TfL acknowledges contactless technology risk
 

In message , at 16:37:48 on Sat, 28 Jun
2014, d remarked:
Perhaps this is why they have trials. The geeks in the office don't
even bother to come up with a set of scenarios that don't work and
postulate solutions, before implementation of a trial. They just wait
to see what breaks and fix it later (no doubt to the immense
inconvenience of the first customer who tries it)

It's a bit more pre-planned than that, although I agree there have been
some major hiccups that should have been anticipated. For example my EMT
card would only allow me to buy Child tickets, because the card knows
your age and the simplest explanations is that they'd coded the DOB
field on the card with its issue date.

A lot of effort and HUGE amounts of money just to replace a small bit of
paper card that did the job fine. What a joke.

Lots of bits of card, actually. Hint: not everyone has a season ticket.
--
Roland Perry

TfL acknowledges contactless technology risk
 

In message , at 13:08:57
on Sat, 28 Jun 2014, remarked:
You and Roland are missing the point I was making which applied solely
to C2C.

I'm sure they also have peak/offpeak rules which staff can
misunderstand.

A lot simpler than those of GA & FCC, i bet.

They seem to have just one off-peak ticket on weekdays, valid for
arrival in London after 10am and any train back.

So this ITSO trial on C2C isn't really going to test how well they
can cope with a mixture of evening restrictions.

Indeed, as the barriers at Cambridge can't do already. Every time I come
back on an Off-Peak Day Return in the evening peak from Liverpool St (as
permitted) the barrier doesn't let me out.

The barriers at Kings Cross won't open for an off-peak return to Ely,
which is also valid in the evening peak. Although the last two times I
had one of those tickets the barriers there were locked open.
--
Roland Perry

TfL acknowledges contactless technology risk
 

In article , (Roland Perry)
wrote:

In message , at
13:08:57 on Sat, 28 Jun 2014, remarked:

Indeed, as the barriers at Cambridge can't do already. Every time I come
back on an Off-Peak Day Return in the evening peak from Liverpool St (as
permitted) the barrier doesn't let me out.

The barriers at Kings Cross won't open for an off-peak return to Ely,
which is also valid in the evening peak. Although the last two times
I had one of those tickets the barriers there were locked open.

As is often the case at Cambridge, thanks to the ORR insisting.

--
Colin Rosenstiel

TfL acknowledges contactless technology risk
 

On 24/06/2014 20:18, CJB wrote:
If you touch your Oyster card on a yellow card reader when it's in the same
wallet or purse as another contactless card, the reader may detect more than
one card. When this happens, the card reader doesn't know which one to read
so rejects them and you could experience any of the following:

That's a strange way to describe it.

If there is more than one contactless cards present it's likely that
they will respond to the readers energy field at the same time and the
reader will just see a corrupt response.

--

Brian Gregory (in the UK).
To email me please remove all the letter vee from my email address.

TfL acknowledges contactless technology risk
 

"Neil Williams" wrote in message
.net...
On Sat, 28 Jun 2014 09:44:14 +0100, Roland Perry
wrote:
They could be, but the idea is that one day ITSO will be used
across the
country on routes that do have period returns.

It's out of date before they even start.

In what way?

tim

TfL acknowledges contactless technology risk
 

"Brian Gregory" wrote in message
...
On 24/06/2014 20:18, CJB wrote:
If you touch your Oyster card on a yellow card reader when it's in the
same
wallet or purse as another contactless card, the reader may detect more
than
one card. When this happens, the card reader doesn't know which one to
read
so rejects them and you could experience any of the following:

That's a strange way to describe it.

If there is more than one contactless cards present it's likely that they
will respond to the readers energy field at the same time and the reader
will just see a corrupt response.

anecdotal evidence suggests that the PP was entirely correct

tim

TfL acknowledges contactless technology risk
 

On Sat, 28 Jun 2014 10:55:54 +0100, Roland Perry wrote:
More difficult is if you have trips to different destinations loaded as
vouchers. Say you live in Grays and have vouchers for both Southend and
London, because you anticipate visiting both soon (and not necessarily
knowing in which order). Which voucher should it swap for a ticket?

