On 30 Jan, 10:08, "Paul Scott" wrote:
It all looks
quite straightforward if you think only of a journey from Kent to a zonal
destination, where anti-fraud measures over the years have led to the
situation where an overnight return is usually no longer sold, and you have
to have two singles - a bit like LU really. But add all the longer duration
advance purchase stuff into the mix, and first class availability on some
but not all services, and railcards, the ticketing problem is an order of
magnitude more complex. I imagine a major question exercising the TOCs is
where to draw their Oyster boundary - notwithstanding that SWT are to
introduce it throughout - but will it be zonal, payg, all ticket types? Who
can tell...

On SE trains it could be quite easy, I'd have thought. Put Dartford
into Zone 6, and that's most of the Dartford commuter services
immediately included. The Hayes & Orpington services don't go beyond
Zone 6.

Patrick

wrote in message
ups.com...


On 30 Jan, 10:08, "Paul Scott" wrote:
It all looks
quite straightforward if you think only of a journey from Kent to a zonal
destination, where anti-fraud measures over the years have led to the
situation where an overnight return is usually no longer sold, and you
have
to have two singles - a bit like LU really. But add all the longer
duration
advance purchase stuff into the mix, and first class availability on some
but not all services, and railcards, the ticketing problem is an order
of
magnitude more complex. I imagine a major question exercising the TOCs
is
where to draw their Oyster boundary - notwithstanding that SWT are to
introduce it throughout - but will it be zonal, payg, all ticket types?
Who
can tell...

On SE trains it could be quite easy, I'd have thought. Put Dartford
into Zone 6, and that's most of the Dartford commuter services
immediately included. The Hayes & Orpington services don't go beyond
Zone 6.


But why assume zonal fares and then only concentric from London? What about
the mysterious commuters who don't go into London - SWT have been tasked by
the DfT to provide 'Oyster style' ticketing throughout their area - now
including the Isle of Wight!

Paul

If people rush at this then it is likely
to go wrong with ticket selling staff and passengers being the poor
people who will deal with the consequences of ticket systems not
working, cards not working, ticket gates and validators doing the wrong
thing and passengers being mischarged. It is all too easy to do and
that's before you get to the issues about revenue assumptions in
franchise bids, running costs, installation, commission on sales,
provision of usage information, system security, training and education
and procurement issues for the equipment and whether compatibility can
actually be achieved.

I think the frustration is around the fact that Oyster has been around
for years now and they are only just starting to work it out. Rushing
it would have been bringing it in 3 or so years ago; by now SER
passengers have a right to the integrated system.

On 30 Jan 2007 10:40:57 -0800, "whos2091"
wrote:

If people rush at this then it is likely
to go wrong with ticket selling staff and passengers being the poor
people who will deal with the consequences of ticket systems not
working, cards not working, ticket gates and validators doing the wrong
thing and passengers being mischarged. It is all too easy to do and
that's before you get to the issues about revenue assumptions in
franchise bids, running costs, installation, commission on sales,
provision of usage information, system security, training and education
and procurement issues for the equipment and whether compatibility can
actually be achieved.

I think the frustration is around the fact that Oyster has been around
for years now and they are only just starting to work it out. Rushing
it would have been bringing it in 3 or so years ago; by now SER
passengers have a right to the integrated system.

The current management of SER have not been in place for much time. For
whatever reason they opted not to include Oyster in their franchise and
no one else considered it was worth imposing on them. I think it highly
doubtful that the public sector controlled South East trains would have
been able to secure the funding to implement Oyster and I expect it
would have perceived as far too much of a risk if it was part committed
at the time of retendering the franchise.

As I have posted more times than I care to remember (almost all of) the
TOCs were disinterested in Oyster more than 8 years ago and didn't
believe it would happen. To be fair there was some doubt as to whether
LT would proceed with the scheme at that point. Only C2C and Chiltern
showed any real interest in it while Silverlink and SWT were a lukewarm
but were interested in gates from the fraud prevention viewpoint. The
more traditional TOCs on the Eastern and Southern regions were simply
not interested at all. What we then called SVT but is now PAYG was seen
as being a dreadful idea and huge threat to their revenue base. It
wouldn't surprise me at all to know if these fears remained.

