On May 8, 12:01 pm, alex_t wrote:
No excuse at all , because obviously I always carry a laptop around
with me wherever I go. Why didn't I think of logging on when I was
standing in that bus queue? Must've just slipped my mind.

No excuse, because judging from your posting frequency you obviously
have an Internet connection around the clock - and may be it's about
time to start using it for something useful, don't you think?

I don't generally have one when I'm out and about you muppet.

P.S. Oyster website works from mobile phone too - no need for laptop.

Not on my cheap pay as you go they don't and even if it did, you think
I'm spending money to check my oyster card balance? Get real.

B2003

On May 8, 2:13 pm, "Richard J." wrote:
If checking your balance is so difficult for you to organise, why not use
auto-top-up?

A) I don't use it enough to make it worthwhile.

B) If you think I'm giving TfL my credit card details you're leaving
in a dream world

C) None of this provides a good reason for paying by cash being twice
the price.

D) Are the TfL apologists breeding or have they started implanting the
mind control chips in others now?

B2003

On May 8, 12:20 pm, MIG wrote:
There seems to be a standard pattern to these exchanges.

Person A points out that certain people (eg those living in South
London or occasional visitors) are disadvantaged by rules which need
not be as they are and suggests a simple change to the rules.

Person B pointlessly (I mean helpfully) explains how you can do some
laborious things to avoid the situation.

Person A says yes I know all that, but there are situations where a
person can still legitimately be in a position where they are
disadvantaged (eg machine not working, shop in wrong direction, bank
holiday etc etc), and that rather than them have to get round it, they
are still suggesting that the rule could be changed.

Person C chimes in with something really ludicrous like suggesting
that you are an idiot for not logging into the Web from a bus queue or
planning every journey days in advance.

Person A says for Godsake, I am just pointing out that the unfairness
is unnecessary and could be solved (repeating whatever the suggestion
was, eg normal priced extensions for paper travelcards).

Person B comes back and says "you are making a mountain out of a
molehill".

The thing about all this is not the scale of the molehill, just that
when there is a molehill, however small, for which there is a
solution, it is sheer bloody-mindedness that makes TfL and its
defenders refuse to contemplate addressing it.

Quite!

B2003

On 8 May, 12:20, MIG wrote:
There seems to be a standard pattern to these exchanges.

Person A points out that certain people (eg those living in South
London or occasional visitors) are disadvantaged by rules which need
not be as they are and suggests a simple change to the rules.
[...]
Person A says for Godsake, I am just pointing out that the unfairness
is unnecessary and could be solved (repeating whatever the suggestion
was, eg normal priced extensions for paper travelcards).

Person B comes back and says "you are making a mountain out of a
molehill".

The thing about all this is not the scale of the molehill, just that
when there is a molehill, however small, for which there is a
solution, it is sheer bloody-mindedness that makes TfL and its
defenders refuse to contemplate addressing it.

In this case, Person A wasn't talking about something sensible and
straightforward like extension fares - they were suggesting that the
price differential between Oyster and paper tickets should be
abolished, despite the fact that paper tickets are substantially more
expensive for TfL to deal with.

Yes, auto-top-up should work on buses, prepay should be valid for all
rail travel within Greater London, etc, and no, the fact that these
don't work isn't the regular punter's fault.

But that doesn't alter the original point, which is that it saves us
all a lot of time and money if people use Oyster; therefore people who
don't use Oyster cost us all a lot of time and money; therefore it's
fair to charge them more for the privilege.

--
John Band
john at johnband dot org
www.johnband.org

On Tue, 6 May 2008 14:24 +0100 (BST), (Colin
Rosenstiel) wrote:

In article
,
(Boltar) wrote:

I had to use a bus on the w/e and found that my pre pay had run out.
It cost me 2 quid to go 1 mile because I had to pay by cash. Is that
fair? I don't think so. Same story on the tube.

I think one of the first things boris should at is ditch Kens
idiotic , deliberate and spiteful disparity between the Oyster and
cash fares to deliberately force occasional commuters to use Oyster
to no benefit to themselves but every benefit to TfL.

Always keep a small credit on your Oyster then. I keep £1.50 so I won't
get caught out like that.

I carry a book of Saver bus tickets to use when I run out of PAYG
credit. Has come in handy on several occasions. I can't use Auto
top-up as you have to 'charge' the card at an underground barrier and
I rarely use the Tube.

Ken

On Thu, 8 May 2008 02:33:24 -0700 (PDT), Boltar
wrote:

On May 8, 7:30 am, James Farrar wrote:
On Tue, 6 May 2008 03:49:51 -0700 (PDT), Boltar

wrote:
On May 6, 11:12 am, John B wrote:

[as well as the auto-top-up point someone else mentioned, aren't there
any newsagents near your house?]

If i'd known it had run out I'd have topped it up beforehand. Its a
bit late when I'm already on the bus.

In other words, you didn't keep track of the balance on your card, an
entirely trivial thing to do.

