Peter Frimberley wrote:
On 29 Aug 2006 11:02:55 -0700, "Paul Weaver"
wrote:

Ran out of credit on my prepay oyster this morning, so I was faced with
a 10 minute queue to one of 2 machines that can do topups at Oxford
Circus. Almost everyone else in the queue was topping up.

There were 8 unused cash ticket machines. What a waste of space, why
haven't the majority (or all) of these been converted to card/oyster
machines? Is it a deliberate decision to raise more money from those in
a rush?

They did announce a new type of ticket machine a few weeks ago that
will fit into many of these spaces. You expect them to do it
overnight?

Oyster was launched in 2003, and the ridiculous cash prices were
launched 8 months ago. It's either malaice or incompetence. They should
have known that once prices were half-price on oyster, hardly anyone
would buy cash tickets, and have had drop in machines designed and
ready to slowly take over.

Why don't you just register for auto-topup and avoid the problem
altogether?

Because that involves registering my oyster and tying it with a credit
card, rather than anonymous cash top-ups.