Comments on: Andrew Gilligan: Rail Fares To Fall Tomorrow – Shock News

By: Jez

Jez — Mon, 18 Jan 2010 12:40:53 +0000

National Rail IS part of the daily capped rated, if you believe the TFL website:

“Oyster daily price capping

Daily price capping is the most you will be charged a day when you use Oyster to pay as you go on Tube, DLR, London Overground and National Rail services in London.

Adult and child tickets

Adult Peak Off-Peak

Zones 1-2 £7.20 £5.60
Zones 1-3 £8.60 £6.30
Zones 1-4 £10.00 £6.30
Zones 1-5 £12.60 £7.50
Zones 1-6 £14.80 £7.50
Zones 1-9 £16.20 £9.00
Zones 1-9 + Watford Junction/Grays# £18.00 £14.20
Zone 2 £7.20 £5.10
Zones 2-3 £8.60 £5.10
Zones 2-6 £9.00 £5.10
Zones 2-9 £10.60 £5.60
Zones 2-9 + Watford Junction/Grays# £12.60 £7.60″

By: Ed

Ed — Sun, 17 Jan 2010 20:32:51 +0000

One of the problems with the Oyster card pay as you go on national rail is it is not capped. Travel round London on Tube, bus and DLR for the day on PAYG and you won’t pay more than the price of a day travel card.

This is not the case on national rail, as I found out to my cost today. It cost me over £10 to go into town on the train, buzz around a bit on the Tube, and come back from Charing X. Every jounrey was charged as a single – and a return was charged when I tapped in at Waterloo East only to discover the trains weren’t running and tapped out again 30 seconds later.

When I asked the national rail guy about it, he said: ‘Nuh capped.’ Which, on second ask, meant that Oyster card on national rail is not capped.

This is so typical. A half-done job of integration. So now of course I’ll never use Oyster card pay as you go on the national rail network again. I’ll have to q to buy a paper day ticket and I’ll go through the turnstiles more slowly. Thus one of the whole points of ticketless systems around the world – faster passenger throughput – is negated.

It’s infuriating that what many people have lobbied for for years is hobbled by this lack of fare-capping.

Does anyone know why this is?

By: Scarlet

Scarlet — Tue, 05 Jan 2010 19:53:46 +0000

Monthly Travelcards, Zone 2-3, on Oyster, huge fare increase. Not that hard to come across then.

By: Alastair

Alastair — Tue, 05 Jan 2010 11:45:08 +0000

Despite these apparant gains in value, speaking as an ex-Maze Hill commuter we need first of all to remember the massive (17% rise if I remember correctly) last year and probably most important of all the reduction in the service to Charing Cross.

By: Indigo

Indigo — Mon, 04 Jan 2010 21:03:41 +0000

I’d like to hear the official justification for putting up the Oyster card single bus journey fare from £1 to £1.20 – 20 per cent! – I was already cutting back on bus travel and am going to have to cut down even more. It seems only yesterday that “short hop” journeys were a 50p cash fare.

By: Adrian

Adrian — Mon, 04 Jan 2010 13:57:39 +0000

I certainly got a shock when I found my paper ticket DLR return from Greenwich to Canary Wharf had increased from £ 3.20 to £ 7.00 this morning.

By: H

Mon, 04 Jan 2010 10:09:22 +0000

I agree that the increase in bus fares is the real killer in this story and the lack of outrage in mainstream media about it is shocking.

When the bus fares increased previously to a cash fare of £2 , I was concerned that most ordinary people who don’t commute but just travel locally would lose out by not having an Oyster card. Thankfully I was wrong and most people do now use the Oyster card for cheaper bus fares. Their reward? Those who can least afford the increase in cost, particularly in a recession, have been rewarded with an unaffordable price rise. Sadly, it’s those voices we’re less likely to hear from but it is those people who will have to change their behavious to accomodate the cost.

By: Sacha

Sacha — Sun, 03 Jan 2010 22:33:03 +0000

So you lose if you go against the evening peak, which is a big change, so evening workers will be affected for the first time, as well as people using trains going to sports and entertainment.

And of course the buses, where the majority get a huge slap in the face, but I await the angry piece about that next week.

By: andrew gilligan

andrew gilligan — Sun, 03 Jan 2010 17:28:14 +0000

That’s not what you said before, is it? And even your hastily-revised example is proof of no more than what I said before – that, though you can of course find a few people who will lose, the vast majority will gain.

By: Helen

Helen — Sun, 03 Jan 2010 00:40:56 +0000

No, £2.60 is the new price of an off-peak single from z 5 to z1 on National Rail. An off-peak day return (after 09:30am or any time at weekends) before 2 January was £5.30. The off-peak day return has now been withdrawn, meaning a return trip from z5-z1, leaving 6pm and returning after 10pm, now costs £6.50 instead of £5.30.