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The message says, in part, "No need to buy a ticket, just tap in on a card reader at the start of your journey and touch out at the end." The article goes on, "

The message says, in part, "No need to buy a ticket, just tap in on a card reader at the start of your journey and touch out at the end." The article goes on, "The Passenger Operated Machine (POM), to use the TfL name for the ticket machines, doesn’t show the pop-up for every journey that they can sell tickets for because not every destination accepts contactless PAYG tickets." Does this mean that there are at least three ways to pay: contactless credit/debit card, contactless PAYG ticket, and paper/magnetic stripe ticket? If so, what happens if you use a contactless PAYG ticket to enter a station but find, at your destination, that this ticket is not accepted?

estel 2y ago
These are typically stations that are outside of London. If you reach the destination station, you'd probably need to appeal to the kindness of staff members who attend the ticket barrier (if there is one), who might ask someone to buy a ticket or pay a penalty fare. But it's functionally equivalent to traveling without a ticket at all. You'd also have to pay a default charge for an incomplete journey on the PAYG ticket, but you could potentially appeal to have this reversed. It's usually made pretty clear on train announcements that you're leaving the contactless PAYG fare zone.
- josephcsible 2y ago
  > It's usually made pretty clear on train announcements that you're leaving the contactless PAYG fare zone. How is an announcement then supposed to help, since you'll have already bought your ticket before you hear it?
  - NullPrefix 2y ago
    >How is an announcement then supposed to help You would have some time to accept whatever is coming and make peace with it
  - alexchamberlain 2y ago
    You can then get off the train, buy a ticket and get the next one in 10 minutes or so.
  - avianlyric 2y ago
    You can get off the train before you exit the oyster fare zone. Tap out, then buy a ticket for your onward travel.
  - iNerdier 2y ago
    Because they tell you before you get to the last station in the zone. You can get off, tap out & buy a ticket to wherever you’re going from that station.
  - tialaramex 2y ago
    Take my routine train home when worked in central London. It's an 1805 from Waterloo towards Weymouth and Poole, in the country's South West. Most people boarding the train at Waterloo are going to be on it for an hour or two, getting home - London's internal fares are obviously irrelevant. But, technically the train is stopping one more time inside London, and thus TfL's Oyster fares are valid for that one stop, at Clapham Junction although as timetabled this train isn't for Clapham Junction, you could leave there and your Oyster would work. This stop is for picking up passengers. Indeed sometimes I might catch my train there if circumstances made it impossible to be sure I'd reach Waterloo early enough. So there's an announcement. Your Oyster (or contactless) is not valid for travel beyond London, and this train isn't even really for internal travel, but you can leave at Clapham Junction.
eynsham 2y ago
This is in theory a problem with most ticketing systems: people can buy the wrong ticket and then get stuck on the way out. The message on the machines is a bit misleading because it suggests that wherever one travels behind the ticket barrier will take contactless, which is not true (e.g. enter at Bond St with contactless or a single, go to Reading via Crossrail, go to Manchester via Cross Country). Depending on how naïve one seems and how far one goes beyond the contactless area, staff may be more or less sympathetic, as the sibling comment suggests. We ought to roll out contactless nationally, and hopefully this will happen under British Rail.
- tialaramex 2y ago
  Because long distance travel can be very expensive it's trickier to make this work, financially. Suppose I "buy" a TfL Oyster card, use almost its entire balance, then Enter the system at peak time and just walk out (without validating) at some semi-rural station like Amersham. Oyster automatically reduces the card balance by the maximum fare, making the balance negative. Since I walked out without validating it couldn't - even if it were legal (which it isn't) - refuse to let me out, but it can refuse to let me back in. Oyster will invalidate this card (until I pay off the balance), its balance is now hugely negative, but obviously I'm not going to pay off that balance, so I effectively got (most of) a free journey. At London scale this feels pretty OK. In London a typical Oyster journey is cheaper than a pint of beer, if somebody "owes" you a pint of beer and then you never see them again you probably aren't bent out of shape about that. But Nationally it's a much greater cost. What if I travel from St Ives to Wick? That's going to be pretty expensive, but somehow we need to accept that I entered at St Ives (maybe for a local journey?) and yet might get out at Wick (the far end of the country) and if I don't have the money for this long journey all of that risk burden lands on... the fare operator? The government? The credit card company? Nobody wants that burden.
  - margalabargala 2y ago
    This is one of those things where it doesn't actually matter in the long run, as long as most people do not abuse the system. It relies on social cohesion to a point. So long as the train isn't entirely full and you're taking up a seat that could be used by someone else, the marginal cost (in fuel, maintenance, etc) to the train operator of having an additional person on the train is very close to zero. The train is going from St Ives to Wick anyway; if you do what you describe, the train operator is in essentially the same situation as if you had simply decided not to take the trip. So as long as the fares that are actually paid are sufficient to operate the train and pay wages to the employees, the train operator can absorb the handful of people who do what you describe. As long as most people don't cheat the system in that way, it's easier to simply ignore.
PaulRobinson 2y ago
There are lots of reminders, regular travellers know about it, and in my experience there is normally a mildly exasperated member of staff who will help you deal with the situation by letting you buy a ticket.
joshuaissac 2y ago
> contactless PAYG ticket This would be a smart card that can hold a credit balance and also season tickets, so it is not necessarily PAYG. However, there are two types of such smart cards, Oyster cards issued by TfL, and ITSO cards issued by other train operating companies. Both can store season tickets for journeys within London. But only Oyster cards can be used for PAYG within London and only ITSO cards can be used for PAYG outside London and store season tickets involving journeys outside London. Aside from that, QR codes are yet another form of ticket for National Rail trains, and they work in some stations in London and not others.
- ThePowerOfFuet 2y ago
  > But only Oyster cards can be used for PAYG within London and only ITSO cards can be used for PAYG outside London and store season tickets involving journeys outside London. Jesus wept.
- seabass-labrax 2y ago
  > Aside from that, QR codes are yet another form of ticket for National Rail trains, and they work in some stations in London and not others. Which National Rail stations in London don't accept the barcoded tickets? I'm especially curious to know what happens if you attempt to purchase a barcoded ticket ('E-Ticket' in National Rail parlance) to one of these destinations.
  - joshuaissac 2y ago
    West Ham railway station, for example. The ticket machines at this station are also the same type as in non-National Rail stations, and they do not let you print pre-booked National Rail train tickets. In my experience, if you try to book a National Rail ticket to West Ham, it will not offer you the option of a barcoded ticket.
roryirvine 2y ago
I believe the reverse is actually more common - mistakenly touching in with with oyster/contactless for a journey out of zone for which a specific ticket has been purchased. I've done this myself a couple of times - touching in at my local station whilst half-asleep on a journey to Luton Airport Parkway when on my way to catch an early flight. What happens then is that TFL record an touch-in without a corresponding touch-out, and so might charge you the maximum fare for an unresolved journey. They're actually pretty good at fixing that automagically - so if, for example, you've not touched out at a station that had its barriers open due to crowding and make a return journey through the same station later in the day, they'll assume that you exited there and charge you the right fare. But if it's not fixed within 48h, you can claim a refund at https://tfl.gov.uk/fares/refunds-and-replacements https://tfl.gov.uk/fares/refunds-and-replacements
- anticensor 2y ago
  > you've not touched out at a station that had its barriers open due to crowding If a station is overcrowded, the barriers are ought to delay the passengers to prevent overcapacity, not waive the fares.

