Oyster Extension Permits

Arkady

Does anyone here have a Zone 1-2 Oyster Travelcard, but occasionally use National Rail to take them into zones further out? The reason I ask is that I have a Z1-2 pass, but sometimes change onto National Rail at Hi&I or Finsbury Park to get to Harringay, Ali Pally, Palmers Green, etc. Of course I always touch out, and I had assumed that when doing so I would simply be charged for the additional zones using my pay-as-you-go top-up. Apparently this is not the case. One is supposed to acquire an ‘Oyster Extension Permit’ prior to the journey from a TFL outlet, at which point you will be charged from your PAYG once you touch out. Failure to do so can lead to penalty fines or prosecution! Apparently this is to discourage people from ticket-dodging at NR stations without ticket barriers. Now I’m pretty sure I’ve not been hit by any penalties, but on the other hand I’m rubbish at keeping track of that sort of thing so maybe I have been… anyone else had experience/problems with this?

miss annie

They are making that unnecessarily difficult aren't they! With PAYG Oyster one is just charged for the additional zones, wonder why it works differently for Travelcards?

Arkady

Dunno. Here's the info: <http://www.tfl.gov.uk/tickets/14869.aspx>;

Marquis

I have a zones 1 and 2 travel card and travel to zone 6 almost every weekend. I always make sure to touch out and have sufficient funds on my PAYG etc for the extension, and so far I haven't noticed any penalty charges, but a complication would be typical. At least they continue to accept Oyster cards, it was nuisance to have to queue for a paper ticket from boundary zone 2. But some evil big man (or scheming woman) at TFL probably wants the queues back.

Arkady

I’ve done some reading on this, and it sounds like it was the train operating companies such as Southern and First Capital Connect that insisted on this, rather than TFL who would rather just ‘zone’ all of London and keep it simple. It also looks like the rule is rarely enforced, but there are some stories of people being refused exit from ticket barriers and being fined even when they have sufficient PAYG funds: <http://www.consumeractiongroup.co.uk/forum/showthread.php?281399-Fine-and-court-action-Oyster-Extension-Permit>; Here’s our Lynne’s thoughts on it from last year: <http://www.lynnefeatherstone.org/2010/01/oyster-pay-as-you-go-finally-comes-to-alexandra-palace-station.htm>; Supposedly the fare will not be deducted at all if you do not have an OEP, but lots of people are pointing out that this is clearly not the case. Very odd and confusing.

Arkady

I can actually understand the rail companies position. Though most don’t know it you are not required to swipe your Oyster on entry or exit within the zones that you have paid for. So if I did not swipe at FP on the way home I wouldn’t pay a penalty… and the system wouldn’t know I had cheated if I got off at Harringay and didn’t swipe. On the other hand, that’s true of PAYG customers too (assuming they enter at a gateless station).

tosscat

And exit from a gateless station.

Papa

Although with the rail company in question here being the absolutely diabolically bad, greedy and shoddily run First Capital Connect, which has made it quite clear the line is run for their convenience not ours, I'm not sure we should give them any understanding.

Renationalise, at least then we're not lining shareholders' pockets with our rail misery.

Arkady

Short of nationalisation, FCC should at least have their north London suburban franchise taken off them so that they are forced to concentrate on Thameslink. I’ve rambled about this before, but I’d love to see London Overground take over FCC’s services between Moorgate and Ally Pally, thence up to Crews Hill and Hadley Wood. FCC can keep the fast service on the mainline.

JoeV

The essential question is why are PAYG travellers treated differently from those who have travel cards? I don’t see the logic in requiring an extension permit. You either have the correct travel card and/or enough PAYG money on your card or you don’t. For the psoting in the link below it seems the extension permit deducts the fare for the ‘declared’ zone upfront, when you tap-in instead of when you tap-out because the rail companies don’t trust that people will tap-out <http://londonist.com/2009/11/you_are_now_leaving_zone_2_please_h.php>; Why the rail companies trust people and assume they will tap-in in the first place is a question for more enquiring minds than mine.

Arkady

Joe I agree, it's a weird distinction.

