"John B" wrote in message
ups.com...
Richard M Willis wrote:
Yebbut if you get caught not touching in, you may end up with a £20
Penalty Fare. That might not be 'best'...

Do you have to touch in if you are using a travelcard, rather than
PrePay ? I thought it was only PP users who had to touch all over the
place ?

Only PAYG users need to touch in.

The Conditions of Carriage state that "When you use London Underground and
National Rail services, you must touch your Oyster card on the reader at
both the start and the end of your journey. Where the ticket gates at
stations are open you must continue to touch your Oyster card on the
reader."



That goes for all Oyster cards, prepay and season tickets.

Alan OBrien wrote:

Do you have to touch in if you are using a travelcard, rather than
PrePay ? I thought it was only PP users who had to touch all over the
place ?

Only PAYG users need to touch in.

The Conditions of Carriage state that "When you use London Underground and
National Rail services, you must touch your Oyster card on the reader at
both the start and the end of your journey. Where the ticket gates at
stations are open you must continue to touch your Oyster card on the
reader."

That goes for all Oyster cards, prepay and season tickets.

Yes but as discussed before not all passengers can touch in at some starts
and ends, due to lack of readers. I'm also left completely unclear as to
whether readers at National Rail stations with barriers (e.g. Ilford) are
sufficient or whether one has to again touch on to a reader when switching
to the tube.

On a daily basis I don't touch in when interchanging at Stratford, not least
because the readers on the platform are badly positioned given the crowds
the station has to cope with, and I've never had a problem when exiting the
system at a barrier.

Tim Roll-Pickering wrote:
Alan OBrien wrote:

Do you have to touch in if you are using a travelcard, rather than
PrePay ? I thought it was only PP users who had to touch all over the
place ?

Only PAYG users need to touch in.

The Conditions of Carriage state that "When you use London Underground and
National Rail services, you must touch your Oyster card on the reader at
both the start and the end of your journey. Where the ticket gates at
stations are open you must continue to touch your Oyster card on the
reader."

That goes for all Oyster cards, prepay and season tickets.

Yes but as discussed before not all passengers can touch in at some starts
and ends, due to lack of readers. I'm also left completely unclear as to
whether readers at National Rail stations with barriers (e.g. Ilford) are
sufficient or whether one has to again touch on to a reader when switching
to the tube.

On a daily basis I don't touch in when interchanging at Stratford, not least
because the readers on the platform are badly positioned given the crowds
the station has to cope with, and I've never had a problem when exiting the
system at a barrier.

Woah - let's correct some things here.

The NCoC, whilst trying to be helpful, is wrong. As you've observed,
there aren't Oyster readers at most National Rail (NR) stations,
because Oyster Pre-Pay is not accepted as a way for paying for your NR
journey (this will change, but not a few years).

I'm going to make up a fantasy journey in your neck of the woods Tim to
illustrate a few things. Let's say you travel from Forest Gate (zone
3), a station *without* gates, into central London - say Oxford Circus
(zone 1), changing at Stratford onto the Central Line. In this case
you'll have a zones 1-3 Travelcard loaded onto your Oyster card (i.e.
you're not using Oyster Pre-Pay to pay for your journey at all).

You wouldn't need to touch-in at the beginning of your journey, not
simply because there aren't any readers at Forest Gate but because it's
not required (the NCoC is wrong here). Nor would you need to touch-in
your Oyster at a reader at Stratford when changing onto the Central
Line.

*If* you were to decide to go to West Ruislip (zone 6) at the end of
the Central Line in the west, then you *would* need to touch-in on an
Oyster reader on the Central Line platform at Stratford. This would
provide a start point for your journey on the Tube, and the gates at
West Ruislip would deduct the appropriate amount for the journey from
the edge of zone 3 to West Ruislip/zone 6.


In real life you start your journey from Ilford - but the gates you go
through are currently dumb, they don't mark an entry point onto the
transport system on your card (you are not touching-in here), they just
let you through as they can see you have the right zone on your card*.
Presuming you travel into central London, on the Central Line like the
fantasy journey above, you don't need to touch in at Straford, the
zones on your Travelcard have you covered. If you fancy seeing the
delights of West Ruislip then you need to touch-in at Stratford on the
Central Line platform.

I guess that's as clear as mud then, but it is right.

"Mizter T" wrote in message
oups.com...
Tim Roll-Pickering wrote:
Alan OBrien wrote:

Do you have to touch in if you are using a travelcard, rather than
PrePay ? I thought it was only PP users who had to touch all over the
place ?

