-
Just got an offer for 20% off TFL contactless every time up till the start of April on my BAPP. It says up ‘20% off every time up to £7’, assume that means £7 in total rather than every time, but either way it’s a saving on everyday spend
Why do TfL run such offers? Do they really expect an uplift in profits as a result?
Perhaps they should run similar offers for congestion charging or ULEZ?
Yeah it’s weird. I was thinking maybe it’s amex funding it to get people to switch to using amex instead of their other cards?
I was going to use my Amex on this public transport monopoly as normal until I saw this offer. Oh wait…
Honestly, makes no sense why they’re preaching to the choir.
TfL want people to switch to contactless instead of using Oyster cards – that’s clear from their messaging across the network. I don’t pretend to know all the reasons why, but an obvious one would be that in due course (a number of years presumably) they want to retire Oyster altogether and save on the operational and infrastructure costs of running it.
The contactless-capable zone is also gradually expanding so, in some cases, TfL are trying to encourage people to shift from paper tickets to contactless payment (because it’s cheaper for them operationally, and arguably for more murky reasons about fare structures and the share of revenue they get from paper Travelcard sales). An offer like this could be enough to persuade people to break their existing Travelcard habit and try contactless instead.
So, assuming that Amex co-funded it to some degree, this could be a relatively efficient way for TfL to nudge gently along the trajectory they want – for sound reasons – to be on. Or it could be that all the slots get taken up by people (like me!) who would have been using contactless anyway. I doubt anyone here has the data needed to really know.
Yeah it’s weird. I was thinking maybe it’s amex funding it to get people to switch to using amex instead of their other cards?
Yes, I believe the idea is you add it to your phone or set it as a default card so use it more for other transactions too
Not on either of our cards.
You’d have thought the ‘system’ would be intelligent enough to target Londoners who currently are not using their Amex/contactless for their TfL travel.
Perhaps I’m not giving them enough credit; given I used their previous offer (20% off up to £5 I think), I clearly wasn’t deemed worthy of it this time!
Yep, its a bit of both. TfL wants people to move to contactless while Amex wants people to set the amex card as default card.
I hope people use the card through apple / google pay instead of using the physical card.The contactless-capable zone is also gradually expanding so, in some cases, TfL are trying to encourage people to shift from paper tickets to contactless payment (because it’s cheaper for them operationally, and arguably for more murky reasons about fare structures and the share of revenue they get from paper Travelcard sales). An offer like this could be enough to persuade people to break their existing Travelcard habit and try contactless instead.
I read that when the contactless zone is expanded, the new stations will not accept oyster. So the oyster sunsetting is already in place.
TfL want people to switch to contactless instead of using Oyster cards – that’s clear from their messaging across the network. I don’t pretend to know all the reasons why, but an obvious one would be that in due course (a number of years presumably) they want to retire Oyster altogether and save on the operational and infrastructure costs of running it.
Cost is the key. Oyster has to be fully supported by TFL while the contactless burden can be shared with payment providers as they have an incentive to get the users tapping their cards.
I read that when the contactless zone is expanded, the new stations will not accept oyster. So the oyster sunsetting is already in place.
Aaaaargh – I was trying not to be too nerdy, but can no longer resist…!
You are correct, and there is a technical reason for it. There is an assumption baked deep into the Oyster system – embodied in the chips on the millions of individual cards – that London is divided into at most 15 fare zones. That seemed like plenty compared to the six zones that existed at the time, but then they added zones 7-9, a special zone for Shenfield, another for Gatwick Airport and so on, and they hit the limit of 15 back in 2019 I think. So since then, any new stations that don’t slot into an existing fare zone can’t work with Oyster.
The underlying “issue” (if it’s fair to call it that) is that Oyster was designed for a time when you couldn’t rely on fast reliable networking to all the readers, so the card itself has to store enough information to work out the correct fare. Contactless is a much simpler system, where the fact you tapped a reader just goes back to a sever farm somewhere, and all the calculations can be done there. Even if they decided to upend the whole zone system it would simply mean replacing the algorithm, as opposed to replacing tens of millions of physical Oyster cards.
So although Oyster and contactless seem quite similar to users, they are totally different – and it will surely be a big cost saving when Oyster is finally binned. There are also some “interesting” security implications of the fact the balance is carried on the Oyster card itself which if I were them I’d be happy to see go away.
