"Paul Oter" wrote in message

On 13 May, 20:51, wrote:
On May 10, 9:53 pm, David of Broadway
wrote:

On Fri, 09 May 2008 04:38:14 +0000, Neil Williams wrote:
On Thu, 8 May 2008 17:09:20 -0700 (PDT),
wrote:

To top up a card that I've already purchased, do I take the card
to a Tube station machine (I won't have a laptop and maybe not
even a cell phone), enter whatever ID or authentication is
necessary and then use a credit card to add additional funds?

Pretty much, yes, though no authentication is necessary, just the
card. You can also use cash.

Note that credit cards not equipped with chip-and-PIN (which is
standard in the UK, but many visitors don't have UK-based credit
cards) will not work at the machines, unless this has been
corrected since my last visit in August 2006.

Wow -- that's good to know. Thanks a bunch for your help. Does this
mean that credit cards will be useless all over London or just for
topping up our Oyster cards?

No. This sounds like a problem with this specific type of machine. In
general foreign credit cards are accepted wherever UK credit cards are
accepted. However you'll usually be asked to sign a slip of paper
rather than enter a PIN.

Note that many places in the UK don't accept American Express. Visa
and MasterCard are fine.

True, and I don't think the machines take Amex, but, surprisingly,
on-line Oystercard top-up does allow you to use Amex.