Only PAYG users need to touch in.

The Conditions of Carriage state that "When you use London Underground
and
National Rail services, you must touch your Oyster card on the reader
at
both the start and the end of your journey. Where the ticket gates at
stations are open you must continue to touch your Oyster card on the
reader."

That goes for all Oyster cards, prepay and season tickets.

Yes but as discussed before not all passengers can touch in at some
starts
and ends, due to lack of readers. I'm also left completely unclear as to
whether readers at National Rail stations with barriers (e.g. Ilford) are
sufficient or whether one has to again touch on to a reader when
switching
to the tube.

On a daily basis I don't touch in when interchanging at Stratford, not
least
because the readers on the platform are badly positioned given the crowds
the station has to cope with, and I've never had a problem when exiting
the
system at a barrier.

Woah - let's correct some things here.

The NCoC, whilst trying to be helpful, is wrong. As you've observed,
there aren't Oyster readers at most National Rail (NR) stations,
because Oyster Pre-Pay is not accepted as a way for paying for your NR
journey (this will change, but not a few years).

I'm going to make up a fantasy journey in your neck of the woods Tim to
illustrate a few things. Let's say you travel from Forest Gate (zone
3), a station *without* gates, into central London - say Oxford Circus
(zone 1), changing at Stratford onto the Central Line. In this case
you'll have a zones 1-3 Travelcard loaded onto your Oyster card (i.e.
you're not using Oyster Pre-Pay to pay for your journey at all).

You wouldn't need to touch-in at the beginning of your journey, not
simply because there aren't any readers at Forest Gate but because it's
not required (the NCoC is wrong here). Nor would you need to touch-in
your Oyster at a reader at Stratford when changing onto the Central
Line.

*If* you were to decide to go to West Ruislip (zone 6) at the end of
the Central Line in the west, then you *would* need to touch-in on an
Oyster reader on the Central Line platform at Stratford. This would
provide a start point for your journey on the Tube, and the gates at
West Ruislip would deduct the appropriate amount for the journey from
the edge of zone 3 to West Ruislip/zone 6.


In real life you start your journey from Ilford - but the gates you go
through are currently dumb, they don't mark an entry point onto the
transport system on your card (you are not touching-in here), they just
let you through as they can see you have the right zone on your card*.
Presuming you travel into central London, on the Central Line like the
fantasy journey above, you don't need to touch in at Straford, the
zones on your Travelcard have you covered. If you fancy seeing the
delights of West Ruislip then you need to touch-in at Stratford on the
Central Line platform.

I guess that's as clear as mud then, but it is right.


One slight issue.
The last three days the main gates at Stratford have been wide open and the
oyster readers dead (no light) I return travel to Holborn peak hours.
What would I be charged if on PAYG?
Will all incomplete journeys be sorted automatically?

Andy wrote:
One slight issue.
The last three days the main gates at Stratford have been wide open and the
oyster readers dead (no light) I return travel to Holborn peak hours.
What would I be charged if on PAYG?
Will all incomplete journeys be sorted automatically?


The Oyster readers on the gates certainly seem dead if they have no
light on - this shouldn't be the case, they should always be on, but in
this case they may have been off (I've no idea why, especially for
three days running).

You'll be able to tell if you go to a Tube ticket machine and check
your journey history - there you can see if you have unresolved
journeys.

If all you do is travel from Stratford to Holborn and back, perhaps
with a bus journey at either end, then you won't be out of pocket.
Unless things have changed you'll be charged a single zone 1 fare on
exit at Holborn in the morning, and a further single zone 1 fare when
entering Holborn in the evening.

If however you've travelled much more than that on any day then you
wouldn't have benefited from the daily cap (the cap on how much you
spend each day), as this will only work on the condition that you
touch-in and out for each journey you make, any unresolved journeys
during that day and you forfeit your daily cap.

Obviously if you weren't able to touch-in/out at Stratford then this
isn't your fault. If you think you should've been capped but weren't,
you can either take this up at a Tube ticket office or perhaps better
get TfL to send you your recent journey history. As long as your card
is registered, if you call the Oyster helpline they'll send you the
last three months of your journey history at no cost. Then you can
identify any overcharging and get a refund.


See this FAQ answer on the 'Oyster help' website (what used to be
called 'Ask Oyster'):
http://tinyurl.com/jr97b