There will always be people who don’t have contactless cards, of course, and the ticket machines in tube stations will always have to be able to sell _something_. My best guess is that we’ll end up with something which is branded Oyster, but behind the scenes is a contactless pre-paid debit card… but that’s complete speculation on my part.
how does the discussion about sunsetting oyster aling with kids oyster photocards ?
you need to differentiate between adult contactless fares and kids. not all kids have contactless payment cards…
Probably something like “My best guess is that we’ll end up with something which is branded Oyster, but behind the scenes is a contactless pre-paid debit card…”
The Oyster-like card in Chicago e.g. is a prepaid MasterCard.If they move everyone off Oyster the can keep all the unused Oyster credit from old cards?
Probably something like “My best guess is that we’ll end up with something which is branded Oyster, but behind the scenes is a contactless pre-paid debit card…”
The Oyster-like card in Chicago e.g. is a prepaid MasterCard.I’m fairly sure TfL didn’t want to do that as, instead of being responsible for some travel credit, they’d be responsible for real money.
If they do decide to start handing out pre-paid cards and binning Oysters, they also need to address discounted and free fares which don’t work on touch-in/touch-out payment cards. Something they have been over promising and under delivering in for years now.
If they move everyone off Oyster the can keep all the unused Oyster credit from old cards?
No because you can ask for a refund at any time.
Outstanding balances are even shown as a line in the TFL accounts.
The reason I kept using Oyster for years after the introduction of contactless was because National Railcard discounts can only be added to Oyster cards, not contactless, for a 1/3 discount on off-peak travel. That’s still the case as far as I’m aware (although I no longer have a Railcard) so I’m not sure how they’ll get around that, given Railcards can’t be added to contactless cards.
Unless and until TfL can load my 33.4% National Railcard (Gold Card) discount and my annual Travelcard, which are Oyster only now, this is a useless promotion.
I’m not sure how they’ll get around that, given Railcards can’t be added to contactless cards.
This will be possible at some point. You will register both a contactless card and a railcard on your TfL account. Once confirmed your card will be charged the discounted fares/caps. You would probably only be allowed to have one contactless card at a time – which would make applying potential future Amex offers a hassle.
The problem with railcards at the moment is live verification. When railcards are attached to contactless cards, Revenue Protection Officers would need to be able to retrieve the railcard details from the TfL database to compare with your actual railcard when they do a revenue block. However at present they can’t even see whether you have touched in (which does mean that it is easy to evade fares if you have lots of contactless cards), they can only see if your card is blacklisted.
Not on either of our cards.
You’d have thought the ‘system’ would be intelligent enough to target Londoners who currently are not using their Amex/contactless for their TfL travel.
Perhaps I’m not giving them enough credit; given I used their previous offer (20% off up to £5 I think), I clearly wasn’t deemed worthy of it this time!
Well, of course – why would they keep offering you the cashback when the aim of the promotion was met previously?
Aaaaargh – I was trying not to be too nerdy, but can no longer resist…!
You are correct, and there is a technical reason for it. There is an assumption baked deep into the Oyster system – embodied in the chips on the millions of individual cards – that London is divided into at most 15 fare zones. That seemed like plenty compared to the six zones that existed at the time, but then they added zones 7-9, a special zone for Shenfield, another for Gatwick Airport and so on, and they hit the limit of 15 back in 2019 I think. So since then, any new stations that don’t slot into an existing fare zone can’t work with Oyster.
The underlying “issue” (if it’s fair to call it that) is that Oyster was designed for a time when you couldn’t rely on fast reliable networking to all the readers, so the card itself has to store enough information to work out the correct fare. Contactless is a much simpler system, where the fact you tapped a reader just goes back to a sever farm somewhere, and all the calculations can be done there. Even if they decided to upend the whole zone system it would simply mean replacing the algorithm, as opposed to replacing tens of millions of physical Oyster cards.
So although Oyster and contactless seem quite similar to users, they are totally different – and it will surely be a big cost saving when Oyster is finally binned. There are also some “interesting” security implications of the fact the balance is carried on the Oyster card itself which if I were them I’d be happy to see go away.
There will always be people who don’t have contactless cards, of course, and the ticket machines in tube stations will always have to be able to sell _something_. My best guess is that we’ll end up with something which is branded Oyster, but behind the scenes is a contactless pre-paid debit card… but that’s complete speculation on my part.
And remember TfL have to pay Cubic Transportation Systems a tiny percentage of everything that goes through Oyster, which is Cubic’s system. So the more you can take away from Oyster the better for TfL.
I was looking at money wallets for my trip to Japan, and I thought – this could be a good way to remove all those Oyster cards from circulation and have only digital ones. That’s how you solve the issue with child oysters. Gatekeepers and bus drivers could still hear a different sound when a child oyster is used if a child tapped in/out with a money wallet (so long the wallet has the right set-up of course!)
- You must be logged in to reply to this topic.
