On Tue, 25 Nov 2008, MIG wrote:

On Nov 25, 5:31*pm, Tom Anderson wrote:
On Tue, 25 Nov 2008, David Cantrell wrote:
On Mon, Nov 24, 2008 at 08:08:28PM +0000, Tom Anderson wrote:
On Sun, 23 Nov 2008, Stephen Osborn wrote:
But to get to a Tube station, as I live in SE London, I would have to
take an Overground train and so I would normally buy a one day
Travelcard at the train station. *To use my Oyster at the Tube station I
would either need to buy a train return ticket instead or use my Oyster
PAYG when I had a valid Travelcard. *Either of those would mean I was
paying extra for the privilege of switching on auto top-up.
Yes. Paying one pound extra. Once.

Two pounds and ninety pence actually.

No, one pound.

You set up auto top-up, and nominate the most convenient station outside
Z1 for pickup. You go to your local railway station or ticket seller and
buy a paper one-day travelcard. You travel to the nominated station using
it. You enter the system using your oyster card, activating auto top-up,
and travel to another station outside Z1. You leave the system, with your
auto top-up activated, and having paid a pound for the journey. You then
continue your day's travelling on the paper travelcard.

From the next day on, you use the oyster card.

The only extra cost over having auto top-up activated at a tube station is
the one pound cost of the tube trip.

That's the only explanation I can think of for how they could have
deployed a system with so many obvious design flaws.

Because *obviously* it wouldn't have been pushed through far too quickly
for mere political expediency!

We should have another utl meet, this time with a tinfoil hat making
workshop.

Can someone please just explain the logic of making a million people
solve a million individual problems, costing them a pound or whatever,
instead of TfL just solving one problem, by allowing top-up to be
activated at the ticket office?

This is, of course, a really good question, but it's one that i suspect
that nobody on this group can actually answer. Is there a technical reason
why it's hard to make ticket machines or ticket office equipment capable
of activating auto top-up? Something to do with the software in it, or the
kind of network connection it has? If so, that would be your answer. If
not, then i can't think of a good reason. But without knowing about the
technical details of the machinery involved, we can't answer it. I don't
know about that, and i assume from the fact that we're having this
discussion that none of the other participants do either!

There is someone on this group who's posted some more insider stuff about
oyster before - who was that? Does he have any ideas?

If not, we could write to TfL.

tom

--
The literature is filled with bizarre occurrances for which we have
no explanation

"David of Broadway" wrote ...
Or at ticket windows, since USA-based credit cards don't work at most UK
vending machines.)

Mastercard and Visa are almost universally accepted, Amex in expensive
places (they have higher merchant fees); Discover and others may be more
difficult.
--

Andrew

"She plays the tuba.
It is the only instrument capable
of imitating a distress call."

On Tue, 25 Nov 2008 05:09:27 -0800 (PST), John B
wrote:

...except for LCY and Canary Wharf, which have travel centres that
'sell' Oyster cards, as well as having top-up machines:
http://www.tfl.gov.uk/tickets/oysteronline/4700.aspx

Can't remember about LCY, but Canary Wharf's is a little kiosk that
has rather poor opening hours.

Neil

--
Neil Williams
Put my first name before the at to reply.

On Tue, 25 Nov 2008 11:52:35 +0000, Roland Perry
wrote:

But they are getting better. For example, a few of the ticket machines
in Amsterdam now take UK plastic. At one time I think it was only a
subset of debit cards though.

2 years ago Schiphol did, but no other station on the Dutch network
without a ticket office would accept anything other than Euro coins
and Maestro debit cards.

I can't understand why, if they can do it in one location, they can't
do it throughout. They are after all the same machines.

Neil

--
Neil Williams
Put my first name before the at to reply.

On Tue, 25 Nov 2008 11:45:55 -0000, "solar penguin"
wrote:

Abolishing Oyster and the flat fare would give more useful info since a
record of the amount paid for each ticket would reflect the distance
travelled. (And, as a bonus, it would also end the injustice that
people only travelling a couple of stops pay the same as someone going
all the way from one end of the line to the other.)

It isn't an injustice, it's a model. The costs of operating a bus
route, once you've bought your buses and got started, bear very little
resemblence to who travels how far.

And charging different fares, unless purchased off the bus or unless
they had touching in *and* out[1] *seriously* slows down boarding.

[1] Singapore does.

Neil

--
Neil Williams
Put my first name before the at to reply.

