On Jun 18, 6:57*pm, Paul Corfield wrote:

On Thu, 18 Jun 2009 15:37:17 +0100, "tim....."
wrote:

"Ben Birkner" wrote:
Thanks, Mizter T. I frankly have never noticed any displays at gates
or in buses
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No, that's because it's only there for a micro second and impossible to read
as you are pushed forward by the next person waiting to use the machine, I
don't think I can name a dumber design on a piece of electronic intended for
use by the consumer

As the design is not really any different to those on thousands of gates
in Japan, Singapore and Hong Kong who all had stored value ticketing
long before London I trust you will go and direct your criticism at them
first. *Then you can bare in mind that all of those systems handle
massive flows of passengers on higher capacity gates than we have in
London and seem to cope with little or no problem. *Finally you may also
wish to consider the need to balance the ability of a passenger to see
their balance for a short period of time with displaying the info for
too long thus allowing criminals and pickpockets to target people with
large amounts of value on their cards.

You may think it was all chucked together with no thought but it wasn't.

My reading of tim's comment was that it was really about the bus
ticket machines - perhaps he might care to clarify matters?

As I've said already, I think the display on the bus ticket machines
is less than ideal - though if there's someone behind you then you'll
only ever get a moment to look, and what with the desire to speed up
boarding times and reduce dwell times, perhaps we don't really want
people slowing down when boarding the bus as they try and catch sight
of the display.

FWIW I think the displays on the newer gates are absolutely fine.
(Indeed the whole pickpocket/criminal issue has certainly crossed my
mind - arguably a good reason to just choose £20 rather than £40 when
it comes to auto top-up.) The very small displays alongside the Oyster
pads retrofitted on the older pneumatic gates are an inevitable
compromise, which is fine too.

"Mizter T" wrote in message
...


My reading of tim's comment was that it was really about the bus
ticket machines - perhaps he might care to clarify matters?

I was referring to the bus at the time, mainly becuse there is more need to
be sure that the money has been debited correctly than on the tube.

But the tube ones are crap as well!

(Indeed the whole pickpocket/criminal issue has certainly crossed my
mind - arguably a good reason to just choose £20 rather than £40 when

I admit that I didn't think of this, but now that it's been pointed out, I
think it's a pretty weak argument.

Most people are going to have either a season ticket or auto top up, or
(like me) a low balance. I can't really see that there would be much of a
business in watching people's credit and targeting the ones with a lot of
money on their card. You'd be there for weeks until you found someone. A
thief would be much better off just randomly choosing people and collecting
100s of cards with small balances than one card with a large balance.

tim