Order is apparently important. From
http://www.c2c-online.co.uk/customer...c2c-smart-faqs "PLEASE
NOTE: Tickets can only be used in the order in which they were purchased".

TfL acknowledges contactless technology risk
 

"David Walters" wrote in message
...
On Sat, 28 Jun 2014 10:55:54 +0100, Roland Perry
wrote:
More difficult is if you have trips to different destinations loaded as
vouchers. Say you live in Grays and have vouchers for both Southend and
London, because you anticipate visiting both soon (and not necessarily
knowing in which order). Which voucher should it swap for a ticket?

Order is apparently important. From
http://www.c2c-online.co.uk/customer...c2c-smart-faqs "PLEASE
NOTE: Tickets can only be used in the order in which they were purchased".

That still doesn't help with deciding if a pax who travelled from home (A)
to work (X) on a return ticket and has just purchased a ticket from X to B,
is starting his journey to B or his return to A.

We could, of course, come up with some rules to resolve every such
conflicts, but that, I would suggest, would make user reluctance to use such
tickets reach the stratosphere

tim

TfL acknowledges contactless technology risk
 

"Michael R N Dolbear" wrote

"tim....." wrote

Except for ITSO concession cards. Stagecoach have implemented limited
smartcard facilities and handle bus passes automatically, as do Whippet
round here.

I though all local buses were supposed to handle oldies bus passes
electronically - it's TfL who are behind the curve on this one.

Certainly all in Kent and Hants do

"all" ?

No requirement for electronic acceptance at all.

I note that North Surrey have 10 operators(most very small) + TFL. The
only
one that accepts National bus pass touches is Arriva


And to update, as of today, my Abellio bus (route 458) wanted my ITSO
National concession card touched on its yellow pad and issued me a paper
ticket when the light went green.


--
Mike D

TfL acknowledges contactless technology risk
 

On 27/06/2014 17:03, Matthew Dickinson wrote:

On Friday, 27 June 2014 16:22:16 UTC+1, Roland Perry wrote:

07:52:57 on Fri, 27 Jun 2014, Matthew Dickinson
remarked:

ITSO on c2c is available now , so the 2017 rollout must refer to either
payment at ticket offices, or a similar scheme to TfL.

Can you get a TfL Travelcard on C2C ITSO (or more to the point, will TfL
recognise it?)

Similarly, have C2C already implemented ITSO-purse purchasing of walk-up
tickets at machines?

It was launched on the 16th June between West Horndon, Tilbury Town and
Shoeburyness. Online and TVMs are both advertised as ways to load tickets.

13th October is the date for Travelcards to be available.

http://www.c2c-online.co.uk/tickets-...art-card/index

Does it still count as vapourware, Roland?

TfL acknowledges contactless technology risk
 

On Sun, 29 Jun 2014 09:26:48 +0200, "tim....."
wrote:
In what way?

The ability to have permanently online barriers, ticket machines etc
within a few years will mean there will be no need for smart cards to
store data locally. NFC, barcodes etc with an online back end are
far more practical (and media agnostic), while contactless
credit/debit cards will win out for local travel.

Neil

--
Neil Williams. Use neil before the at to reply.

TfL acknowledges contactless technology risk
 

On Sun, 29 Jun 2014 09:14:35 +0100, David Walters
wrote:
http://www.c2c-online.co.uk/customer...c2c-smart-faqs
"PLEASE
NOTE: Tickets can only be used in the order in which they were
purchased".

That's useless, then.

It is an expensive chocolate teapot.

Neil

--
Neil Williams. Use neil before the at to reply.

