Paul Corfield wrote:

The answer to this is very simple. He might have a suspicion but he
could not prove it. There are a number of places where passengers can
enter the LU network from National Rail by crossing between platforms.
There are no gates. There are validators but are there signs to demand
that *everyone* with an Oyster card validates? - no there are not. There
*are* signs saying that if you use Pre-Pay on Oyster cards that you
should do so. There is NO requirement for a Travelcard user to do so
unless they are making a Pre-Pay trip as an extension to the Travelcard.
In such cases they are rather obviously using Pre-Pay!

Except it's not so obvious...

In my case, entering the system from National Rail at Forest Gate I pass
signs telling me "Oyster PrePay is NOT valid from this station". And there
is nothing at all at that station for me to touch in/out of, even for the
conscientious traveller who wants to help National Rail and TfL get a better
picture of service use.* I get to Stratford to change for the tube. I do not
think of myself as a PrePay user and that's all the sign tells me need to
touch in. So I have no need to touch in there. Then I get the tube.
Sometimes I come out through barriers, sometimes not - how does it tell?

And if I go out of zone, say to Amersham or Chesham, that's the first time
the ticket picks me up. And this brings up the other problem. The travelcard
is in part appealing because of "no need to plan your journey in advance",
whilst Oyster PrePay has been advertised (dodgily) on the same basis. But
the extensions *do* require me to beep in and out at Stratford, even if I
haven't yet planned to do so - say I was going to Harrow but got a phone
message to go to Chesham in the Willsden area?

Incidentally, if I'd started my journey at Ilford were there are barriers
with Oyster readers, would the system have a problem? Or would I need to
find a TfL reader for PrePay as well?

( * There used to be readers on the platforms but these were removed. And I
can't see how you can easily gate up (b-boom!) Forest Gate easily taking
into account people overshooting and wishing to double back, the frequent
switching of Ilford bound trains to platform 4 which is cannot be accessed
from the station building and requires stepping out onto street, and the
architecture of the station not really offering a good place for a row of
barriers for platforms 1-3.)

(Oh and yes I know that for Forest Gate to Metropolitan Line destinations
the best interchange is Liverpool Street, with two sets of barriers, but the
Circle/Hammer & Met central London sections are often being worked on at
weekends, making Stratford a better interchange.)

On Thu, 23 Mar 2006 00:46:58 -0000, "Tim Roll-Pickering"
wrote:

And if I go out of zone, say to Amersham or Chesham, that's the first time
the ticket picks me up. And this brings up the other problem. The travelcard
is in part appealing because of "no need to plan your journey in advance",
whilst Oyster PrePay has been advertised (dodgily) on the same basis. But
the extensions *do* require me to beep in and out at Stratford, even if I
haven't yet planned to do so - say I was going to Harrow but got a phone
message to go to Chesham in the Willsden area?

In that case, tough luck!! I really don't see why you think you're
being so deprived here. If you thought you might need to go out of
zone, you should have touched in when you entered the Tube system.

Is it really so much trouble, on these extremely rare occasions, to
have to leave then re-enter the gates at Harrow (where you'd probably
be changing trains anyway)? It's still more convenient than pre-Oyster
days as you don't need to buy a ticket extension.

(In fact, if you were really lucky, you might have received the phone
call on board an Amersham/Chesham-bound train that subsequently got
routed into platform 1 at Harrow, which has validators on the platform
that you could step out briefly and use.)

Incidentally, if I'd started my journey at Ilford were there are barriers
with Oyster readers, would the system have a problem? Or would I need to
find a TfL reader for PrePay as well?

UIVMM you'd also need to touch in when entering the pre-pay system.

asdf wrote:

And if I go out of zone, say to Amersham or Chesham, that's the first time
the ticket picks me up. And this brings up the other problem. The
travelcard
is in part appealing because of "no need to plan your journey in advance",
whilst Oyster PrePay has been advertised (dodgily) on the same basis. But
the extensions *do* require me to beep in and out at Stratford, even if I
haven't yet planned to do so - say I was going to Harrow but got a phone
message to go to Chesham in the Willsden area?

In that case, tough luck!! I really don't see why you think you're
being so deprived here. If you thought you might need to go out of
zone, you should have touched in when you entered the Tube system.

Well part of the point is that at Stratford it's possible that as the
travelcard is Zones 1-6 the thought of going into Buckinghamshire has not
entered my mind (and it has happened before, although on an occasion when
the central London part of the Met was working, so I'd gone through the
barriers at Liverpool Street).

The advertising for Oyster goes on and on about "the start of your journey".
Now I've been using a travelcard regularly for well over a decade and "the
start of your journey" has always meant to me the start of the journey
regardless of the system used. My journey to day was Forest Gate to
Whitechapel - two interchanges, both cross platform (and both requiring me
to dive across from one train to another). The advertising (and for that
matter the layout of platforms 3,4&5 and 6&8 at Stratford) do nothing to
create the concept of entering the "tube system" at Stratford in any
meaningful fare zone sense to the traveller. Similarly a lot of the
advertising about "no need to plan your journey in advance" is very much a
"no problem if your plans change mid journey"/"no need to take advance
precautions" thing.

I don't know if there have been any disputed claims that have sought
judgements on this, or if the ASA has ruled on any of the literature on this
point, but I'd hope the concept of Reasonableness still prevails in law to
consider it reasonable for an Oystercard holder to follow the information
they're being given without doing major research on the internet into the
nuances of what is presented as a straightforward option.

Is it really so much trouble, on these extremely rare occasions, to
have to leave then re-enter the gates at Harrow (where you'd probably
be changing trains anyway)? It's still more convenient than pre-Oyster
days as you don't need to buy a ticket extension.

Actually when I go to Harrow I still instinctively go for the fast Amersham
service - old habits die hard and the timetable on arrival at Baker Street
usually still supports them. But that's neither here nor there.

As for the "trouble" factor, whilst I personally know about the problems
with the out of zones extension, that's only because of this newsgroup. All
the advertising/literature I've seen and been given does not cover this
point properly - it just says that travel card users going out of zone get
charged PrePay extensions.

Also given the way my ticket works on a normal journey I don't pick this up.
Since I regularly enter the system at a point with no swipe pad, and exit it
at one, I'm used to the system detecting me as legitimately there, and
assume that at Chesham it detects me and deduces that I have travelled out
of zone, so adds on the extension fare. It's the return journey that causes
problems - again each day I start the home journey at a pad but can't swipe
out at the end of my journey.

(In fact, if you were really lucky, you might have received the phone
call on board an Amersham/Chesham-bound train that subsequently got
routed into platform 1 at Harrow, which has validators on the platform
that you could step out briefly and use.)

I haven't actually noticed these - I presume they're for Aylesbury Chiltern
traffic changing for local stations or Watford? But again this is not
something everyone knows about.

Incidentally, if I'd started my journey at Ilford were there are
barriers
with Oyster readers, would the system have a problem? Or would I need to
find a TfL reader for PrePay as well?

UIVMM you'd also need to touch in when entering the pre-pay system.

Which makes the whole thing even more of a mess - there's zilch at Ilford
saying that if you're on an Oyster season ticket you must touch on a TfL
swipe pad as well to activate PrePay. Again the anti-PrePay advertising at
National Rail stations is not helping the situation much either.