London buses have become cashless

[Busaholic]

I haven't got one. I used to have one before I moved my current account (2 years ago). I have one debit and 3 credit cards.

I don't have one, because when my debit card was due for renewal I'd just heard an item on Radio 4 Today programme, interviewing an academic who specialises in the area of bank fraud, credit card security etc and he said not to touch them with an Oyster Reader, or it may have been bargepole, and it wasn't just in relation to keeping an Oyster card in your wallet near to a contactless card either. He cited M&S where several people had paid a bill by 'ordinary' card and had then been debited again from their contactless card. My solution? Go to the bank and fill in a form saying you want a traditional card, which I now have. This is not Luddite, just a recognition that this may be the next bank 'scandal' to arise and guess who'll pay for it? As a shopkeeper I get German and American bank cards processed and they don't even have chip and pin, just a signature still.

 

[berneyarms]

Today I was on the hourly 166 from Epsom, which has a few low frequency Tfl bus routes but the local station is not in the oyster area. There was a woman who didn't use the bus regularly and needed to travel to Banstead for a job interview. Luckily someone paid her fare for her with their contactless card. I'm not aware of how easy or difficult it is to obtain/top up an oyster card in Epsom. These outlying areas with just the one tfl route out of several bus routes are going to be at a bit of a disadvantage :?

There is an Oyster ticket agent in Epsom less than 5 minutes from the station.

 

[jon0844]

Some places won't activate the contactless acceptance until you try to use it, or ask to use it. Presumably to stop accidental payments, although I doubt you'd pay twice. If you accidentally paid on a card wordlessly, the system would surely not still accept payment another way?

I do think there's a little bit or scaremongering and misinformation from some people who have a financial incentive to do so.

 

[Busaholic]

Some places won't activate the contactless acceptance until you try to use it, or ask to use it. Presumably to stop accidental payments, although I doubt you'd pay twice. If you accidentally paid on a card wordlessly, the system would surely not still accept payment another way?

I do think there's a little bit or scaremongering and misinformation from some people who have a financial incentive to do so.

My wife told me there had been an item on contactless cards on the Underground on yesterday's Radio 4 'World at One' so I've just listened to it on catch-up. Under a Freedom of Information request the BBC obtained (two months later than the maximum response time allowed, a sure sign of embarassment or worse on TfL's part) an internal TfL document from January revealing their extensive trials on the Underground involving contactless cards including when Oyster cards were in the mix.

Banning of cash on buses is of course the outrider to TfL's main purpose of banning it on the tube, which itself is a political decision of the Mayor's to scrap ticket offices, thus saving hundreds of staff. This internal document reveals there would probably be 4,000 to 7,000 'card clashes' EVERY DAY under the present system leading to a 'major reputational problem for TfL and contactless payment in general'. Having been forced into this embarassing revelation, TfL did at least have the grace to allow a couple of spokespeople to be interviewed where the claim was made that, with tweaking, this number had been reduced to 2,200 a day (a suspiciously precise figure).

TfL have admitted that nowhere else in the world will have attempted to introduce contactless card payment on such a scale: so the world is watching and, if deemed a success, it will no doubt be King Boris and, if a failure, will scupper Boris's chances of becoming Tory leader.

 

[jon0844]

There have been posters and announcements about 'card clash' for ages. I don't really see why it's a problem in the long term. It's an educational thing, as in people need to understand the problem.

Once you know only to present one card to a reader (whether for travel or for payment) then you will have no problems.

Such payments are the future, regardless of what TfL may have in mind for other things. Even if we kept ticket offices and still kept taking cash on buses, contactless payment cards would still be the best way for most people to pay. Perhaps even more so than Oyster for irregular travellers.

I can't see this being the deciding factor in whether Boris one day leads the Tories! It really isn't that big a deal. The media makes it so because it's one of those very easy stories to write and will resonate with just about everyone (I mean, we could all be victims, right?).

I've got 5 contactless cards in my wallet, plus a foreign travel smartcard (Stockholm) and a photo ID that also has an embedded chip. I always remove the card I need to pay with, while my Oyster is in a separate ticket wallet. It's not difficult.

 

[Smethwickian]

I see another good reason why card clash shouldn't be an issue.

I always keep my Oyster card separate, to hand, and all my other cards/cash etc in my wallet safely stashed away. If I were to use a contactless card,I would, again, have only that card in my hand on approaching the bus or the tube barrier.

Why would you walk around a bustling tube station concourse or clamber aboard a busy bus platform with your wallet and all those valuable items on show, easily droppable and snatchable in the melee?