On Tue, 25 Nov 2008 17:26:42 +0000, Tom Anderson
wrote:

It's designed primarily for TfL network users. The way the system works
means that activation needs access to fixed hardware, so not buses. Fixed
hardware is attached to railway stations. If TfL doesn't run the railway
stations in your part of town, that's hardly their fault.

The issue could be resolved to some extent by allowing things like
auto-top-up to be triggered at ticket machines without the need to
travel - or even at Ticket Stops.

Neil

--
Neil Williams
Put my first name before the at to reply.

On Tue, 25 Nov 2008 10:39:03 +0000, Roland Perry
wrote:

Interesting that there doesn't seem to be a sales outlet at Heathrow

Er, the ticket offices at the Tube stations?

Neil

--
Neil Williams
Put my first name before the at to reply.

On Tue, 25 Nov 2008 10:54:03 -0800 (PST), Matthew Dickinson
wrote:

Mastercard Paypass & Visa Wave cards seem to be TfL's eventual
solution for overseas tourists.

If that option was on offer, why would anyone want an Oyster card?
I'd far rather be billed monthly in arrears than have to maintain a
credit balance with TfL.

I suspect it might be a bit difficult to implement this at the
barriers, though, and it would have the added downside of one having
to remove one's Oyster or credit card from their wallet due to the
risk of the wrong card triggering the barrier.

Neil

--
Neil Williams
Put my first name before the at to reply.

Matthew Dickinson wrote:

Mastercard Paypass & Visa Wave cards seem to be TfL's eventual
solution for overseas tourists.

Interesting idea. Alas, although my primary credit card has Paypass, I
don't use that card overseas, as it, like most (American?) credit cards,
tacks on a 3% international transaction fee. Instead, I use my Capital
One card - the only major (AFAIK) American credit card provider not to
charge an international transaction fee - but I don't believe that
Capital One offers Paypass yet.
--
David of Broadway

On 25 Nov, 19:08, Tom Anderson wrote:
On Tue, 25 Nov 2008, MIG wrote:
On Nov 25, 5:31*pm, Tom Anderson wrote:
On Tue, 25 Nov 2008, David Cantrell wrote:
On Mon, Nov 24, 2008 at 08:08:28PM +0000, Tom Anderson wrote:
On Sun, 23 Nov 2008, Stephen Osborn wrote:
But to get to a Tube station, as I live in SE London, I would have to
take an Overground train and so I would normally buy a one day
Travelcard at the train station. *To use my Oyster at the Tube station I
would either need to buy a train return ticket instead or use my Oyster
PAYG when I had a valid Travelcard. *Either of those would mean I was
paying extra for the privilege of switching on auto top-up.
Yes. Paying one pound extra. Once.

Two pounds and ninety pence actually.

No, one pound.

You set up auto top-up, and nominate the most convenient station outside
Z1 for pickup. You go to your local railway station or ticket seller and
buy a paper one-day travelcard. You travel to the nominated station using
it. You enter the system using your oyster card, activating auto top-up,
and travel to another station outside Z1. You leave the system, with your
auto top-up activated, and having paid a pound for the journey. You then
continue your day's travelling on the paper travelcard.

From the next day on, you use the oyster card.

The only extra cost over having auto top-up activated at a tube station is
the one pound cost of the tube trip.

That's the only explanation I can think of for how they could have
deployed a system with so many obvious design flaws.

Because *obviously* it wouldn't have been pushed through far too quickly
for mere political expediency!

We should have another utl meet, this time with a tinfoil hat making
workshop.

Can someone please just explain the logic of making a million people
solve a million individual problems, costing them a pound or whatever,
instead of TfL just solving one problem, by allowing top-up to be
activated at the ticket office?

This is, of course, a really good question, but it's one that i suspect
that nobody on this group can actually answer. Is there a technical reason
why it's hard to make ticket machines or ticket office equipment capable
of activating auto top-up? Something to do with the software in it, or the
kind of network connection it has?

I think it's about implementing the system once. You can only sign up
in one place (online) and you can only activate it in one place (tube
station gatelines). Once you start adding other combinations the
software and support issues become exponentially more complex. , It
was probably also built by reusing the same software mecahnisms that
already handled topping up online.

There is someone on this group who's posted some more insider stuff about
oyster before - who was that? Does he have any ideas?

Oyster sucks and everyone who built it was a complete clueless
douchenozzle.

(chant that three times and he will appear)

U