I just got an Epsom + Z1-6 Travelcard on my Southern Key card. It seems to operate gates as fast as Oyster, and the journey history shows up on the web page within half an hour, rather than next day for Oyster.

In message , at
03:04:09 on Mon, 8 Sep 2014, Matthew Dickinson
remarked:
I just got an Epsom + Z1-6 Travelcard on my Southern Key card. It seems
to operate gates as fast as Oyster, and the journey history shows up on
the web page within half an hour, rather than next day for Oyster.

Things seem to be looking up for ITSO. I think we might have been
expecting the extension to Travelcards to go live at the earliest *next*
week, after the Thameslink franchise changes hands and
contactless-on-the-tube goes public.

Meanwhile, I was in Edinburgh over the weekend and tried out my Scotrail
ITSO card on one of the TVMs. It took *ages* to read the card (two to
three seconds) but did then offer me a range of Scotrail destinations to
buy a walk-up day ticket to. I didn't actually try buying one.
--
Roland Perry

On 08.09.14 12:11, Roland Perry wrote:
In message , at
03:04:09 on Mon, 8 Sep 2014, Matthew Dickinson
remarked:
I just got an Epsom + Z1-6 Travelcard on my Southern Key card. It seems
to operate gates as fast as Oyster, and the journey history shows up on
the web page within half an hour, rather than next day for Oyster.

Things seem to be looking up for ITSO. I think we might have been
expecting the extension to Travelcards to go live at the earliest *next*
week, after the Thameslink franchise changes hands and
contactless-on-the-tube goes public.

Meanwhile, I was in Edinburgh over the weekend and tried out my Scotrail
ITSO card on one of the TVMs. It took *ages* to read the card (two to
three seconds) but did then offer me a range of Scotrail destinations to
buy a walk-up day ticket to. I didn't actually try buying one.

I wonder when other agencies besides London will start to accept
contactless. Besides London, IIRC, Bergen is the only other place to
accept contactless as payment.

On Monday, 8 September 2014 15:08:52 UTC+1, wrote:
On 08.09.14 12:11, Roland Perry wrote:

In message , at

03:04:09 on Mon, 8 Sep 2014, Matthew Dickinson

remarked:

I just got an Epsom + Z1-6 Travelcard on my Southern Key card. It seems

to operate gates as fast as Oyster, and the journey history shows up on

the web page within half an hour, rather than next day for Oyster.



Things seem to be looking up for ITSO. I think we might have been

expecting the extension to Travelcards to go live at the earliest *next*

week, after the Thameslink franchise changes hands and

contactless-on-the-tube goes public.



Meanwhile, I was in Edinburgh over the weekend and tried out my Scotrail

ITSO card on one of the TVMs. It took *ages* to read the card (two to

three seconds) but did then offer me a range of Scotrail destinations to

buy a walk-up day ticket to. I didn't actually try buying one.



I wonder when other agencies besides London will start to accept

contactless. Besides London, IIRC, Bergen is the only other place to

accept contactless as payment.

TfGM have mentioned it.

https://www.getmethere.com/web/tfgm_...e#a-card-types

Did you have to sit down and rest due to the shock of it working? ;-)



Thanks for the update btw.

--

Paul C

I was a little surprised that it all works. I wonder whether RPIs will be able to check the card..

In message , at
08:06:17 on Mon, 8 Sep 2014, Matthew Dickinson
remarked:
I wonder when other agencies besides London will start to accept
contactless. Besides London, IIRC, Bergen is the only other place to
accept contactless as payment.

TfGM have mentioned it.
https://www.getmethere.com/web/tfgm_...e#a-card-types

Although as "coming soon(fsvo)":

"In later phases of get me there, you'll be able to use your
contactless bank card to travel on Metrolink by simply using it
to touch in and out, without having to buy a travelcard or load
on travel credit first."

Contactless on the London Underground was in this state for quite a long
time
--
Roland Perry

In message , at 17:06:32 on
Mon, 8 Sep 2014, Paul Corfield remarked:
Did you have to sit down and rest due to the shock of it working? ;-)

Thanks for the update btw.

I was a little surprised that it all works. I wonder whether RPIs will be able to check the card..

hmm - very good question. I hadn't thought about that but these
seismic changes in card acceptance [1] do present some interesting
revenue protection issues for TfL and the TOCs. I'm not aware that
new readers have been procured but I don't use rail services very
often these days so may have missed some changes.

One of the problems with one-TOC ITSO cards is their lack of
interavailability with other operators on the same route which people
take for granted with paper tickets.