Emma

I have an annual travelcard (Gold Card) for zones 1 and 2, and often travel to Croydon, and I always make sure I get a paper extension ticket after conducting some trials a while back to see whether simply touching in at Victoria and out at Croydon charged me the same as the paper ticket price. It doesn't. In fact it seems to charge a different amount each time, and doesn't recognise the fact I have a Gold Card and am therefore entitled to a further discount on the fare. I find the rail companies' attitude to Oyster highly suspect, eg adopted unwillingly and only as a way to get more money out of us by overcomplication.

It's also worth pointing out in this thread that the penalty fare for not touching in/out at the start/end of your journey has just gone up to £6.50.

miss annie

Daylight robbery, theiving whatnots!

Arkady

Emma, That penalty fare only applies to PAYG people though right? If you had a standard TFL annual 1-2 travelcard I think it would cost less to get an extension permit than a paper ticket (but I’m not sure), but I don’t know how or if that’s also true when the gold card discount is taken into account – I suspect not.

Papa

Agreed Arkady, but barring nationalisation I'd go further.

I'd pull every commuter service into London into the London Overground network, so going all the way out into Hertfordshire, Essex, Berkshire, Surrey, Kent etc.

While I'm loathe to give TFL more power, this is the only way I can see of controlling/bringing down fares and what is an essential service for people going to work. It would also create a massive economy of scale.

If you have to have privatised rail let it be long distance, where people have the closest thing approaching a choice of how to travel

Nationalisation would be my first choice.

ADGS

How do people have a choice long distance? There are one or two routes with multiple services (eg to Bristol, you can go from Waterloo or Paddington, iirc) - but they are the exception, not the rule. Or do you mean the choice of trains vs coaches and flying? There are few routes where more than one is genuinely viable, especially as a frequent trip.

Arkady

@Papa L – I agree with you about extending London Overground. So do TFL, they have indicated as such in the past, but I believe they have to wait for franchises to expire, as with Silverlink. I’m also sympathetic to extending the TFL regime further out – the Oyster zones are somewhat arbitrarily contained within the 1965 Greater London boundaries. It’s a little odd that the zones take in Hadley Wood but not the important commuter town of Potter’s Bar which is one stop further out, for instance. Zones should reflect commuter patterns, not semi-arbitrary political boundaries.

sg_mike

OK, techie explanation:

The difference is that LUL stations are supposed to be manned throughout opening hours (as with London Overground stations), so there's some kind of checking that everyone "touches out" and gets a fare deducted from their PAYG. NR stations don't have that requirement. Well, not yet.

Zone 1-2 season travelcard users don't have a deduction taken from their PAYG when they enter a zone1-2 station as quite a few of them don't have PAYG on their oystercards. So there's quite a large opportunity to fare dodge if you exit at an NR station without tapping out.

However, this doesn't apply on the way back. So if you travel from Harringey to Moorgate on a Z1-2 season ticket with PAYG, you only have to tap in at Harringey for the reader to register it as a journey. Because at that point, the reader takes a deposit for the journey, and if a ticket inspector finds you they can fine/prosecute you for not tapping in fairly easily - there's no excuses left.

The easy way to solve this is to give all the Z1-2 season ticket holders the choice to have PAYG on their oystercards - if they do, then they have to promise to tap in and tap out on every journey or accept the maximum fare, just like normal PAYG users, even if the journey's still covered by the travelcard. The fact they haven't done this probably shows that the cost of implementing it isn't worth the extra money they'd make from stopping fare evasion despite the inconvenience to passengers. I.e. TfL can't be arsed.

Not a lot that can be done - rules is rules - but if you're ever given a penalty fare for this, I'd suggest you write a letter to FCC (or whoever), complaining of false advertising about PAYG. If it isn't genuinely pay-as-you-go, then any train company advertising them as valid on their services without a true pay-as-you-go nature would seem to be on thin ice ...

Papa

ADGS - that's why I said the closest thing approaching a choice, ie they could not go by rail but by car, coach or sometimes plane.

You are right, on a evaluation of rail privatisation level, they don't really have a choice at all. After all, you can't decide the train fare to Newcastle is too pricey, so you'll take advantage of competition and use another rail firm because then you'll end up in a completely different place.

