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I think lying is too strong a word here. TfL have not said that all fares have risen in line with the national increase of 4.6%.
Whenever increases are applied to small fares there is always going to be quite a bit of variation given that the increased fare still has to be a multiple of 10p. There will be winners and losers, but overall the increase will be roughly the desired figure.
That said, the fares in zones 2-6 have seen an abnormally high increase. It should be noted that compared to NR fares, TfL fares are still competitive. I don’t know whether there is a direct connection, but bus and tram fares have been frozen, so across all of TfL the increase is probably just right.
The fares in zones 7-9 may have been an oversight (I genuinely dont know) and they may well go up more next year.
Hi Rob,
Although the off-peak cap for zones 1-9 is the same as for 1-6, the weekly caps are very different. I’d therefore expect you to be charged zone 7-9 extension fares relevant to the times of the journeys to/from Brentwood. However, they won’t account for £11.30 extra, unless you went there and back twice.
I’d be grateful if you could post your journey history for the week so I can try and work out what’s happened.
I checked earlier and it was working fine. I even saw the touch in on the bus I was using after about 15 minutes
Hi kijeta,
Neither of those journeys have been charged correctly. The two max fares one is interesting because 70 minutes is the usual maximum allowed for a single zone, but in zone 1 that is extended to 90 minutes so there shouldn’t have been a problem. For the other one I wonder whether there was a timing issue and the validator recorded a time after that received from the gate.
I would contact the help desk and ask them to look into both journeys and explain why they have been mis-charged. At the very least they should convert both to a single zone 1 fare of £2.70/£2.80. If they do give you an explanation (and I hope they will), please do come back here and let us know what they say.
The timing issue is one that I have seen before, though it is very rare. In most cases it won’t have any effect, but where an interchange with a very short walk between readers is involved it could cause issues.
Hi Chris,
I think the idea is to allow pedestrians to make the journeys across the river without paying. Thus it will only apply to journeys between the specific pairs of stations. You could get out and touch out/in to get a slightly cheaper fare on a longer journey, but it’s probably only worthwhile if one of the 4 stations is at one end of the overall journey.
I haven’t got any information on how it will work yet. I’m still awaiting information held up by the cyber security incident and we’ve got the March fares revision to come first.
Hi Christine,
Both the 60+ Oyster card and the older person’s Freedom Pass are treated as off-peak travelcards so purchase of extension tickets is the same in both cases.
I’m a little confused about what you mean by changing at London Bridge in relation to Epsom, and specifically Ewell West. Are you arriving into London Bridge using Southeastern? If so, I’d recommend changing at Waterloo East instead and taking SWR direct to Ewell West from Waterloo. That way no extension is required.
Otherwise, you can purchase the ticket from Boundary Zone 6 to Epsom anywhere before you actually need to be using it. London Bridge would be fine. The return extension ticket is valid between either Ewell East or West and Epsom, so you could use it with your 60+ to get from East to West via Epsom. You’d need another return ticket to do the reverse journey later in the day because you use both outward and return on the one journey.
Hope that helps.
Hi Michael,
Apologies for the delay in replying.
The nature of the stations at Farringdon and Liverpool Street on the Elizabeth line mean that fares valid to/from either of them have to also apply to Barbican and Moorgate respectively. The same is also true in reverse for Moorgate and Liverpool Street. A side effect of this is that travel on the Circle, Met or Ham&City can be allowed at NR rates if the overall journey could have been made on NR only. It’s complicated.
I will look further at the fares guide map, but it is only a guide and the page does say that the fare finder should be used for specific fares. There are other anomalies which aren’t specified like fares for SWR services changing to the Victoria line at Vauxhall for other LU destinations in zone 1. Although the journey is charged as one, if splitting it in two at Vauxhall would be cheaper then the sum of the split fares is what is charged.
Hi Christine,
Buses are zoneless, so if a bus accepts Oyster then it is valid for the whole route. The 60+ Oyster is accepted on all TfL bus routes after 9am on weekdays.
It’s definitely valid on the 96/428/492 to Bluewater. If the other buses you mention are operated on behalf of TfL and accept Oyster for payment then it will be valid on them too.
Hope that helps.
A single pre 0930 tube journey followed by 4 chargeable bus journeys will cost the price of the tube journey plus the bus cap.