estel 2y ago

These are typically stations that are outside of London. If you reach the destination station, you'd probably need to appeal to the kindness of staff members who attend the ticket barrier (if there is one), who might ask someone to buy a ticket or pay a penalty fare. But it's functionally equivalent to traveling without a ticket at all. You'd also have to pay a default charge for an incomplete journey on the PAYG ticket, but you could potentially appeal to have this reversed. It's usually made pretty clear on train announcements that you're leaving the contactless PAYG fare zone.

josephcsible 2y ago
> It's usually made pretty clear on train announcements that you're leaving the contactless PAYG fare zone. How is an announcement then supposed to help, since you'll have already bought your ticket before you hear it?
- NullPrefix 2y ago
  >How is an announcement then supposed to help You would have some time to accept whatever is coming and make peace with it
- alexchamberlain 2y ago
  You can then get off the train, buy a ticket and get the next one in 10 minutes or so.
- avianlyric 2y ago
  You can get off the train before you exit the oyster fare zone. Tap out, then buy a ticket for your onward travel.
- iNerdier 2y ago
  Because they tell you before you get to the last station in the zone. You can get off, tap out & buy a ticket to wherever you’re going from that station.
- tialaramex 2y ago
  Take my routine train home when worked in central London. It's an 1805 from Waterloo towards Weymouth and Poole, in the country's South West. Most people boarding the train at Waterloo are going to be on it for an hour or two, getting home - London's internal fares are obviously irrelevant. But, technically the train is stopping one more time inside London, and thus TfL's Oyster fares are valid for that one stop, at Clapham Junction although as timetabled this train isn't for Clapham Junction, you could leave there and your Oyster would work. This stop is for picking up passengers. Indeed sometimes I might catch my train there if circumstances made it impossible to be sure I'd reach Waterloo early enough. So there's an announcement. Your Oyster (or contactless) is not valid for travel beyond London, and this train isn't even really for internal travel, but you can leave at Clapham Junction.

