On 26 Nov, 12:21, "Stephen Osborn"
wrote:
"Tom Anderson" wrote in message

.li...





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.

And if one needs to get a train to get to a Tube station then nearest Tube
station will be inside Z1. *So to get the lower excess price involves more
travel

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.

There is the cost of my time in travelling to & from two Tube stations
outside Z1.

This is only one of a number of problems with Oyster that does not seem to
have a reason and which TfL does not seem to be doing anything about
resolving.
1. * *Journey history is only available to customers if they have purchased
pay as you go credit (including Auto top-up) from Oyster online. *Why? *The
data is in TfL's computers. *They have software to publish that via a web
intertface. *So why is only some data available.

2. * *Oyster retailers can sell seven day (and longer) Travelcards on Oyster
but not one day Travelcards.

3. * *The Tram terminus at Wimbledon is a mess. *AFAIUI, if you are using
Oyster PAYG then you have touch out on the Tram platform before exiting
through the barriers. *If you don't touch out on the Tram platform then you
are charged for a Tram journey to Wimbledon and a £5 minimum Tube fare for
using the barrier. *Even if it does not get sorted out immediately at the
barrier then overnight the system should be able to work out that you
started at a Tram stop and ended at Wimbledon and only make the appropriate
charge.

The warning posters about this say that the same is true if you have a
Travelcard on Oyster but I know for a fact that that is not the case. *So
either TfL don't know how their systems work or they are lying.

4. * *I read in another thread that if you start your journey, using Oyster
PAYG, in the peak period and make further journeys in the off-peak period
then those later journeys count towards the peak cap and not the off-peak
cap. *Hence it can be cheaper to buy a single ticket [1] for the peak
journey and use Oyster PAYG for the off-peak journeys

[1] In the case quotes the person actually uses two Oyster PAYG cards.


You have misintepreted this bit actually. It will ignore your peak
journey if all your off-peak journeys hit the off-peak cap, but it
won't count your peak journey towards the off-peak cap, so you'd pay
one single journey plus the off-peak cap.

The two cards thread was about the different fares charged at
different times of day, which aren't the same periods that apply to
peak and off-peak capping, and, I think, whether it made sense to
restart a single journey after 0930 rather than have it all charged at
the before 0930 rate, or something like that.





5. * *TfL staff don't seem to understand how Oyster works. *One example;
when I wanted to change my Z1-3 Travelcard to a Z1-4 Travelcard I was told
at one station that this is not possible and that I had to apply for a new
Oyster by filling out a form - but that I could not do that there as they
had run out of forms. *So I went to the next station and there they changed
my Travelcard on the same Oyster card with problem and no paperwork.

--
regards

Stephen

On 26 Nov, 12:21, "Stephen Osborn"
wrote:
1. * *Journey history is only available to customers if they have purchased
pay as you go credit (including Auto top-up) from Oyster online. *Why? *The
data is in TfL's computers. *They have software to publish that via a web
intertface. *So why is only some data available.

Because it's not TfL's computers. The system is outsourced and for
some obscure data protection reason they can only share the data
between suppliers if you're a customer of the supplier, which requires
purchasing credit through said supplier (I think).

2. * *Oyster retailers can sell seven day (and longer) Travelcards on Oyster
but not one day Travelcards.

This appears to be a deliberate omission. The point of Oyster is
discourage people visiting the ticket machines/office every day.

4. * *I read in another thread that if you start your journey, using Oyster
PAYG, in the peak period and make further journeys in the off-peak period
then those later journeys count towards the peak cap and not the off-peak
cap. *Hence it can be cheaper to buy a single ticket [1] for the peak
journey and use Oyster PAYG for the off-peak journeys

That's not quite the issue. The problem occurs only when the further
journeys are considered part of the original journey (ie you go
through an out-of-station interchange) because then the whole journey
gets charged as peak, which can be more expensive then the peak fare
for the first leg plus the off-peak fare for the second.

5. * *TfL staff don't seem to understand how Oyster works. *One example;
when I wanted to change my Z1-3 Travelcard to a Z1-4 Travelcard I was told
at one station that this is not possible and that I had to apply for a new
Oyster by filling out a form - but that I could not do that there as they
had run out of forms. *So I went to the next station and there they changed
my Travelcard on the same Oyster card with problem and no paperwork.

I'm sure people have run into exactly this getting paper Travelcards
changed/refunded. Doesn't seem to be anything Oyster specific about
it.

U

In article ,
(Stephen Osborn) wrote:

Public bodies don't have a good track record of keeping computer
data very secure.

Masterly understatement!

--
Colin Rosenstiel

In message , at 12:17:16
on Wed, 26 Nov 2008, David Cantrell remarked:
On Tue, Nov 25, 2008 at 08:41:19AM +0000, Roland Perry wrote:

The most confusing place for visitors to grapple with the UK's public
transport, ticketing especially, is probably Gatwick. Unless they ignore
the "local" trains and get Gatwick Express.

What's so confusing about it? The process is:

* go to ticket office

See a queue that might well take 20 minutes to get to the head of. The
ticket machines are more confusing, but have a shorter queue.

* ask for ticket

Get a response along the lines of "What do you mean by London. Do you
want the first train, the quickest train or the cheapest train" "There's
a train meeting your criteria leaving in 2 minutes, do you feel
athletic/lucky" etc.