TfL acknowledges contactless technology risk
 

In message , at 20:13:14 on Sun, 29 Jun
2014, Mizter T remarked:
13th October is the date for Travelcards to be available.

http://www.c2c-online.co.uk/tickets-...art-card/index

Does it still count as vapourware, Roland?

Currently yes, because what it actually says is:

"we're also working with TfL to introduce London Travelcards as part
of Phase 2"

....so while they can promise that they'll sell tickets to Fenchurch St
on their own network by then, they aren't sure about the Travelcard
part.

Not all vapourware fails to eventually appear - the vital element is
"advertised but is not yet available to buy, either because it is only a
concept or because it is still being written or designed", which I think
summarises this Travelcard aspect perfectly.

This is what I posted back in May:

" EMT FAQ:
From late 2012/early 2013, East Midlands Trains Smartcards can
be used on the London Underground. Until then, underground
tickets need to be purchased separately.

This is what Cubic (the supplier) said about ITSO-on-Prestige in
November 2013 (so it sounded quite imminent...)

The next stage of the project will see Cubic deploy the
technology to provide ITSO capability on the remaining Oyster
overground gate estate, with the final stage enabling London
Underground and buses to accept ITSO cards in early 2014.

Although TfL were claiming the gates had been done by the end of 2013,
and were just waiting for TOCs to be capable of issuing ITSO tickets
(which of course at least Southern and EMT had been doing for two
years, but whatever...)"

If TfL have gates already installed and are just waiting for a TOC to be
able to issue Travelcards on ITSO, what exactly are C2C "working on"
with them until [at least] October?
--
Roland Perry

TfL acknowledges contactless technology risk
 

In message , at
20:24:20 on Sun, 29 Jun 2014, Neil Williams
remarked:
http://www.c2c-online.co.uk/customer...c2c-smart-faqs "PLEASE
NOTE: Tickets can only be used in the order in which they were
purchased".

That's useless, then.

It is an expensive chocolate teapot.

Although C2C is a toy network (it could hardly be simpler or easier to
run) the principles they are testing could well be applied to the rest
of the country.

However, when I buy tickets ahead of time, it's always for a specific
day. How would this "buying order" rule work if I bought a ticket for
the end of August today, and a ticket for early August tomorrow?

In other news, I see they say you can only buy one ticket per day
[online]. So bad luck if you want to buy one for late August, and
another for early August, the same day.

--
Roland Perry

TfL acknowledges contactless technology risk
 

In message , at
20:23:40 on Sun, 29 Jun 2014, Neil Williams
remarked:
The ability to have permanently online barriers, ticket machines etc
within a few years will mean there will be no need for smart cards to
store data locally. NFC, barcodes etc with an online back end are far
more practical (and media agnostic), while contactless credit/debit
cards will win out for local travel.

Are you also anticipating permanently online RPIs? And all of this
(barriers and RPIs) over the entire country.
--
Roland Perry

TfL acknowledges contactless technology risk
 

"Neil Williams" wrote in message
.net...
On Sun, 29 Jun 2014 09:26:48 +0200, "tim....."
wrote:
In what way?

The ability to have permanently online barriers, ticket machines etc

Define permanently on?

Networks do go done once in a while. What are all those commuters with
"online" season tickets going to do when it does?

within a few years will mean there will be no need for smart cards to
store data locally. NFC, barcodes etc with an online back end are far
more practical

I can't agree

storing someone's season ticket on a network server is a dumb thing to do.

Smart cards seem eminently more sensible, especially if we enhance the
offering to "part time" seasons and carnets.

(and media agnostic), while contactless credit/debit cards will win out for
local travel.

And what about the percentage of the population that doesn't have a
credit/debit card (such as children, TfL solve this problem by letting kids
travel free, are all ToCs expected to solve the problem this way?), or have
a card that isn't contactless enabled (such as foreigners, as I have said
many times German banks don't seem the slightest but inclined to offer this
feature to their customers. i suspect some, even more bankingly backwards
countries, will be similar).