The removal of choice is a fundamental flaw in the entire system, but over long distances and less regular travel it impacts less than say someone commuting from St Albans to work.

We studied the proposed rail privatisation for our A-level economics coursework, the arguments we picked out as schoolchildren against the idea are the same problems that have left us with a shit and ludicrously expensive rail system not the shiny better value future we were promised.

I wanted to write that this is a fact that never ceases to amaze me, but on reflection I actually find it in no way suprising.

Arkady, TFL missed a trick when the FCC franchise was issued then, especially as the halfwits have made both the line through Finsbury Park and the Thameslink line worse.

ADGS

As you say, a schoolchild can see the reasons against privatisation. In a hundred years* it's going to seem as baffling as crusades or trepanning do to us.

*assuming we make it that far, and corporate feudalism hasn't been formalised so there's still education for the proles.

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sincers

Ditto. I'll get the bus, thanks.

Papa

Tom Watson's blog today had an interesting suggestion of Cameron calling a snap election <http://labour-uncut.co.uk/2011/01/12/a-snap-election-promises-cameron-the-glory-he-craves/>; He'd probably guarantee victory if he announced he'd renationalise the railways. I cannot even begin to understand that Oyster thing above. Baffling

Arkady

@sg_mike Thanks for the explanation. I agree that asking travelcard users to always tap in and out would be a better solution than the extension permit – most don’t realise that they don’t have to do so anyway. A publicity campaign about that would suffice – I don’t see that it would cost that much. On the other hand, I don’t agree that NR stations not having ticket gates is legitimate excuse for forcing Oyster Extension Permits on people (which is the excuse the rail companies give, not that the stations are unmanned). No DLR or London Overground stations have gates or staff checking that you are swiping in or out - except those that are interchanges with Underground stations - but they are happy to trust travelcard users not to overrun their tickets. And the DLR has been in the Oyster regime from the start.

JoeV

Travel card holders can and do have the option of carrying a PAYG balance on their Oyster cards. When I travel outside the zones of my travel card on the underground the fare is deducted from my PAYG balance, so if TFL trusts me to tap in and out why not the rail companies? I think most people know they have to tap in and out with Oyster, and it’s no different from a paper ticket in that you need one to get in and get out of the system. It seems to me that the extension permit isn’t about fare dodging. It’s all an accounting game and a pissing match between the rail companies and TFL. Rail companies hate the Oyster system because it means TFL have a finger in their pie by putting TFL in control of collecting their fares and reimbursement. It seems to me that if an Oyster user doesn’t tap out it means the rail companies don’t get their money or have to chase harder to collect it from TFL. So they inconvenience passengers by requiring the permit and threaten penalty fares because they can and it’s an easier to collect the cash. @Arkady...thanks for highlighting this. I had no idea what the extension permit was for. I had thought it was to travel outside zone 6 and explains why I couldn't tap out at London Bridge a few weeks ago even though I had enough money on my PAYG for the fare.

Arkady

@the confused: In short, if you have a travelcard (e.g. Zone 1-2) but plan to *end* your journey at a *national rail* station outside your normal zones (e.g. Harringay Rail in Zone 3) using pay-as-you-go, you are first supposed to have an ‘Oyster Extension Permit’ added to your Oyster. You must do this prior to every such journey. If you do not do so you risk being charged the incorrect amount and/or fined. You can acquire an Oyster Extension Permit at all the places that you can normally top-up, including online, underground stations and newsagents (though the latter rarely know what you are on about). @Papa L – London Overground didn’t exist when the FCC franchise was granted. I believe that TFL argued that they should control Thameslink (at the time when the Thameslink 2000 works were being planned), but this option was rejected as it would end up as a London suburban service rather than the Brighton to Bedford (and eventually Brighton-Cambridge) service that it is now. The central Thameslink section has insufficient capacity to accommodate a London Overground-style service *and* a city-to-city service. The high rate metro-style frequency of Thameslink should mean that isn’t a problem, except that FCC are customer-hating nincompoops who can’t be trusted with a damp flannel. One can only hope that when Thameslink 2000 is finished and Bombardier pull their finger out and start delivering the new rolling stock that things will improve. Roll on 2018. It will be nice, it must be said, to be able to go direct to Brighton (or Farringdon, City Thameslink, Blackfriars, London Bridge, Elephant etc en route) from Finsbury Park without having to change onto or between underground lines.