* pay using cash or card
* take ticket
* get on train

which is exactly the same as the way you buy a train ticket at any
station in any other country I've visited.

The only slight wrinkle might be being asked whether you want to use the
Express or a normal train.

It's more complex than that as there are other ticketing options than
"Gatex only" and "any Permitted". And is the "Any permitted" even
allowed on Gatex - and why should a tourist be expected to understand?
--
Roland Perry

On Tue, Nov 25, 2008 at 02:12:00PM -0000, Andrew Heenan wrote:

You have done nothing but come up with ill informed, crackpot arguments that
Oyster should be (a) made to suit YOU or (b) be abandoned.

No, the argument has always been that it should be made to suit *all*
Londoners, not just those who regularly use the tube.

You are *still* an idiot.

Seeing that you've decided to take the debate down to the level of the
playground, I declare you to be the loser, because "it takes one to know
one".

--
David Cantrell | Reality Engineer, Ministry of Information

I apologize if I offended you personally,
I intended to do it professionally.
-- Steve Champeon, on the nanog list

On Wed, 26 Nov 2008 12:21:12 -0000, "Stephen Osborn"
wrote:

There is the cost of my time in travelling to & from two Tube stations
outside Z1.

Surely the answer for people like me who are 5-6 miles from 4
underground stations and who have internet access is to buy a card
from the Oyster website with PAYG already enabled. Then the other
arguments that we're having here don't apply.

1. Journey history is only available to customers if they have purchased
pay as you go credit (including Auto top-up) from Oyster online. Why? The
data is in TfL's computers. They have software to publish that via a web
intertface. So why is only some data available.

As said elsewhere, probably for data protection reasons, given the
nature of the project (which didn't *need* to be like that).

2. Oyster retailers can sell seven day (and longer) Travelcards on Oyster
but not one day Travelcards.

Not necessary once all trains are included, and I can see an argument
that we are simply in a transitional or rollout phase, though I think
after 4 years the argument is getting a bit thin.

3. The Tram terminus at Wimbledon is a mess. AFAIUI, if you are using
Oyster PAYG then you have touch out on the Tram platform before exiting
through the barriers. If you don't touch out on the Tram platform then you
are charged for a Tram journey to Wimbledon and a £5 minimum Tube fare for
using the barrier. Even if it does not get sorted out immediately at the
barrier then overnight the system should be able to work out that you
started at a Tram stop and ended at Wimbledon and only make the appropriate
charge.

It's not quite like that, but I only know now after the most expensive
tram journey I've ever done. You can *leave* a tram and go straight
to the barriers. It's just upon entering the station that, having
touched in at a barrier, you have to do it again at the validator in
the platform so that you do not have an unresolved journey at the
National Rail rate - £5? - still on your card.

My problem was that I touched in at East Croydon, got a successful
indication followed immediately by a cryptic error message (but
probably paid for the journey), tried again and got a different error
and to avoid any trouble bought a paper ticket, thinking that the
Oyster had failed. Upon arrival at Wimbledon, I got confused (as
above) and touched out at the platform validator, paying a third time.
I was changing onto NR so didn't touch out at the Wimbledon gateline,
perhaps that would have removed the third charge?

I agree - it's a mess, simply mitigated, if the situation must
persist, by VERY obvious signage at Wimbledon.

The warning posters about this say that the same is true if you have a
Travelcard on Oyster but I know for a fact that that is not the case. So
either TfL don't know how their systems work or they are lying.

I think they're deliberately simplifying the message. They do the
same wherever the "need" to touch in and out is explained.

Richard.

In article , (Roland
Perry) wrote:

In message , at
18:13:32 on Tue, 25 Nov 2008,
remarked:
So the employer is happy to pay for a ticket with a stopover, but
he's not happy to pay the tube fare to Putney??

I think the cheapest fares include the stopover.

While it's sometimes cheaper to buy a fare and hotel as a package
and get it cheaper, it's rare that a hotel+fare package is cheaper
than the cheapest fare.

(Sits back to wait for lots of anecdotes where it is...)

As the visits are for academic purposes does it not occur to you that the
hosts might provide accommodation?

--
Colin Rosenstiel

In article , (Roland
Perry) wrote:

In message , at
18:13:32 on Tue, 25 Nov 2008, remarked:

And I don't speak a word of Dutch.

You do, but don't realise it.


http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of...f_Dutch_origin

Ho, ho. You'll be telling me I understand Hungarian next because I know
what a coach is.

I'm sure you speak a few words of Hungarian. Goulash, for example.

Perhaps you are not aware that coach is a Hungarian word?

--
Colin Rosenstiel

In message , at 09:08:35
on Wed, 26 Nov 2008, remarked:
I'm sure you speak a few words of Hungarian. Goulash, for example.

Perhaps you are not aware that coach is a Hungarian word?

Who's been coaching you in Hungarian, then?
--
Roland Perry

In message , at 09:08:35
on Wed, 26 Nov 2008, remarked:
As the visits are for academic purposes does it not occur to you that the
hosts might provide accommodation?

At the airport?

(If not at the airport, then there's some fares to pay[1] - or do they
have a free shuttle bus).

[1] The earlier proposition you suggested was that stopovers didn't
involve employers paying any fares.
--
Roland Perry