I think you’re conflating two issues. If you start in zone 6 on a train then make lots of zone 1-2 journeys then you will reach the zone 1-6 cap, and that will be corrected by the back office if the zone 6-1 journey plus zones 1-2 cap is less than the zone 1-6 cap. However, where buses are concerned, they will NEVER charge more than the bus cap.
Using current rates this is what would happen assuming all travel is after 0930 with a railcard discount.
Bus £1.75
Bus £1.75 total £3.50
Tube £2.10 zone 1-2 off-peak cap £5.60
Bus Free
Bus FreeHope that helps.
I’m confused. Neither a Student photocard or a blue Oyster with a discount will go through the back office, so why are you better off using different cards? Am I missing something?
And no, there’s no update on all Oyster cards going through the back office.
Hi Matthieu,
Bus (and tram) journeys will always be limited by the bus cap in the first instance. The bus fares also count towards whatever rail cap might be triggered, but you’ll only ever pay up to the bus cap on buses/trams. The back office follows the same rules in relation to caps.
Neither photocards, nor blue Oyster cards with a discount attached, go through the back office calculation at the end of the day.
Hi Michael,
That’s not what I’d expect. Can you paste the relevant journey history in here with all touches expanded?
Hi Reg,
Sadly not. The Gatwick Express will be charged separately at full price, then there will be a zone 1 tube fare.
Hi Amber,
Apologies for the delay.
If you cross zone 1 from one side to the other then you will be charged a zone 1 single from your PAYG balance.
Time limits do apply when using a travelcard, but in your specific example you might get away with no further charge. I would advise having some credit in case you find yourself needing to exit outside of your zones.
Hi Chris,
There are no OSIs between the NR and LU stations at Heathrow, so you’d be ‘charged’ for two journeys, albeit that the second one would be free.
Hi James,
As long as you don’t exceed the interchange time between the Finchley Road stations then the whole journey will be charged as off-peak. I do try to make this clear on the peak, off-peak and caps page. This can have undesirable consequences at the other end of the peak periods, but that is how the system works.
Thanks for the input, Michael. Yes, fares which go beyond zone 6/9 do not conform to any pattern. There are other split points like East Croydon on fares from Gatwick Airport and many points on fares from Reading. With the latter one it wouldn’t be possible to use the fast trains if a split was desired.
Hi,
Yes, using the Underground from Hertford North will add extra to the cost for travel to zone 1. I don’t think there is likely to be any significant reduction in peak fares anytime soon. In to Covent Garden and out from Moorgate is quite an interesting journey combination. How do you get between the two during the day?
There are no avoiding zone 1 fares between Hertford North and South Bermondsey. You can avoid zone 1 if you go to Bermondsey on the Jubilee line via Stratford. The cheapest fare means using Thameslink between either Finsbury Park or St Pancras and London Bridge and then Southern to South Bermondsey. If Thameslink is shut for engineering works then you may have to pay the extra to use the tube.
The other thing to note is that the TfL Oyster app is the most affected Oyster thing by the cyber security alert. Even if you do get a card to view on there you won’t be able to top up. I don’t know whether this also affects the website because I very rarely use my Oyster card these days.
More details of the cyber security alert will be coming shortly – watch latest news.
Hi,
Weekly capping on Oyster is currently only done on normal adult Oyster cards with no discount entitlement. If you are certain that you won’t need to use the discounted travelcards then I agree that a normal Oyster is ok. The 16-25 railcard can be added to both normal and Student Oyster cards.
Hi Chantal,
The Oyster app doesn’t actually let you travel, its for managing your account on the go. You need an Oyster card. Take it, and your senior Railcard, to an Underground station and ask one of the staff to add the discount entitlement. It should only take a couple of minutes.
The zone 1-2 cap is a cap on charges for travel solely within zones 1-2. If you use zone 3 then your cap becomes zone 1-3. Yes, your single fares between zones 1-3 have contributed towards a zone 1-2 cap, but you still have to pay for the zone 3 bits. These are called extension fares and are calculated at the same rate as the fares just for the extension bit. If the extension fares plus the smaller cap end up being more than the larger cap then the larger cap is charged.
It doesn’t matter when the zone 1-3 journeys are made, they will never fully contribute to the zone 1-2 cap.