Arkady

You’re welcome Joe. I thought it deserved attention, not least because if you don’t acquire an extension permit you may very well be overcharged and risk a fine.

jandb

@Arkady - can you really get an OEP online? The TFL page I found doesn't mention it.

Arkady

@j&b – you’re right, you can’t. That’ll be because you need to swipe your oyster at a designated spot to apply the change, which people might forget to do, screwing up the stupid ‘system’.

Roy

Just to add to what others have said:

The way PAYG works is that when you touch in then the PAYG 'maximum fare' is deducted from your card, and when you touch out, the difference between that and the correct fare is refunded.

The way a travelcard on Oyster works is that nothing is deducted when you touch in within your zones. It will still record the entry and as I'm sure you know if you end your journey outside your zones it will charge the correct fare from your PAYG balance when you touch out.

But if you just never touch out, you will not be charged. So there's an obvious fraud - touch in within your zones, and leave at an ungated station outside your zones, and you can dodge the fare simply by not touching out.

Now, for whatever reason, TfL were happy with this, either because they think the revenue they lose through people exploiting this loophole is small, or because they have some cunning plan for catching people who exploit it - i dunno.

Now, AIUI some of the Train Operating Companies that operate on National Rail were *not* happy with this loophole. They wanted a system where a ticket inspector on the train could tell whether you've paid, just as they can with a paper ticket, rather than in effect trusting you to pay when you leave the station.

What the OEP on your card does is effectively switch the next journey to PAYG rules *even if you touch in within your zones*. So when you touch in within your zones you will be charged the 'maximum fare' just as PAYG users are. When you touch out, it will refund the difference between the fare taken and the correct fare (and I believe it will correctly refund the entire initial amount taken if you touch out within your zones - although in that case using an OEP was obviously rather pointless!). And if you fail to touch out, you will be left with that maximum fare for your unresolved journey - just as PAYG users are.

Implementing this was the price of reaching agreement to roll out Oyster on NR.

Technically it's true that you can be charged a penalty fare (or even prosecuted!) for failing to get an OEP although posters to uk.transport.london seem to suggest this is not being implemented on the ground. As long as you touch in and out you *will* be charged the correct fare - the problem is just if you encounter an inspector en route he has no way of knowing whether you're a fare dodger or whether you genuinely intend to touch out at the far end.

I suggest if you want to know more then you use Google Groups to browse past postings to uk.transport.london and if you still can't find your answers, post a question there.

-roy (N4-curious but still hoping to become actual N4 soon)

Roy

Incidentally, I don't think it's entirely true that you can *entirely* ignore touhing in and out within your zones if you've got a Travelcard.

Consider this first scenario:

You touch in in central London on your way home from work, and leave at Finsbury Park without touching out.

Shortly after getting home, you realize you need to make a journey from Finsbury Park to Zone 3 and go back to the station where you need to touch in. But when you try to do so you find that you haven't yet exceeded the maximum journey time for your journey home so the system registers your touch as a touch out of your original journey. Now, being aware of the problem and paying attention to the display you see it flash up EXIT and so touch your card again to register an entry - but the system just registers it as a double touch and repeats EXIT.

Now this one is easy to fix, I think. AIUI you just need to wait a short tme (two minutes?) between it flashing up EXIT before touching again and it will flash up ENTRY and you're good to go.

But what if you weren't paying attention and hadn't spotted that it had flashed up EXIT? Unbeknownst to you, you'd be travelling on a PAYG journey without having touched in. At best (and most likely) you'd be charged a maximum fare as a penalty when you touch out -- worst case scenario and you'd be facing the full force of the law for travelling without a validated Oyster card.

You can see why the advice is to always touch in and touch out. Basically as I see it you have three options:

1. Always touch in and touch out

2. Never travel outside your zones, in which case you need only touch where necessary in order to open gates, or

3. Understand the intricacies of the system in their gory, geeky detail, to figure out exactly when you can get away without touching, when you can't, and when you *kinda* can, *but*...

-roy