And what about non local journeys?

tim

TfL acknowledges contactless technology risk
 

On Sun, 29 Jun 2014 20:46:09 +0100, Roland Perry
wrote:
However, when I buy tickets ahead of time, it's always for a
specific
day. How would this "buying order" rule work if I bought a ticket
for
the end of August today, and a ticket for early August tomorrow?

Exactly.

In other news, I see they say you can only buy one ticket per day
[online]. So bad luck if you want to buy one for late August, and
another for early August, the same day.

Again useless :)

Neil

--
Neil Williams. Use neil before the at to reply.

TfL acknowledges contactless technology risk
 

On Sun, 29 Jun 2014 20:50:15 +0100, Roland Perry
wrote:
Are you also anticipating permanently online RPIs? And all of this
(barriers and RPIs) over the entire country.

Yes. Give it a couple of years.

Neil

--
Neil Williams. Use neil before the at to reply.

TfL acknowledges contactless technology risk
 

On Sun, 29 Jun 2014 22:00:31 +0200, "tim....."
wrote:
Networks do go done once in a while. What are all those commuters
with
"online" season tickets going to do when it does?

Presumably be allowed to travel free. The incentive of course is for
it not to go down.

storing someone's season ticket on a network server is a dumb thing
to do.

Why?

And what about the percentage of the population that doesn't have a
credit/debit card

Buy single use barcoded tickets? Pay by phone? (Very few people now
don't have even a basic mobile).

And what about non local journeys?

I expect predominantly online tickets of various types.

Neil

--
Neil Williams. Use neil before the at to reply.

TfL acknowledges contactless technology risk
 

In message , at
21:54:28 on Sun, 29 Jun 2014, Neil Williams
remarked:
Are you also anticipating permanently online RPIs? And all of this
(barriers and RPIs) over the entire country.

Yes. Give it a couple of years.

In the mean time perhaps the train companies can practice by making
their on-board wifi work rather better.
--
Roland Perry

TfL acknowledges contactless technology risk
 

"Neil Williams" wrote in message
.net...
On Sun, 29 Jun 2014 22:00:31 +0200, "tim....."
wrote:
Networks do go done once in a while. What are all those commuters
with
"online" season tickets going to do when it does?

Presumably be allowed to travel free. The incentive of course is for it
not to go down.

Yeah. But if this isn't the chosen solution you don't need to bother


storing someone's season ticket on a network server is a dumb thing
to do.

Why?

because you can't guarantee 100% access to it

And what about the percentage of the population that doesn't have a
credit/debit card

Buy single use barcoded tickets?

Oh so new technology that we have to install in stations (and with ticket
inspectors) that we don't have at the moment - to replace something that we
do have.

Pay by phone? (Very few people now don't have even a basic mobile).

Just having a phone doesn't give you the means to bill a ticket to, either
it, or your bank account. You still need that little extra. Something many
of the late adopters will be reluctant to have.

And what about non local journeys?

I expect predominantly online tickets of various types.

Really.

I have to say that so far, my experience of online tickets with DB (who seem
to have embraced this whole-heartedly) is that buying them is a right PITA.

And unless you have print at home (which the ToCs seem reluctant to adopt -
for whatever reason) you still need a technology to convert that online
purchase into a token that the traveler holds (not lease so that he can get
out of an exit barrier

Nah. I think that you have your desired solution and are trying as hard as
possible to shoehorn it into an inappropriate system..

tim

TfL acknowledges contactless technology risk
 

"Neil Williams" wrote in message
.net...
On Sun, 29 Jun 2014 20:46:09 +0100, Roland Perry
wrote:
However, when I buy tickets ahead of time, it's always for a
specific
day. How would this "buying order" rule work if I bought a ticket
for
the end of August today, and a ticket for early August tomorrow?

Exactly.

