Arrgh.

Just got off the phone after a long session of being bounced around
trying to get a refund for an incomplete journey between Euston and
Watford Junction. Don't get me wrong, the helpline staff seemed
helpful enough, but the first had no idea about Oyster being valid to
Watford Junction, and then giving me an internal telephone number to
the refunds department who all then kicked me back to the end of the
queue of the automated system as soon as they realised what had
happened.

The final attempt resulted in me finding out that to get a refund via
cheque (I only regularly use Oyster for bus journeys...so nominating a
station is no good for me), apparently now has a £5 admin
charge!....which is news to me, and makes it pretty useless for
incomplete journey resolution.

*sigh*

Sometimes, I really, really, really despise this Oyster system.

Sometimes, I really, really, really despise this Oyster system.

To be fair, it's probably not the system but the people implementing it
that's the problem. I'm often in the opposite situation to you, where I'd
rather have Customer Charter refunds issued directly to my Oyster Card but
instead receive paper vouchers through the post which I then have to take to
a ticket office and get them credited to the card there.

dB wrote:
... I'm often in the opposite situation to you, where I'd
rather have Customer Charter refunds issued directly to my Oyster Card but
instead receive paper vouchers through the post which I then have to take to
a ticket office and get them credited to the card there.

As far as I know no refunds are issued directly to the card. At least
the customer charter vouchers can be used when you choose.

To get an Oyster refund you have to make a journey by rail, to know
that you're going to do so and which station you're going to start
from, and to inform the helpline of the fact 5-11 days in advance.
This is spectacularly inconvenient for those who rarely use train or tube.

Why can't the refund be credited by a ticket machine rather than a
barrier?

Colin McKenzie

--
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the population level, and anyway cycling is about as safe per mile as
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Make an informed choice - visit www.cyclehelmets.org.

In article ,
(Colin McKenzie) wrote:

dB wrote:
... I'm often in the opposite situation to you, where I'd
rather have Customer Charter refunds issued directly to my Oyster
Card but instead receive paper vouchers through the post which I
then have to take to a ticket office and get them credited to the
card there.

As far as I know no refunds are issued directly to the card. At
least the customer charter vouchers can be used when you choose.

To get an Oyster refund you have to make a journey by rail, to know
that you're going to do so and which station you're going to start
from, and to inform the helpline of the fact 5-11 days in advance.
This is spectacularly inconvenient for those who rarely use train
or tube.

Why can't the refund be credited by a ticket machine rather than a
barrier?

I thought I had a refund once to my credit card.

--
Colin Rosenstiel

As far as I know no refunds are issued directly to the card. At least the
customer charter vouchers can be used when you choose.

But they are, it's just they send you the vouchers which you then take to a
ticket office (when you remember, have the time and find one that's open),
hand them over to a member of staff who then credits your Oyster card.
Surely, it would be more sensible to cut out the middle man and just credit
the Oyster card in the first instance (and save paper and postage).


To get an Oyster refund you have to make a journey by rail, to know that
you're going to do so and which station you're going to start from, and to
inform the helpline of the fact 5-11 days in advance. This is
spectacularly inconvenient for those who rarely use train or tube.

The paper vouchers are inconvenient for those of us who do regularly use the
underground, so why don't they give people the option of chosing their
preferred method of refunds?

Just a final update on this, I went to one of the main tube ticket
offices at KX a few days back to sort out my unresolved journey, and
the system wouldn't let the nice chappie resolve the journey for me,
nor indeed remove it, or indeed modify it in any way at all. Which is
a bit rubbish, as LO don't have a ticket office at Euston, London
Midland do, and don't care one jot.

So he ended up giving me a new Oyster card with the correct amount
preloaded, which could get expensive for them if they need to do that
to resolve LO journeys!

dB wrote:

The paper vouchers are inconvenient for those of us who do regularly use the
underground, so why don't they give people the option of chosing their
preferred method of refunds?

They used to but they seem to have stopped (I've certainly received
discounts as Oyster Credits on one occasion). Presumably it caused
some problems.

--
Each day a man watched a donkey walk past a high wood fence with one
plank removed. Each day he saw a nose, then the ears, then the neck,
forequarters, back and finally the tail. He pondered this for a time
and eventually declared. “I understand now. The nose causes the tail”