Of course , when I'm in a hurry back from somewhere I'll always glance
at the gate to see the balance left with a dozen people in a hurry
behind me to get out - oh wait , not all of them show it. But thats
easily solved - next time I want to get a bus I'll just head off down
the tube station to see how much I have on my card - oh wait , its a
mile away and the nearby NR station doesn't take prepay and has no
machines to read it. Well thats ok , I'll just go to the nearby
newsagents and ask them. Oh , its bank holiday and they're closed.

Yes , trivial, and I should be punished by having to pay double fare.

Do you work for the Labour party by any chance?

This last question is quite possibly the funniest thing I've ever read
on Usenet.


Every time you use your Oyster card, you should be looking at the
display, if only to check that the card has been read correctly. When
you look at the display, it tells you your balance (if you have used
PAYG for that journey). Therefore, it is trivial to know when you're
running low on credit.

You mentioned not using PAYG often enough to make atuo-topup
worthwhile. In that case, may I suggest that you give yourself a
target to keep your balance within a band of, say, £5-£15. That way,
when your balance drops below £5, you have plenty of time to add £10
before you run out of credit.

Your moan about not all gates showing the balance is technically true
but irrelevant - the only gates, TTBOMK, that don't have a display are
the *in* gates on the oldest model gates. Even if you happen to use
one such gate to enter the Tube system, you will still be leaving it
by a gate with a reader or a standalone target - all of which will
show you your balance.

Bottom line, when you get penalised because you screwed up - that's
no-one's fault but your own.

--
James Farrar
. @gmail.com

On 8 May, 17:30, James Farrar wrote:
On Thu, 8 May 2008 02:33:24 -0700 (PDT), Boltar





wrote:
On May 8, 7:30 am, James Farrar wrote:
On Tue, 6 May 2008 03:49:51 -0700 (PDT), Boltar

wrote:
On May 6, 11:12 am, John B wrote:

[as well as the auto-top-up point someone else mentioned, aren't there
any newsagents near your house?]

If i'd known it had run out I'd have topped it up beforehand. Its a
bit late when I'm already on the bus.

In other words, you didn't keep track of the balance on your card, an
entirely trivial thing to do.

Of course , when I'm in a hurry back from somewhere I'll always glance
at the gate to see the balance left with a dozen people in a hurry
behind me to get out - oh wait , not all of them show it. But thats
easily solved - next time I want to get a bus I'll just head off down
the tube station to see how much I have on my card - oh wait , its a
mile away and the nearby NR station doesn't take prepay and has no
machines to read it. Well thats ok , I'll just go to the nearby
newsagents and ask them. Oh , its bank holiday and they're closed.

Yes , trivial, and I should be punished by having to pay double fare.

Do you work for the Labour party by any chance?

This last question is quite possibly the funniest thing I've ever read
on Usenet.

Every time you use your Oyster card, you should be looking at the
display, if only to check that the card has been read correctly. When
you look at the display, it tells you your balance (if you have used
PAYG for that journey). Therefore, it is trivial to know when you're
running low on credit.

You mentioned not using PAYG often enough to make atuo-topup
worthwhile. In that case, may I suggest that you give yourself a
target to keep your balance within a band of, say, £5-£15. That way,
when your balance drops below £5, you have plenty of time to add £10
before you run out of credit.

Your moan about not all gates showing the balance is technically true
but irrelevant - the only gates, TTBOMK, that don't have a display are
the *in* gates on the oldest model gates. Even if you happen to use
one such gate to enter the Tube system, you will still be leaving it
by a gate with a reader or a standalone target - all of which will
show you your balance.

I can't remember the last time I went in or out of an LU gate that
displayed anything at all apart from maybe "Enter" or "Exit".

On Thu, 8 May 2008 09:35:03 -0700 (PDT), MIG
wrote:

On 8 May, 17:30, James Farrar wrote:

Your moan about not all gates showing the balance is technically true
but irrelevant - the only gates, TTBOMK, that don't have a display are
the *in* gates on the oldest model gates. Even if you happen to use
one such gate to enter the Tube system, you will still be leaving it
by a gate with a reader or a standalone target - all of which will
show you your balance.

I can't remember the last time I went in or out of an LU gate that
displayed anything at all apart from maybe "Enter" or "Exit".

Using PAYG or a Travelcard?

--
James Farrar
. @gmail.com

A) I don't use it enough to make it worthwhile.

It would occasionally save you the difference between cash and Oyster
fares - makes sense if it is a frequent problem for you.


B) If you think I'm giving TfL my credit card details you're leaving
in a dream world

Any reasonable explanation why not?


C) None of this provides a good reason for paying by cash being twice
the price.

Yes, but the cost of paper tickets, handling, printing, proofing them
from fakes - all the extra costs that TfL needs to cover somehow. And
the less people use paper tickets, the more expensive it gets for
single ticket (economy of scale) and the bigger loss for TfL.

I don't generally have one when I'm out and about.

Well, I don't know, you could check before going out - I mean, tens of
thousands of people somehow manage that.