eynsham 2y ago

This is in theory a problem with most ticketing systems: people can buy the wrong ticket and then get stuck on the way out. The message on the machines is a bit misleading because it suggests that wherever one travels behind the ticket barrier will take contactless, which is not true (e.g. enter at Bond St with contactless or a single, go to Reading via Crossrail, go to Manchester via Cross Country). Depending on how naïve one seems and how far one goes beyond the contactless area, staff may be more or less sympathetic, as the sibling comment suggests. We ought to roll out contactless nationally, and hopefully this will happen under British Rail.

tialaramex 2y ago
Because long distance travel can be very expensive it's trickier to make this work, financially. Suppose I "buy" a TfL Oyster card, use almost its entire balance, then Enter the system at peak time and just walk out (without validating) at some semi-rural station like Amersham. Oyster automatically reduces the card balance by the maximum fare, making the balance negative. Since I walked out without validating it couldn't - even if it were legal (which it isn't) - refuse to let me out, but it can refuse to let me back in. Oyster will invalidate this card (until I pay off the balance), its balance is now hugely negative, but obviously I'm not going to pay off that balance, so I effectively got (most of) a free journey. At London scale this feels pretty OK. In London a typical Oyster journey is cheaper than a pint of beer, if somebody "owes" you a pint of beer and then you never see them again you probably aren't bent out of shape about that. But Nationally it's a much greater cost. What if I travel from St Ives to Wick? That's going to be pretty expensive, but somehow we need to accept that I entered at St Ives (maybe for a local journey?) and yet might get out at Wick (the far end of the country) and if I don't have the money for this long journey all of that risk burden lands on... the fare operator? The government? The credit card company? Nobody wants that burden.
- margalabargala 2y ago
  This is one of those things where it doesn't actually matter in the long run, as long as most people do not abuse the system. It relies on social cohesion to a point. So long as the train isn't entirely full and you're taking up a seat that could be used by someone else, the marginal cost (in fuel, maintenance, etc) to the train operator of having an additional person on the train is very close to zero. The train is going from St Ives to Wick anyway; if you do what you describe, the train operator is in essentially the same situation as if you had simply decided not to take the trip. So as long as the fares that are actually paid are sufficient to operate the train and pay wages to the employees, the train operator can absorb the handful of people who do what you describe. As long as most people don't cheat the system in that way, it's easier to simply ignore.

PaulRobinson 2y ago

There are lots of reminders, regular travellers know about it, and in my experience there is normally a mildly exasperated member of staff who will help you deal with the situation by letting you buy a ticket.

joshuaissac 2y ago

> contactless PAYG ticket This would be a smart card that can hold a credit balance and also season tickets, so it is not necessarily PAYG. However, there are two types of such smart cards, Oyster cards issued by TfL, and ITSO cards issued by other train operating companies. Both can store season tickets for journeys within London. But only Oyster cards can be used for PAYG within London and only ITSO cards can be used for PAYG outside London and store season tickets involving journeys outside London. Aside from that, QR codes are yet another form of ticket for National Rail trains, and they work in some stations in London and not others.

ThePowerOfFuet 2y ago
> But only Oyster cards can be used for PAYG within London and only ITSO cards can be used for PAYG outside London and store season tickets involving journeys outside London. Jesus wept.
seabass-labrax 2y ago
> Aside from that, QR codes are yet another form of ticket for National Rail trains, and they work in some stations in London and not others. Which National Rail stations in London don't accept the barcoded tickets? I'm especially curious to know what happens if you attempt to purchase a barcoded ticket ('E-Ticket' in National Rail parlance) to one of these destinations.
- joshuaissac 2y ago
  West Ham railway station, for example. The ticket machines at this station are also the same type as in non-National Rail stations, and they do not let you print pre-booked National Rail train tickets. In my experience, if you try to book a National Rail ticket to West Ham, it will not offer you the option of a barcoded ticket.

roryirvine 2y ago

I believe the reverse is actually more common - mistakenly touching in with with oyster/contactless for a journey out of zone for which a specific ticket has been purchased. I've done this myself a couple of times - touching in at my local station whilst half-asleep on a journey to Luton Airport Parkway when on my way to catch an early flight. What happens then is that TFL record an touch-in without a corresponding touch-out, and so might charge you the maximum fare for an unresolved journey. They're actually pretty good at fixing that automagically - so if, for example, you've not touched out at a station that had its barriers open due to crowding and make a return journey through the same station later in the day, they'll assume that you exited there and charge you the right fare. But if it's not fixed within 48h, you can claim a refund at https://tfl.gov.uk/fares/refunds-and-replacements https://tfl.gov.uk/fares/refunds-and-replacements

anticensor 2y ago
> you've not touched out at a station that had its barriers open due to crowding If a station is overcrowded, the barriers are ought to delay the passengers to prevent overcapacity, not waive the fares.