It always baffles me when I see pensioners in my native West Midlands openly waving their purses around in bus queues because they have put their NCTS pass in a little window in the front - don't they realise how easily they could lose them to a thief jostling them or brazenly running past?

 

[Tom B]

I have kept my Oyster card separate for many years - for some time I held an Oyster card and a Ridacard (LRT's version of an Oyster), so keeping them together would lead to their being rejected.

FirstBus had plans for a smarcard in South Yorkshire (as with anything new, paid for entirely by the taxpayer), although the flaw with that was it would (I believe) deduct the entire balance at the start of your journey and then put the remainder back on at the end of your journey. I don't trust such a system to work properly, especially when buses or machines break down etc.

 

[bb21]

FirstBus had plans for a smarcard in South Yorkshire (as with anything new, paid for entirely by the taxpayer), although the flaw with that was it would (I believe) deduct the entire balance at the start of your journey and then put the remainder back on at the end of your journey. I don't trust such a system to work properly, especially when buses or machines break down etc.

The entire balance on the card, or just the maximum fare for the journey the bus is running? If the latter, it works more or less just like an Oyster card.

 

[Busaholic]

I see another good reason why card clash shouldn't be an issue.

I always keep my Oyster card separate, to hand, and all my other cards/cash etc in my wallet safely stashed away. If I were to use a contactless card,I would, again, have only that card in my hand on approaching the bus or the tube barrier.

Why would you walk around a bustling tube station concourse or clamber aboard a busy bus platform with your wallet and all those valuable items on show, easily droppable and snatchable in the melee?

It always baffles me when I see pensioners in my native West Midlands openly waving their purses around in bus queues because they have put their NCTS pass in a little window in the front - don't they realise how easily they could lose them to a thief jostling them or brazenly running past?

Personally, I always keep my Oystercard sepparate and to hand, even though I have nothing that could clash, but in London it's not just pensioners who proffer wallets, at least in the parts I tend to frequent which are mostly off the tube network, but people will certainly have to adjust their habits or be out of pocket!

 

[jon0844]

I try and keep my wallet hidden. It's why I couldn't see how the various trials of travel payments using a mobile phone (e.g. Nokia/Barclaycard/O2) succeeding. Who wants to flash their top of the range smartphone on a gateline reader before walking home at 2am? I say that because I worked with people who were on the trial and said just that.

Anyone wanting to steal a nice shiny new smartphone would know exactly where to look for the next victim.

You could argue that one day stealing a wallet won't be of much use either, given you'll probably have little to no cash in it (and the cards can be cancelled and replaced fairly easily and quickly) but I'd still not want to be taking it out at a gateline. If I was going to use it for travel, I'd sooner have it in a ticket wallet. When I had my Barclaycard/Oyster card, it wasn't exactly hard to take the payment card out of that wallet to pay for something.

 

[RJ]

This affected me in the ticket office today. There are a lot of tourists where I work and a surprising number of people every weekend who travel, saying they haven't used trains or buses for years. People in their droves were trying to obtain Oyster cards after realising they couldn't pay cash on the buses. Lots of people were asking me for bus tickets too, but understandably didn't want an £8.90 Travelcard.

There was an Oyster card stockout, the first time I've known this to happen since I started working there over a year ago.

 

[GaryMcEwan]

In theory could EE's Tap Wallet (Cash on Tap) app work as well? Basically you link your Credit or Debit card and top up your balance on the app and you can start using it...

 

[jon0844]

EE told me at launch that there was some issue to be resolved before Cash on Tap could be used. Has that been resolved?

Presumably it comes down to whatever system TfL has in place with the banks? The EE system doesn't debit straight from your bank card, but is charged up by debiting your card (via a payment)?

I've never used it as you have to have an EE supplied phone and new SIM.

 

[GaryMcEwan]

EE told me at launch that there was some issue to be resolved before Cash on Tap could be used. Has that been resolved?

Presumably it comes down to whatever system TfL has in place with the banks? The EE system doesn't debit straight from your bank card, but is charged up by debiting your card (via a payment)?

I've never used it as you have to have an EE supplied phone and new SIM.

Yeah that's right, you have to 'top up' the app via your credit or debit card and the money is transferred onto the app.

 

[Abpj17]

This affected me in the ticket office today. There are a lot of tourists where I work and a surprising number of people every weekend who travel, saying they haven't used trains or buses for years. People in their droves were trying to obtain Oyster cards after realising they couldn't pay cash on the buses. Lots of people were asking me for bus tickets too, but understandably didn't want an £8.90 Travelcard.