In some respects work expended on trying to get Oyster PAYG to work on
NR over the last three years may well have been wasted given that the
introduction of tube - train tickets and now zonal fares for NR only
have greatly simplified matters in terms of fares. As someone else
pointed out there are a load of other issues such as season tickets,
relationships between in zone and out of zone and discounts and ticket
classes to be worked out.

It will be interesting to see what press releases fly around tomorrow
and from whom given the mayoral deadline.
--
Paul C


Admits to working for London Underground!

All the golden oldies were the increased risk of fraud
at
ungated stations (as if bits of the Tube and the DLR can't cope with
that);

I've never really grasped this often seen argument. I just can't see how
Oyster is any different from paper tickets in this respect. What am I
missing?

"Graham J" wrote in message
...
All the golden oldies were the increased risk of fraud
at
ungated stations (as if bits of the Tube and the DLR can't cope with
that);

I've never really grasped this often seen argument. I just can't see how
Oyster is any different from paper tickets in this respect. What am I
missing?

I get on at gated station and swipe in my Oyster.

I get off at ungated station and if there is someone there
I swipe out with my Oyster. If there isn't, I walk off and pay
the Oyster 'penalty' fare.

Of course, this only works if the actual fare is less than the
penalty but there are some journeys that will be.

tim

On Jan 31, 7:31 pm, "tim....." wrote:
"Graham J" wrote in message

...

All the golden oldies were the increased risk of fraud
at
ungated stations (as if bits of the Tube and the DLR can't cope with
that);

I've never really grasped this often seen argument. I just can't see how
Oyster is any different from paper tickets in this respect. What am I
missing?

I get on at gated station and swipe in my Oyster.

I get off at ungated station and if there is someone there
I swipe out with my Oyster. If there isn't, I walk off and pay
the Oyster 'penalty' fare.

Of course, this only works if the actual fare is less than the
penalty but there are some journeys that will be.

tim



No no; we are going to find that the price of getting the TOCs to
accept Oyster PAYG is going to be a minimum cash fare for any journey
(eg Bexley to Crayford) of £400.

"tim....." wrote in message
...

"Graham J" wrote in message
...
All the golden oldies were the increased risk of fraud
at
ungated stations (as if bits of the Tube and the DLR can't cope with
that);

I've never really grasped this often seen argument. I just can't see how
Oyster is any different from paper tickets in this respect. What am I
missing?

I get on at gated station and swipe in my Oyster.

I get off at ungated station and if there is someone there
I swipe out with my Oyster. If there isn't, I walk off and pay
the Oyster 'penalty' fare.

Of course, this only works if the actual fare is less than the
penalty but there are some journeys that will be.

and of course I meant to say more.

tim


tim

All the golden oldies were the increased risk of fraud at
ungated stations (as if bits of the Tube and the DLR can't cope with
that);

I've never really grasped this often seen argument. I just can't see how
Oyster is any different from paper tickets in this respect. What am I
missing?

I get on at gated station and swipe in my Oyster.

I get off at ungated station and if there is someone there
I swipe out with my Oyster. If there isn't, I walk off and pay
the Oyster 'penalty' fare.

Of course, this only works if the actual fare is less than the
penalty but there are some journeys that will be.

I had considered that (and I acknowledge you meant more, not less) but
arguably the Oyster 'penalty' fare would be set at a level where any
journeys costing more would be very much in the minority. To me it seems
the 'penalty' fare capability of Oyster at worst reduces the financial hit
of fraudulent travel and at best actually reduces the risk, not increases
it. In contrast the ability to deliberately purchase the cheapest possible
paper ticket to enter at a gated station and take ones chances on there not
being any ticket checks on route or at the ungated exit seems to provide
much more scope for fradulent travel.

If both entry and exit are at ungated stations then the risks with paper
tickets and Oyster seem pretty much equal. In theory one could touch in on
exit if ticket checks are seen and take the 'penalty' hit rather than get
caught travelling fraudulently, but in practice RPIs can watch the
validators and see this happening.

"Graham J" wrote in message
...

If both entry and exit are at ungated stations then the risks with paper
tickets and Oyster seem pretty much equal. In theory one could touch in
on exit if ticket checks are seen and take the 'penalty' hit rather than
get caught travelling fraudulently, but in practice RPIs can watch the
validators and see this happening.

Isn't the amount charged on entry at NR stations such as Marylebone, where
Oyster is in use, already more
than the 'tube' version, and broadly the same as a single NR journey to zone
6?

Paul