In other news, I see they say you can only buy one ticket per day
[online]. So bad luck if you want to buy one for late August, and another
for early August, the same day.

Again useless :)

This is a back end problem. If they have decided that they can't solve if
for this electronic ticketing type they won't be able to solve it for any
electronic ticketing type

OTOH it could just be a step on the road to tne final solution, that isn't
broken.

tim



Neil

--
Neil Williams. Use neil before the at to reply.

TfL acknowledges contactless technology risk
 

In message , at 10:14:40 on Mon, 30
Jun 2014, tim..... remarked:

However, when I buy tickets ahead of time, it's always for a
specific day. How would this "buying order" rule work if I bought a
ticket for the end of August today, and a ticket for early August
tomorrow?

Exactly.

In other news, I see they say you can only buy one ticket per day
[online]. So bad luck if you want to buy one for late August, and
another for early August, the same day.

Again useless :)

This is a back end problem. If they have decided that they can't solve
if for this electronic ticketing type they won't be able to solve it
for any electronic ticketing type

OTOH it could just be a step on the road to tne final solution, that
isn't broken.

The issue here is when the passenger has ambiguous stored tickets. In
fact, if I buy an AP-ticket for the end of August, and one for the start
of August, it's much less ambiguous which one I want to use, because
they have a date associated with them.

For other situations, like the one I had yesterday[1], you can
disambiguate some of them by waiting until the journey finishes before
deciding.

Although that has other problems like I didn't get off and back on the
train home at Cambridge, so wouldn't be able to touch-out the return
half from London and touch-in the single to Ely. In fact most "Break of
Journey" situations and "split ticketing" stop working as soon as you go
'paperless'

[1] Bought tickets at Cambridge for both London and Ely, intending to
travel Cambridge-London-Cambridge-Ely.

ps The barriers at Cambridge were working at 7am, but the Liverpool St
ones were locked out on arrival, as were the Kings Cross ones when I
came back mid-afternoon.
--
Roland Perry

TfL acknowledges contactless technology risk
 

On Sun, 29 Jun 2014 10:41:33 +0200, tim..... wrote:


"David Walters" wrote in message
...
On Sat, 28 Jun 2014 10:55:54 +0100, Roland Perry
wrote:
More difficult is if you have trips to different destinations loaded as
vouchers. Say you live in Grays and have vouchers for both Southend and
London, because you anticipate visiting both soon (and not necessarily
knowing in which order). Which voucher should it swap for a ticket?

Order is apparently important. From
http://www.c2c-online.co.uk/customer...c2c-smart-faqs "PLEASE
NOTE: Tickets can only be used in the order in which they were purchased".

That still doesn't help with deciding if a pax who travelled from home (A)
to work (X) on a return ticket and has just purchased a ticket from X to B,
is starting his journey to B or his return to A.

The A to X ticket was bought before the X to B ticket so the return
portion of the A to X ticket gets used when he enters X. Or at least
that is my understanding of the rules.

TfL acknowledges contactless technology risk
 

In message , at 09:48:12 on Mon, 30 Jun
2014, Roland Perry remarked:
For other situations, like the one I had yesterday[1], you can
disambiguate some of them by waiting until the journey finishes before
deciding.

Forgot to say that on arrival in London it should have been obvious I
wasn't using the Cambridge-Ely ticket yet.

Although that has other problems like I didn't get off and back on the
train home at Cambridge, so wouldn't be able to touch-out the return
half from London and touch-in the single to Ely. In fact most "Break of
Journey" situations and "split ticketing" stop working as soon as you
go 'paperless'

[1] Bought tickets at Cambridge for both London and Ely, intending to
travel Cambridge-London-Cambridge-Ely.

