There's the additional problem (in addition to everything else that's
been discussed) of the railcard's off-peak definition. I'm pretty sure
I can't get a discount with my railcard before 10am (rather than
9:30). I assume that 9:30 will be the cut-off time with the PAYG
system with the railcard discount?

I am fairly sure that the railcard doesn't have a seperate peak definition,
but some ticket *sellers* do. My YPR discount applies as soon as the "peak"
period ends (9:37 at my station) but the self service ticket machine won't
offer a ticket with the YPR discount until gone 10am. I have never been able
to ascertain exactly when it begins to allow it! The ticket office will
though.

Best Wishes,
LEWIS

On Sat, 15 Dec 2007 15:57:07 +0000, Michael Hoffman wrote:

"Another new thing in the fares leaflet is the availability of Railcard
discounted fares caps on Oyster PAYG. You'll be able to have your Young
Persons, Disabled Persons, HM Forces or Senior Railcard loaded onto your
Oyster card (no details how) and from then on the off-peak fares cap for
you will be around a third lower than normal (e.g. £3.10 vs £4.80 for
Zones 1-2). There doesn't appear to be a discount on peak caps or single
journeys."

This is an interesting development which closes up a few of the gaps in
Oyster versus paper ticketing, but for my and my wife's purposes, not
enough of the gaps to make a switch viable, even when Southeastern
finally starts accepting Pay As You Go (whenever that is!).

My wife has a Zones 3-6 annual travelcard (on Oyster), so when we want
to go to central London she can get us both cheap all zones travelcards
(£4.70 I think they are). Am I right to think that the new Oyster
capabilities don't go any way towards replicating this situation?

By far the easier part of this, to my mind, should be to make sure that
her travel is capped at whatever the Oyster 2008 equivalent of the £4.70
is. Her Oyster card clearly already 'knows' that she has a Gold Card,
since it is loaded onto it. So it seems it should be an even easier task
to set this up than to set up the facilities described by the original
poster. Have they really overlooked this in the new system?

My side of our trips to London, however, I can see is rather a difficult
one to replicate. I could only suggest that we could be able to register
our relationship - as in, the fact that we often travel together, rather
than that we are married! - via the Oyster web site or similar; then if
the system noticed us making the same set of journeys at about the same
time on the same day, it could cap mine at the £4.70-equivalent cost as
well.

(Of course if on that day I took any journey that she did not also take,
my daily cap would revert to the standard daily Oyster PAYG cap, since
that journey would not be covered by her Gold Card's effect on
travelling companions. She, on the other hand, could travel as much as
she liked without me, since she holds the Gold Card.)

I realise my side of this is all quite complicated, but it does sound
like it should be logically achievable. And the first wish - for her
Oyster-stored Gold Card to provide a discount to her Oyster PAYG use -
doesn't even seem complicated.

What do you think - are they ever likely to get either of these ideas up
and running, in addition to these other laudable new features?

Paul

By far the easier part of this, to my mind, should be to make sure that
her travel is capped at whatever the Oyster 2008 equivalent of the £4.70
is. Her Oyster card clearly already 'knows' that she has a Gold Card,
since it is loaded onto it. So it seems it should be an even easier task
to set this up than to set up the facilities described by the original
poster. Have they really overlooked this in the new system?

My side of our trips to London, however, I can see is rather a difficult
one to replicate. I could only suggest that we could be able to register
our relationship - as in, the fact that we often travel together, rather
than that we are married! - via the Oyster web site or similar; then if
the system noticed us making the same set of journeys at about the same
time on the same day, it could cap mine at the £4.70-equivalent cost as
well.


What do you think - are they ever likely to get either of these ideas up
and running, in addition to these other laudable new features?


Annual Gold card discounts would be trivial to implement, but I guess
that they think they are all Zones 1-6 anyway.

Network card discount would only matter at the weekend.

Family railcard, partner and groupsave discounts couldn't be
intrdouced within the existing products.

I would think they could only be implemented either as

i) pre-loaded "stored journey rights" (i think only possible with ITSO
not oyster)

or

ii) end of day rebating (mooted previously on Usenet for the probably
apocryphal weekly "best value" capping.)

On Mon, 17 Dec 2007 07:41:09 -0800 (PST), Matthew Dickinson wrote:

Annual Gold card discounts would be trivial to implement, but I guess
that they think they are all Zones 1-6 anyway.

Network card discount would only matter at the weekend.

Family railcard, partner and groupsave discounts couldn't be
intrdouced within the existing products.

I would think they could only be implemented either as

i) pre-loaded "stored journey rights" (i think only possible with ITSO
not oyster)

or

ii) end of day rebating (mooted previously on Usenet for the probably
apocryphal weekly "best value" capping.)

Thanks for this response. I completely forgot I'd posted this query
until just now, whoops.

The Annual Gold Card part really sounds like a silly oversight. I hope
they rectify that before we finally get PAYG here on Southeastern's
network next year!

And I guess I'll be sticking to paper tickets for the foreseeable future
for my £4.80 all zones travelcard when I go into London with my wife.

Paul

"Paul Speller" wrote in message
...
On Mon, 17 Dec 2007 07:41:09 -0800 (PST), Matthew Dickinson wrote:

Annual Gold card discounts would be trivial to implement, but I guess
that they think they are all Zones 1-6 anyway.

Network card discount would only matter at the weekend.

Family railcard, partner and groupsave discounts couldn't be
intrdouced within the existing products.

I would think they could only be implemented either as

i) pre-loaded "stored journey rights" (i think only possible with ITSO
not oyster)

or

ii) end of day rebating (mooted previously on Usenet for the probably
apocryphal weekly "best value" capping.)

Thanks for this response. I completely forgot I'd posted this query
until just now, whoops.

The Annual Gold Card part really sounds like a silly oversight. I hope
they rectify that before we finally get PAYG here on Southeastern's
network next year!


I don't think it is an oversight - as it basically works as a 'free Network
Card' for annual season ticket holders, I suspect the absence of Gold Cards
from the scheme has to be seen in the same light as the (presumed
intentional) lack of a discount for Network Card holders...

Paul

On Dec 15 2007, 3:57 pm, Michael Hoffman
wrote:
U Thant reports on his blog that:

"Another new thing in the fares leaflet is the availability of Railcard
discounted fares caps on Oyster PAYG. You'll be able to have your Young
Persons, Disabled Persons, HM Forces or Senior Railcard loaded onto your
Oyster card (no details how) and from then on the off-peak fares cap for
you will be around a third lower than normal (e.g. £3.10 vs £4.80 for
Zones 1-2). There doesn't appear to be a discount on peak caps or single
journeys."

http://londonconnections.blogspot.co...discounts-on-o...

Does anyone know how this loading process will be done? Will you be able
to waltz into any LU ticket office and do it? When does this start,
beginning of 2008?
--
Michael Hoffman

I was hoping it would be possible to do it online but alas not..

" * Tube station ticket offices
* London Overground station ticket offices
* Some National Rail station ticket offices "

http://www.tfl.gov.uk/tickets/faresa...ares/6769.aspx