John wrote:

I may look into an Oyster card.
It is very annoying that the travel card is good for only one specific day.
It is not as if it is reserving a seat.
The clock for expiration should not start until it is first used.
I may mail them back to the UK for refund.


Ermm the One Day Travel Cards (ODTC) have a date printed on them. This
is so bus drivers, ticket inspectors, etc. are able to find out if the
ticket is valid or not by meerly glancing at it rather than feeding it
through a machine (which would take a lot of time)

If you want a ticket which is a ODTC but not tied to a specific date
then get an Oystercard for each person (www.oystercard.com) and put on
enough prepay to pay for a travelcard then just use it (as long as you
are only traveling by tube, bus, tram and/or dlr)

Chris! wrote:
snip


Ermm the One Day Travel Cards (ODTC) have a date printed on them. This
is so bus drivers, ticket inspectors, etc. are able to find out if the
ticket is valid or not by meerly glancing at it rather than feeding it
through a machine (which would take a lot of time)


And if you buy them from a shop which stamps the ticket manually (no
machine), then they are validated by their first use, regardless of the
date stamped.

A lot of time to feed a ticket through a machine? I'd have thought that
inspectors would have that time (30 seconds at the most) and there's no
reason why bus drivers should have to inspect tickets in any case.

Paul