My journey yesterday could of course have been made on a pair of
singles, avoiding the issues at Cambridge completely. But not with
current pricing models where the single is only 10p less than the
return.
--
Roland Perry

TfL acknowledges contactless technology risk
 

In message , at 09:54:24 on
Mon, 30 Jun 2014, David Walters remarked:
More difficult is if you have trips to different destinations loaded as
vouchers. Say you live in Grays and have vouchers for both Southend and
London, because you anticipate visiting both soon (and not necessarily
knowing in which order). Which voucher should it swap for a ticket?

Order is apparently important. From
http://www.c2c-online.co.uk/customer...c2c-smart-faqs "PLEASE
NOTE: Tickets can only be used in the order in which they were purchased".

That still doesn't help with deciding if a pax who travelled from home (A)
to work (X) on a return ticket and has just purchased a ticket from X to B,
is starting his journey to B or his return to A.

The A to X ticket was bought before the X to B ticket so the return
portion of the A to X ticket gets used when he enters X. Or at least
that is my understanding of the rules.

C2C is also much simpler because they don't have any period returns.

Therefore once you've arrived at X the "return half X-A" is going to
expire that night anyway. In the situation that you stayed overnight
near X, and then used a pre-bought ticket X-B it should be possible to
make that work even if the X-B was bought before the A-X-A ticket.

The question remains, though, if the passenger presents himself at A
with a X-B (for tommorrow, bought yesterday) and an A-X-A (bought
today), will it accept the later-bought A-X-A or will it say "you must
use the X-B ticket first, you are at A not X, bugger off".
--
Roland Perry

TfL acknowledges contactless technology risk
 

In article , (Roland Perry)
wrote:

In message , at
21:54:28 on Sun, 29 Jun 2014, Neil Williams
remarked:
Are you also anticipating permanently online RPIs? And all of this
(barriers and RPIs) over the entire country.

Yes. Give it a couple of years.

In the mean time perhaps the train companies can practice by making
their on-board wifi work rather better.

Than GA as we experienced yesterday morning, you mean? Indeed.

I did better than that on the Metropolitan Line to Uxbridge with the wifi
provided by my phone!

--
Colin Rosenstiel

TfL acknowledges contactless technology risk
 

On 29/06/2014 09:41, tim..... wrote:


"David Walters" wrote in message
...
On Sat, 28 Jun 2014 10:55:54 +0100, Roland Perry
wrote:
More difficult is if you have trips to different destinations loaded as
vouchers. Say you live in Grays and have vouchers for both Southend and
London, because you anticipate visiting both soon (and not necessarily
knowing in which order). Which voucher should it swap for a ticket?

Order is apparently important. From
http://www.c2c-online.co.uk/customer...c2c-smart-faqs "PLEASE
NOTE: Tickets can only be used in the order in which they were
purchased".

That still doesn't help with deciding if a pax who travelled from home
(A) to work (X) on a return ticket and has just purchased a ticket from
X to B, is starting his journey to B or his return to A.

We could, of course, come up with some rules to resolve every such
conflicts, but that, I would suggest, would make user reluctance to use
such tickets reach the stratosphere

tim




That very problem was solved with version 2.1.4 of the ITSO Technical
Spec and the changes to the specification of the TYP24 IPE - sorry to
get technical, but you don't have much option with ITSO!

Suppose you have a number of rail tickets, encoded as ITSO TYP 24
products on you card, and you make a journey....

- at the point of initial validation (the entry gate), a list of the
potentially valid tickets on the card is written to the "Transient
Ticket" on the card.
- at subsequent valdiations - whether on train, at an intermediate
station, or at the final exit gate - that list is examined, and any
tickets that are not valid "here and now" are removed from the list.
- on final exit if the number of potentially valid tickets is 1, then we
are done. If it is zero there will be an excess or penalty to pay, with
a manual procedure to be follwed. If the number is greater than once
then again a manual procedure will be required. BUt that should only
happen in a small number of degenerate cases.

A lot of this is set out in an RSP document (RSPS3002 IIRC) which some
former colleagues mine helped to author a few years ago.

