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Yesterday I travelled from Farringdon to Seven Sisters, accidentally boarding a Thameslink train to Kentish Town rather than Finsbury Park. I used the OSI to KTW, yet my touch in there shows on my Oyster history as a second touch out, associated with the journey from ZFD to KTN. I was then charged a penalty fare on exit at SVS! I’ve got in touch with TfL for a refund, but I wonder what caused this?
Hi Felix,
That’s an easy one. The validators at Kentish Town are set to continuation exit because ordinarily they are inside a gated station. Of course they aren’t at the moment because of the rebuilding work. Because Kentish Town West also has validators they can’t tell which way you’re going so with an open continuation exit the system assumed exit.
Do let me know whether TfL respond appropriately with a refund.
Small point: you had an incomplete journey charge rather than a penalty fare.
Ah, I thought it could be something like that. Interestingly, these were the readers in the street once I’d left by the “night exit”. They had in fact covered over the reader on the bridge, perhaps to try to avoid this error?
I doubt readers at a station can be configured differently. The cover over the normal reader is probably to stop you heading towards the closed building. I’ve alerted my contact at TfL so hopefully something will be done.
This is a serious issue. Why does a continuation exit allows continuation of the journey? Isn’t the point of a continuation exit solely to help customers who don’t know if the station is gated or not?
Can you give me some legitimate examples where a continuation exit reader is used other than to exit the station where the reader is located?
At some stations there are validators with signs simply stating that Oyster users should touch here. One such place is Stratford walking away from DLR platform 4. The reason those validators are there is usually to allow NR ticket holders to start or end a PAYG journey. They have to react sensibly if someone touches one when they don’t need to.
Sorry but this is insane. The instruction for such pads should say, like the notice shown at Highbury & Islington Northern City Line / Victoria Line interchange (not the exact wording):
National Rail ticket holders only
If you are travelling with Oyster / Contactless pay as you go and using another ticket for the remainder of the journey, touch here to start or end your pay as you go journey in order for the correct fare to be charged.
Furthermore, all the promotional materials for PAYG users specify that only touch the yellow reader at the start and the end, and all pink readers en-route, so it should be clear enough that yellow readers should not be touched during the journey.
The existence of continuation exits, which puts the card in a state of both inside and outside the system, solves nothing that can’t be solved by prominent signage, but creates so many problems that even RPIs are confused.
I’m very much in agreement, Michael. Signage at many stations leaves a lot to be desired. I’m not convinced different readers for entry and exit would work necessarily. It would be another chance for things to go wrong if someone didn’t have time or space to read the labels. It would work where there are clear lanes for each direction, but that just isn’t the case in most places in London. Also, prominent signage can be an issue in crowds where there isn’t enough room.
However, this particular situation is a serious issue, given that people could be reported for prosecution after doing the right thing. TfL are aware and I hope to have a swift update.
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