I haven't seen the T&C for using Contactless cards on TfL (and I bet
neither have 99.99% of the people about to be using it). One way to do
revenue protection (as long as the T&C allow it) is to swipe the card
the same way an entry/exit barrier does, and then use the overnight
back-office system to decide to either ignore it as redundant [when
someone has been good] or use it to charge a penalty fare [when you
suspect they haven't].

Inevitably there will be false positives [a penalty fare charged when
not warranted] which should make a good story in the next day's Evening
Standard. Assuming that anyone notices, which I'm sure TfL will be
hoping they won't.
--
Roland Perry

On 08/09/2014 22:09, Roland Perry wrote:
[...]
I was a little surprised that it all works. I wonder whether RPIs
will be able to check the card..

hmm - very good question. I hadn't thought about that but these
seismic changes in card acceptance [1] do present some interesting
revenue protection issues for TfL and the TOCs. I'm not aware that
new readers have been procured but I don't use rail services very
often these days so may have missed some changes.

One of the problems with one-TOC ITSO cards is their lack of
interavailability with other operators on the same route which people
take for granted with paper tickets.

I haven't seen the T&C for using Contactless cards on TfL (and I bet
neither have 99.99% of the people about to be using it). [...]

The currently available T&Cs for contactless only cover bus travel:
http://www.tfl.gov.uk/cdn/static/cms/documents/contactless-conditions-of-use.pdf

[...] One way to do
revenue protection (as long as the T&C allow it) is to swipe the card
the same way an entry/exit barrier does, and then use the overnight
back-office system to decide to either ignore it as redundant [when
someone has been good] or use it to charge a penalty fare [when you
suspect they haven't].

Inevitably there will be false positives [a penalty fare charged when
not warranted] which should make a good story in the next day's Evening
Standard. Assuming that anyone notices, which I'm sure TfL will be
hoping they won't.

In message , at 22:38:09 on Mon, 8 Sep 2014,
Mizter T remarked:
I haven't seen the T&C for using Contactless cards on TfL (and I bet
neither have 99.99% of the people about to be using it). [...]

The currently available T&Cs for contactless only cover bus travel:
http://www.tfl.gov.uk/cdn/static/cms/documents/contactless-conditions-of-use.pdf

2.2 is especially bizar

"It is your responsibility to check the fare for your journey
before you travel"

Aren't buses flat-fare, and even if they weren't, what mechanisms exist
for you to either enter, or confirm, a fare taken from a contactless
card?

Anyway, 2.5 covers the RPI angle:

"You must be prepared to show your contactless payment card on
every journey you make with it. You must let an authorised
member of staff or a police officer inspect your contactless
payment card at any time during your journey if asked to do so.
You may be asked to touch your card on their portable card
reader as part of their inspection."

Important to remember (on a bus anyway) which card you touched in with!
If you forget on the tube (when it goes live) then there's the whole
'unresolved journey' thing to contend with.

I have a slight issue with the word "inspection", as I don't think the
fact you made a particular contactless payment is stored on the card, so
all they can really do (unless they have a way of downloading the
information from the bus before starting to examine cards) is grab your
data and then charge you a penalty fare or unresolved journey fee later.
--
Roland Perry

In message , at 10:23:21 on
Tue, 9 Sep 2014, Paul Corfield remarked:
On Tue, 9 Sep 2014 09:28:46 +0100, Roland Perry
wrote:

I have a slight issue with the word "inspection", as I don't think the
fact you made a particular contactless payment is stored on the card, so
all they can really do (unless they have a way of downloading the
information from the bus before starting to examine cards) is grab your
data and then charge you a penalty fare or unresolved journey fee later.

Inspectors request a print out from the ticket machine on boarding the
bus. This has a list of any CPCs used on that trip which the
inspectors then use to check against any cards presented by a
passenger.

A wonderfully manual way of implementing an e-ticket system! As bad as
MegaTrain, where they check off your P@H tickets from a manual list at
the gateline.

I've only seen it happen once but that's the process as I
understand it. I don't know if that has since been modified as the
system has been upgraded in preparation for multi modal use.

This Londonist article gives some clues about what happens to a CPC
when touched in and also about new inspectors machines that can read
bank cards.

http://londonist.com/2014/08/contact...rt-some-more-a
nswers.php

"TfL is starting to issue inspectors with portable card readers which
will be able to read the card’s recent journey history."

Which contradicts what I thought I'd read about contactless card
technology and the ability to store recent transactions on the card - or
am I conflating that aspect with ITSO?

Although one of the comments (to you in fact) says: "On Oyster the
reader does write on to the card to prove you have touched in.
On contactless cards (as far as I know) they cannot write to the card,"
--
Roland Perry