In article .com,
wrote:
[replied via google so apologies if it looks weird]

A question - do *any* of the NR ticket windows at Walthamstow deal with
Oyster?

OK - I went there this morning.
[snip: the answer is no]

I could have sworn they did; I was obviously wrong. I won't bother donig
the sidestep to Walthamstow, but I will check out Barking.

--
Mike Bristow - really a very good driver

In article ,
(Paul Corfield) wrote:

This happened when One upgraded from APTIS (which had a plug in
unit) to new machines which are not compatible. A nonsense but then
the attitude of the TOCs and Rail Settlement Plan to Prestige always
was nonsensical when I was trying to negotiate with them and
convince them that the scheme was going to happen. Now it has I
suspect the attitude has not changed very much if a recent article
in Modern Railways is anything to go by.

That's not all. I discovered recently the new tribute kit can't do two
singles for a return journey, the TOCs' coming way of doing cheap
fares. So I had to do two completely separate transactions, including
the credit card payments.

What MR article, BTW?

--
Colin Rosenstiel

Barry Salter writes:
panto Oh yes it can! /panto

Pantograph? :-)
--
Mark Brader, Toronto "It's the almost correct solutions that
are the most dangerous..." -- Dave Eisen

On Sat, 27 Aug 2005 21:04 +0100 (BST), (Colin
Rosenstiel) wrote:

In article ,
(Paul Corfield) wrote:

This happened when One upgraded from APTIS (which had a plug in
unit) to new machines which are not compatible. A nonsense but then
the attitude of the TOCs and Rail Settlement Plan to Prestige always
was nonsensical when I was trying to negotiate with them and
convince them that the scheme was going to happen. Now it has I
suspect the attitude has not changed very much if a recent article
in Modern Railways is anything to go by.

That's not all. I discovered recently the new tribute kit can't do two
singles for a return journey, the TOCs' coming way of doing cheap
fares. So I had to do two completely separate transactions, including
the credit card payments.

Hmm - bit odd that. Having read Barry's reply as well I think it is down
to staff training. I recently booked a series of fairly complex tickets
at Kings Cross GNER office (none on GNER trains either!) and that was
all one transaction and very efficiently done by the chap behind the
counter. I asked him if he liked Tribute compared to APTIS and he said
it was OK. He knew I was LU staff so wasn't completely taken aback by
that question.

What MR article, BTW?

IIRC Roger Ford did an Informed Sources article on Oyster, the ITSO
standard smartcard and how the TOCs were struggling to integrate either
card into their retail systems. It was published within the last 2-3
months. It felt as if time had stood still for 5 years - i.e. no
progress since I was dealing with the TOCs on this subject.
--
Paul C


Admits to working for London Underground!

In article ,
(Paul Corfield) wrote:

On Sat, 27 Aug 2005 21:04 +0100 (BST), (Colin
Rosenstiel) wrote:

In article ,
(Paul Corfield) wrote:

This happened when One upgraded from APTIS (which had a plug in
unit) to new machines which are not compatible. A nonsense but
then the attitude of the TOCs and Rail Settlement Plan to
Prestige always was nonsensical when I was trying to negotiate
with them and convince them that the scheme was going to
happen. Now it has I suspect the attitude has not changed very
much if a recent article in Modern Railways is anything to go by.

That's not all. I discovered recently the new tribute kit can't
do two singles for a return journey, the TOCs' coming way of
doing cheap fares. So I had to do two completely separate
transactions, including the credit card payments.

Hmm - bit odd that. Having read Barry's reply as well I think it
is down to staff training. I recently booked a series of fairly
complex tickets at Kings Cross GNER office (none on GNER trains
either!) and that was all one transaction and very efficiently
done by the chap behind the counter. I asked him if he liked
Tribute compared to APTIS and he said it was OK. He knew I was LU
staff so wasn't completely taken aback by that question.

Kings Cross GNER seemed better equipped than Cambridge last time I made
a ticket purchase. The guy did try to do it in one transaction, stopped
at one point, muttered and started again as two separate single
transactions.

What MR article, BTW?

IIRC Roger Ford did an Informed Sources article on Oyster, the ITSO
standard smartcard and how the TOCs were struggling to integrate
either card into their retail systems. It was published within the
last 2-3 months. It felt as if time had stood still for 5 years -
i.e. no progress since I was dealing with the TOCs on this subject.

Oh that one. Yes, not very impressive. I blame the shambles that is
privatisation and short franchises.

--
Colin Rosenstiel

Paul Corfield wrote:
On 26 Aug 2005 06:01:28 -0700, wrote:

ALL of the NR ticket windows on BOTH sides of the station say "Oyster
not available at this window. Please go to LUL office downstairs."