Hope that helps

Kevin

TfL acknowledges contactless technology risk
 

In message , at 16:48:39 on Mon, 30 Jun
2014, Kevin Ayton remarked:
More difficult is if you have trips to different destinations loaded as
vouchers. Say you live in Grays and have vouchers for both Southend and
London, because you anticipate visiting both soon (and not necessarily
knowing in which order). Which voucher should it swap for a ticket?

Order is apparently important. From
http://www.c2c-online.co.uk/customer...c2c-smart-faqs "PLEASE
NOTE: Tickets can only be used in the order in which they were
purchased".

That still doesn't help with deciding if a pax who travelled from home
(A) to work (X) on a return ticket and has just purchased a ticket from
X to B, is starting his journey to B or his return to A.

We could, of course, come up with some rules to resolve every such
conflicts, but that, I would suggest, would make user reluctance to use
such tickets reach the stratosphere

That very problem was solved with version 2.1.4 of the ITSO Technical
Spec and the changes to the specification of the TYP24 IPE - sorry to
get technical, but you don't have much option with ITSO!

Suppose you have a number of rail tickets, encoded as ITSO TYP 24
products on you card, and you make a journey....

- at the point of initial validation (the entry gate), a list of the
potentially valid tickets on the card is written to the "Transient
Ticket" on the card.
- at subsequent valdiations - whether on train, at an intermediate
station, or at the final exit gate - that list is examined, and any
tickets that are not valid "here and now" are removed from the list.
- on final exit if the number of potentially valid tickets is 1, then
we are done. If it is zero there will be an excess or penalty to pay,
with a manual procedure to be follwed. If the number is greater than
once then again a manual procedure will be required. BUt that should
only happen in a small number of degenerate cases.

A lot of this is set out in an RSP document (RSPS3002 IIRC) which some
former colleagues mine helped to author a few years ago.

Hope that helps

It all sounds very sensible, no it really does.

Are C2C implementing this, and if so why are they disseminating
misinformation to their customers?
--
Roland Perry

TfL acknowledges contactless technology risk
 

"David Walters" wrote in message
...
On Sun, 29 Jun 2014 10:41:33 +0200, tim.....
wrote:


"David Walters" wrote in message
...
On Sat, 28 Jun 2014 10:55:54 +0100, Roland Perry
wrote:
More difficult is if you have trips to different destinations loaded as
vouchers. Say you live in Grays and have vouchers for both Southend and
London, because you anticipate visiting both soon (and not necessarily
knowing in which order). Which voucher should it swap for a ticket?

Order is apparently important. From
http://www.c2c-online.co.uk/customer...c2c-smart-faqs "PLEASE
NOTE: Tickets can only be used in the order in which they were
purchased".

That still doesn't help with deciding if a pax who travelled from home
(A)
to work (X) on a return ticket and has just purchased a ticket from X to
B,
is starting his journey to B or his return to A.

The A to X ticket was bought before the X to B ticket so the return
portion of the A to X ticket gets used when he enters X.

how does that help if the pax is actually going to B?

tim

TfL acknowledges contactless technology risk
 

"Roland Perry" wrote in message
...
In message , at 16:48:39 on Mon, 30 Jun
2014, Kevin Ayton remarked:
More difficult is if you have trips to different destinations loaded
as
vouchers. Say you live in Grays and have vouchers for both Southend
and
London, because you anticipate visiting both soon (and not necessarily
knowing in which order). Which voucher should it swap for a ticket?

Order is apparently important. From
http://www.c2c-online.co.uk/customer...c2c-smart-faqs "PLEASE
NOTE: Tickets can only be used in the order in which they were
purchased".

That still doesn't help with deciding if a pax who travelled from home
(A) to work (X) on a return ticket and has just purchased a ticket from
X to B, is starting his journey to B or his return to A.

