that
may become the position soon !!!) and I concede I have made mistakes
on at least a couple of occasions. I still think the benefits far
outweigh the potential difficulties. I really like the convenience of
having the Oyster card and not needing to buy a ticket. If I lose out
on the odd occasion I am happy to treat it as a donation to TfL as I
support the concept of public transport.

Problem is the donation is going to be of the order of 15 pounds (twice the
new 7.80 default fare).

far too much a donation, IMHO

tim

"solar penguin" wrote:

And if you think I'm being paranoid, ask yourself why TfL banned
newsagents from accepting credit/debit card payments for Oyster top-
ups. Think about it. I can't think of any reason for it except that
it means anyone wanting to use card payments for Oyster to either use
the website or the facilities at stations, so the authorities will be
able to link the specific credit/debit card holder with the specific
Oyster card...

But TfL *haven't* banned newsagents from accepting credit/debit card
payments for Oyster top-ups - it's up to the newsagents themselves to decide
on whether they want to offer that or not. It's worth bearing in mind the
cost to the shopkeeper of processing credit/debit card payments, which might
well wipe out the commission they get for selling Oyster top-ups, or at
least significantly reduce it to the point of it not being worth their
while. If customers are making a larger purchase, of which topping up their
Oyster is only part, then shopkeepers might well be more amenable to payment
by credit/debit card - though some will have it as an absolute rule.

(Is that acceptable, Big Brother? Good, I'll post it now...)

On 4 May, 18:05, Paul Corfield wrote:
On Wed, 4 May 2011 07:09:58 -0700 (PDT), George

wrote:
How much longer are people going to be ripped off like this? And
surely the London Tourist Board and similar organisations should be
telling visitors to London NOT to use Oyster and to buy a ODTC where
appropriate instead?

As ever George I assume that instead of moaning on here that you have
addressed your concerns to TfL and also to the London Tourist Board? *If
you haven't done so then you obviously don't think it is a particularly
serious matter.

PS - on an unrelated matter it was very nice of you to give me two new
nicknames in a recent posting about traffic in Purley on your "not
discredited" London-Transport Yahoo group. I have yet to finalise what I
"might not be able to do anything about" in response to my postings
being copied between groups.

You'd be surprised what I get to hear about. Have a nice day.

--
Paul C

Firstly Paul it is not my Yahoo Group it is Paul Morant that is the
owner.

Two new nicknames?? Some of your postings were being forwarded onto
the group from another group which I thought was a bit naughty!

On 4 May, 21:45, Paul Corfield wrote:
On Wed, 04 May 2011 21:31:52 +0100, Scott

wrote:
I think you go too far in condemning a whole system because of one or
two difficulties. *I will continue to use my Oyster card as a highly
convenient method of payment.

Go too far? George? surely not?

Some of us have read his comments over and over again in other places.
--
Paul C

I'm afraid that this is a bit more than one or two difficulties!

"Scott" wrote in message
...

I'm actually campaigning for an Oyster type card for Scotland. (I say
Oyster type as I know it will be ITSO compliant instead). I know
there are practical difficulties about unresolved journeys. Will I
get charged a full single fare to Thurso is I omit to touch out? That
might alter my attitude!

Oyster style PAYG (with max cash fare deducted on touch in and rebate on
exit) over anything larger than a well defined urban area isn't really
possible - as you rightly point out.

Paul S

On May 6, 11:31*am, Clive Page wrote:
[snip]

I have to say, that I use Oyster in London reluctantly, and only when a
paper One-day travel card is unavailable or much more expensive. *And
when visiting cities abroad I'm extremely reluctant to take out an
Oyster-equivalent card unless I can find out in advance exactly what I'm
letting myself in for. *In Paris, for example, the carnet of 10 tickets
is still available, and that works for me.

I am the exact opposite to you. As I will typically be making a lot of
use of public transport I will seek out the "ride at will" ticket or
smartcard version thereof. This saves me having multiple single trip
transactions right throughout a stay or worrying about finding cash
all the time. I'll do this even if I might make a financial loss
because I value the convenience of having "travel" in my pocket.

On this basis I have a RATP Mobilis card (their version of a ODTC but
you have a ID card), a Singapore EZ Pass, Hong Kong Octopus and Tokyo
Suica. I've had magnetic Metrocards in Hong Kong and paper "seasons"
in other cities. I cannot claim to know all the ins and outs of these
fare systems but I do what most people will do and that is search the
web and do a bit of research beforehand.

Fortunately many systems do provide some English language info but
usually it is a subset of the info provided in the native language.
While I suppose I might be deemed an "expert user" here in London I
can't be said to be that in these other places. I cannot recall ever
being wrongly charged nor have I been caught out by the system other
than a couple of times in Paris. That was dealt with very quickly. I
had an Octopus Card fail in HK on my final day there and I was
refunded on the spot based on my estimate of the card balance. Some
systems have features that London does not have (e.g exit validation
on buses) but you learn to cope with those features. I didn't know
how to use my Suica on a tram in Tokyo but coped just fine; ditto on a
Tokyo bus. I even had a ticket machine revert to Japanese part way
through a top up transaction but "guessed" what to do and got the
money on the card fine.

Having looked at the TfL website I wonder what more TfL could do in
terms of making getting an Oyster Card easy for visitors and providing
pretty clear info on the system's rules and features. OK it is all in
English but many visitors will have a smattering of the language or
they can use an on line translation facility. It's not absolutely
perfect (show me a transport ticketing website that is) but neither is
it some sort of disaster zone where information is virtually
impossible to obtain or understand.