This happened when One upgraded from APTIS (which had a plug in unit) to
new machines which are not compatible. A nonsense but then the attitude
of the TOCs and Rail Settlement Plan to Prestige always was nonsensical
when I was trying to negotiate with them and convince them that the
scheme was going to happen. Now it has I suspect the attitude has not
changed very much if a recent article in Modern Railways is anything to
go by.

That explains why I thought I was going mad, and had a feeling that the
windows there DID offer Oyster for a short period of time.

There is ONE single LUL ticket window (badly-positioned next to the
luggage gate and in my 3 years of living there, I would say it's closed
A LOT (I can't quantify that - sorry!) of the time.


You can blame me for the luggage gate issue as we had to compromise on
the design when we did the project to put the gates in.

Presumably, it's not your fault it's always closed though? :-)

Maybe when they finish the subway to the bus station (was meant to be
open a few months ago, but has now been put back another 18 months to 2
years - ha!), they will provide some better facilities.


Out of curiosity where did you hear that timescale from?

http://www.walthamforestguardian.co....php?utag=10366

Unless there is more space than I can foresee in the subway link then I
doubt there will be any real expansion of the LU ticketing facility. I
won't mind being proved wrong though.

Those small Oyster Quick Tickets machines are pretty small though -
would be very handy.

[1] to replace the "temporary" 1968 structures that were removed earlier
this year.

....which now looks much better - let's hope it's not something equally
ugly that goes up!

Thanks for the info.

On 25 Aug 2005 10:57:26 -0700, "Mizter T" wrote:

I think it's only SWT and Silverlink that issue Oyster cards (and sell
tickets to be loaded to Oyster cards), though only at some stations.

There are more One and WAGN for example. See the list of stations at:
http://www.tfl.gov.uk/tfl/fares-tick...05.pdf#page=14
--

Cheers,

Jason.

A: Because it messes up the order in which people normally read text.
Q: Why is top-posting such a bad thing?
A: Top-posting.
Q: What is the most annoying thing on Usenet and in e-mail?

On 24 Aug 2005 16:18:29 -0700, "Mizter T" wrote:

I'm no expert, but this is my understanding of the Passengers Charter
discount. It's offered on monthly or longer season ticket *renewals* if
punctuality or reliability over the past 12 months has been below
targets.

This can be worth a 5% or 10% discount.

Or nothing on 'one', who changed their charter some time to require
season ticekt holders to claim for each and every delay!

I stopped buying tickets from them shortly after that...
--

Cheers,

Jason.

A: Because it messes up the order in which people normally read text.
Q: Why is top-posting such a bad thing?
A: Top-posting.
Q: What is the most annoying thing on Usenet and in e-mail?

On 25 Aug 2005 08:15:43 -0700, "Mizter T" wrote:

Mike Bristow wrote:
In article ,
Alan OBrien wrote:
wrote in message
ups.com...
I wonder how many people who refuse Oyster cards are working in the
black economy and don't want their regular 5-day a week journies from
A-to-B recorded?

I think the main reason is that some people live in zone 2 north - say
Kentish Town - but work in zone 2 on the other side of zone 1 - say Canary
Wharf. By buying a zone 2 paper weekly they hope to avoid the fare for zone
1 every day, which with Oyster they can't do;

They can't do it with paper tickets, eitherm when the Revinue Protection
crowd get ahold of them.

They shouldn't do it, as it is fare evasion, but just because you
shouldn't do it doesn't mean you can't do it! I know someone who has
done this, I don't approve of it but I know it can be done. I've
overheard someone else being caught doing it by RP staff when changing
Tube lines at Zone 1 interchange stations ("I though my ticket included
Zone 1" - "No sir it doesn't" etc etc).

Some years ago, I used to travel from the northern end of the Victoria
line to West London, changing to the Piccadilly at Green Park.

There were numerous times when ticket checks were done in the
interchange tunnels, precisely for this reason.

Because of this and other notions about 'Big Brother watching over us'
some people may wish to avoid Oyster. I supsect that some NR stations
that are near Tube stations may see a slight rise in the number of
7DTC's sold, but no subsequent increase in passenger traffic.

Additionally, people with paper travelcards can't have journey start
and end times verified for LU "Customer Charter" claims - another
reason for some to avoid Oyster.
--

Cheers,

Jason.

A: Because it messes up the order in which people normally read text.
Q: Why is top-posting such a bad thing?
A: Top-posting.
Q: What is the most annoying thing on Usenet and in e-mail?

Jason wrote:
On 25 Aug 2005 10:57:26 -0700, "Mizter T" wrote:


I think it's only SWT and Silverlink that issue Oyster cards (and sell
tickets to be loaded to Oyster cards), though only at some stations.


There are more One and WAGN for example. See the list of stations at:
http://www.tfl.gov.uk/tfl/fares-tick...05.pdf#page=14

We already know that the inclusion of Walthamstow on that list is a lie
- how many other stations on the list is it not actually true for?