Oyster card problems on the trains
The Mayor of London and TfL(Transport for London) are at loggerheads with the surface train operating companies because of their refusal to accept pre-pay Oyster cards as payment on their systems.
The Oyster card was introduced three years ago and the Mayor has been hailing its success, saying 10million cards have been issued and that 75% of bus and Tube journeys are now paid by Oyster as opposed to only 5% by cash. Not surprising if you make paying by cash three times more expensive for the same journey.
TfL wants to include the surface rail network in London in the 1-6 Zone system that happens with the Tube and Bus networks and charge people accordingly, the train operators say the money being offered to them to install the Oyster card readers at all their London stations is not enough. Naturally the Mayor disagrees and has given them a 31 January deadline to except.
If you have an Oyster card, not being able to use it on the surface rail doesn’t really make sense. To many suburban areas of London switching to the overground trains is much quicker than doing the same journey by Tube or Bus, I use the trains to Mooorgate and Kings Cross all the time and they’re the easiest way into town from my part of north London. The train operators will install the machines sooner or later especially if their franchise is up for renewal.
By Chris | Permalink
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Comments
The Oyster card is a bit confusing, you can have a 7 day Travelcard added to it but not single days apparently. It seems like its designed for single journey, daily commuters and infortunately not visitors hopping on and off public transport.
I don’t have one, I get a travelcard whenever I head into London. Sorry to hear you lost money.
My experience of using an Oyster Card has been similar to the other comments. It is a system that is not geared up to deal with visitors. Daily travel tickets that would have cost £15 for the 3 days I spent in London cost me £23 with Oyster and I have not received a reply to the letters I sent and also could not get through via phone.
If you overpay on Oyster, it would be a good idea to report it to London Transport. In Dec. 06 when I was last in London, there was a big promotion underway to get people to switch over to the Oyster system. I thought that one of the selling points was that the card would make calculations as you went on, to ensure you did not overpay.
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we came to london on a short break with family, we were advised that the way to travel around london was to get an oyster card as this is the cheapest way to travel, on previous visits we have bought the one day travel passes which aloud you to use the undregroung and buses at will, we were shocked that in the two days that we travelled into london that it has cost nearly double than the one day pass which we used to use. we have spent £36 this was for 4 tube journey’s and 7/8 bus journey’s i will not be making the same mistake and use the oyster card the next time we come to london as this has been an expensive way to see london. mr k bithell