--
Paul C
via Google

Mizter T wrote:
"solar penguin" wrote:

And if you think I'm being paranoid, ask yourself why TfL banned
newsagents from accepting credit/debit card payments for Oyster top-
ups.

But TfL *haven't* banned newsagents from accepting credit/debit card
payments for Oyster top-ups - it's up to the newsagents themselves to decide
on whether they want to offer that or not.

That's not what the newsagents themselves said. I've heard this at
two different shops, so it's not just one newsagent that's mistaken.

It's worth bearing in mind the
cost to the shopkeeper of processing credit/debit card payments, which might
well wipe out the commission they get for selling Oyster top-ups, or at
least significantly reduce it to the point of it not being worth their
while. If customers are making a larger purchase, of which topping up their
Oyster is only part, then shopkeepers might well be more amenable to payment
by credit/debit card - though some will have it as an absolute rule.

Just the opposite. One newsagent made me split my purchase, paying
for the Oyster by cash, and the other goods by debit card. He clearly
had no problem accepting debit cards in general, but insisted TfL
rules didn't allow him to accept them for Oyster.

So this raises the question of why TfL are letting newsagents believe
they're not allowed to accept credit/debit card payments for Oyster if
it's not he case?

Paul Corfield wrote:

On this basis I have a RATP Mobilis card (their version of a ODTC but
you have a ID card), a Singapore EZ Pass, Hong Kong Octopus and Tokyo
Suica. I've had magnetic Metrocards in Hong Kong and paper "seasons"
in other cities. I cannot claim to know all the ins and outs of these
fare systems but I do what most people will do and that is search the
web and do a bit of research beforehand.

Is that what "most people" do? Really? Have you got any surveys to
back you up on this?

I know I've never looked up how to pay for the local public transport
before taking a trip somewhere. Check whether there is any public
transport nearby, yes. But nothing more. And I know people who don't
even do that much.

While I suppose I might be deemed an "expert user" here in London I
can't be said to be that in these other places. I cannot recall ever
being wrongly charged nor have I been caught out by the system other
than a couple of times in Paris.

Compare that with how often London's Oyster goes wrong, and it's
obvious that TfL must be doing something wrong somewhere.

"solar penguin" wrote:

Mizter T wrote:

"solar penguin" wrote:

And if you think I'm being paranoid, ask yourself why TfL banned
newsagents from accepting credit/debit card payments for Oyster top-
ups.

But TfL *haven't* banned newsagents from accepting credit/debit card
payments for Oyster top-ups - it's up to the newsagents themselves to
decide
on whether they want to offer that or not.

That's not what the newsagents themselves said. I've heard this at
two different shops, so it's not just one newsagent that's mistaken.

It's worth bearing in mind the
cost to the shopkeeper of processing credit/debit card payments, which
might
well wipe out the commission they get for selling Oyster top-ups, or at
least significantly reduce it to the point of it not being worth their
while. If customers are making a larger purchase, of which topping up
their
Oyster is only part, then shopkeepers might well be more amenable to
payment
by credit/debit card - though some will have it as an absolute rule.

Just the opposite. One newsagent made me split my purchase, paying
for the Oyster by cash, and the other goods by debit card. He clearly
had no problem accepting debit cards in general, but insisted TfL
rules didn't allow him to accept them for Oyster.

So this raises the question of why TfL are letting newsagents believe
they're not allowed to accept credit/debit card payments for Oyster if
it's not he case?

Perhaps there's some issue w.r.t. the settlement of monies which makes
accepting credit/debit card payments more troublesome (e.g. TfL want the
money for Oyster card purchases before the retailer has got it from their
payment card processer).

FWIW this is what it says on the Oyster Ticket Stops section of the TfL
website:

---quote---
How to pay
Please check with individual retailer which types of payment are accepted.
---/quote---

Source:
http://www.tfl.gov.uk/tickets/14434.aspx

If Oyster Ticket Stops (OTS) weren't permitted to accept credit/debit card
payments for Oyster top-ups at all, then one wouldn't expect the above text
to appear. That's not to say that the local relationship manager or whatever
doesn't just say to OTS shopkeepers that accepting debit/credit cards is
more trouble than its worth (for whatever reason). One possibility is that
to accept credit/debit card payments for Oyster top-ups, OTS shopkeepers
have to pass a more rigourous credit test, and many/most don't bother with
that - in which case they'd be right in saying that TfL rules meant that
they couldn't accept credit/debit card payments for Oyster.

"solar penguin" wrote in message
...

Paul Corfield wrote:

On this basis I have a RATP Mobilis card (their version of a ODTC but
you have a ID card), a Singapore EZ Pass, Hong Kong Octopus and Tokyo
Suica. I've had magnetic Metrocards in Hong Kong and paper "seasons"
in other cities. I cannot claim to know all the ins and outs of these
fare systems but I do what most people will do and that is search the
web and do a bit of research beforehand.

Is that what "most people" do? Really? Have you got any surveys to
back you up on this?

I know I've never looked up how to pay for the local public transport
before taking a trip somewhere. Check whether there is any public
transport nearby, yes. But nothing more. And I know people who don't
even do that much.

Don't got to southern Sweden then!.

As of June you will no longer be able to pay your fare "on the bus". You
either buy a ticket from a station or pay with (their) Oyster equivalent (or
walk)

tim