We could, of course, come up with some rules to resolve every such
conflicts, but that, I would suggest, would make user reluctance to use
such tickets reach the stratosphere

That very problem was solved with version 2.1.4 of the ITSO Technical Spec
and the changes to the specification of the TYP24 IPE - sorry to get
technical, but you don't have much option with ITSO!

Suppose you have a number of rail tickets, encoded as ITSO TYP 24 products
on you card, and you make a journey....

- at the point of initial validation (the entry gate), a list of the
potentially valid tickets on the card is written to the "Transient Ticket"
on the card.
- at subsequent valdiations - whether on train, at an intermediate
station, or at the final exit gate - that list is examined, and any
tickets that are not valid "here and now" are removed from the list.
- on final exit if the number of potentially valid tickets is 1, then we
are done. If it is zero there will be an excess or penalty to pay, with a
manual procedure to be follwed. If the number is greater than once then
again a manual procedure will be required. BUt that should only happen in
a small number of degenerate cases.

A lot of this is set out in an RSP document (RSPS3002 IIRC) which some
former colleagues mine helped to author a few years ago.

Hope that helps

It all sounds very sensible, no it really does.

Are C2C implementing this, and if so why are they disseminating
misinformation to their customers?

just because it's in the spec doesn't mean that it has found its way into
the software

tim


--
Roland Perry

TfL acknowledges contactless technology risk
 

In message , at 15:28:02 on Thu, 3 Jul
2014, tim..... remarked:
The A to X ticket was bought before the X to B ticket so the return
portion of the A to X ticket gets used when he enters X.

how does that help if the pax is actually going to B?

It doesn't, which is the issue.
--
Roland Perry

TfL acknowledges contactless technology risk
 

On Thu, 3 Jul 2014 15:32:50 +0100
Roland Perry wrote:
In message , at 15:28:02 on Thu, 3 Jul
2014, tim..... remarked:
The A to X ticket was bought before the X to B ticket so the return
portion of the A to X ticket gets used when he enters X.

how does that help if the pax is actually going to B?

It doesn't, which is the issue.

I never thought ticketing systems could get any more idiotic, but it looks
like I was wrong. This sounds like a master class in technology for its own
sake and to hell with the passenger.

--
Spud

TfL acknowledges contactless technology risk
 

On Thu, 3 Jul 2014 15:09:33 +0000 (UTC),
d wrote:
I never thought ticketing systems could get any more idiotic, but
it looks
like I was wrong. This sounds like a master class in technology for
its own
sake and to hell with the passenger.

I am broadly inclined to agree. Oyster made a lot of sense, as does
the contactless development of it, but it does not apply at all well
to longer distance journeys. I remain of the view that barcode based
(with future NFC expansion) print at home and mobile tickets would
have been a better development.

Neil

--
Neil Williams. Use neil before the at to reply.

TfL acknowledges contactless technology risk
 

"Neil Williams" wrote in message
.net...
On Thu, 3 Jul 2014 15:09:33 +0000 (UTC), d
wrote:
I never thought ticketing systems could get any more idiotic, but
it looks
like I was wrong. This sounds like a master class in technology for
its own
sake and to hell with the passenger.

I am broadly inclined to agree. Oyster made a lot of sense, as does the
contactless development of it, but it does not apply at all well to longer
distance journeys. I remain of the view that barcode based (with future
NFC expansion) print at home and mobile tickets would have been a better
development.

TBH, I doubt that anyone involved thinks that this technology expands to
long single distance tickets.

that is just a stupid (set of) politician's wishes

But it is good technology for season tickets and by not rocking the boat at
this point there is probably 5 years further development in rolling that out
amongst all of the London (and other) commuters

tim

TfL acknowledges contactless technology risk
 

On Thu, 3 Jul 2014 19:10:35 +0100, "tim....."
wrote:
But it is good technology for season tickets

Yeah, I will give it that. Potentially for carnets and the likes as
well.

Neil

--
Neil Williams. Use neil before the at to reply.