There was an Oyster card stockout, the first time I've known this to happen since I started working there over a year ago.

I was getting a clipper from Bankside to North Greenwich and we had to wait for two boats before getting a space. This weekend was apparently extra-busy because of Robbie Williams concert and a nice sunny day.

 

[Tetchytyke]

FirstBus had plans for a smarcard in South Yorkshire (as with anything new, paid for entirely by the taxpayer), although the flaw with that was it would (I believe) deduct the entire balance at the start of your journey and then put the remainder back on at the end of your journey.

That sounds suspiciously like a rehashed version of the First Card that First Bradford finally gave up on a couple of years ago.

Banning of cash on buses is of course the outrider to TfL's main purpose of banning it on the tube, which itself is a political decision of the Mayor's to scrap ticket offices, thus saving hundreds of staff.

Of course it is. It's transparent too. And stupid.

You don't even need to have your bank card and your Oyster card in the same wallet to have "card clash". Not long after contactless card payment was introduced I was on a 43 which took the roundabout in Muswell Hill a bit fast. A woman was pushed against the card reader and BEEP- her handbag had gone against the card reader and it recognised her contactless card inside her wallet insider her bag.

 

[Deerfold]

You don't even need to have your bank card and your Oyster card in the same wallet to have "card clash". Not long after contactless card payment was introduced I was on a 43 which took the roundabout in Muswell Hill a bit fast. A woman was pushed against the card reader and BEEP- her handbag had gone against the card reader and it recognised her contactless card inside her wallet insider her bag.

That's obviously not good - but it's not "card clash" - it's accidentally putting your card (or circumstances causing you to put your card) near a reader without meaning to.

 

[Busaholic]

That's obviously not good - but it's not "card clash" - it's accidentally putting your card (or circumstances causing you to put your card) near a reader without meaning to.

Whatever you call it, it's madness. Someday the wheel will have to be re-invented because we've forgotten how to use it - then somebody will come up with this new, simple concept of 'cash' and we'll wonder why it had never been thought of before. In the meantime, Britain will lead the world (pro rata) in card fraud and how to over-complicate the simplest thing. What possible sane reason can there be for refusing cash? Is it all these raids on security vans we read about everyday requiring Denis Waterman to come out of retirement yet again, this time to rejoin the Sweeney? If TfL want the perfect world, they should just ban passengers and then everything could run like clockwork

 

[Hadders]

Living in Hertfordshire and being a regular bus user it's absolute torture to watch people paying with cash. The faffing around and time it takes is unreal, and slows up the journey quite significantly. Then there's the passenger who tries to pay with a £20 note... Or the one who wants a season ticket, or an explorer ticket...

I do think gong cashless is the best way forward. Perhaps a halfway house could be to have local shops selling bus tickets. I've experienced this when on holiday and it seems to work pretty well although you usually have to buy a carnet of 5 tickets.

 

[Robertj21a]

Whatever you call it, it's madness. Someday the wheel will have to be re-invented because we've forgotten how to use it - then somebody will come up with this new, simple concept of 'cash' and we'll wonder why it had never been thought of before. In the meantime, Britain will lead the world (pro rata) in card fraud and how to over-complicate the simplest thing. What possible sane reason can there be for refusing cash? Is it all these raids on security vans we read about everyday requiring Denis Waterman to come out of retirement yet again, this time to rejoin the Sweeney? If TfL want the perfect world, they should just ban passengers and then everything could run like clockwork

I really can't see what all the fuss is about. High time that people took a bit of responsibility for themselves rather than expecting everything to be handed to them on a plate. Nearly everybody in London travels free, has a season, or uses Oyster. It won't affect foreign tourists as they take care with such issues, it will be people in the UK who don't like it, probably Londoners themselves.

 

[antharro]

I really don't see what the fuss is about either. I have two contactless cards (one debit, one credit) and an Oyster which lives in a separate Oyster wallet so I don't have to get my wallet out when I'm on the tube. I have never had card clash, and I always know which card I'm planning on using. I haven't had need to use either of the contactless bank cards with TfL yet, and probably won't unless I either forget my Oyster or Oyster is phased out - but it's nice to know the option is there if I do forget my Oyster though, and I am aware as I'm approaching the ticket barriers that it is an option should I choose to take it..

More generally speaking, I am very much in favour of not using cash on buses and replacing it with contactless or other fast payments. On the tube I'm still in favour of keeping cash payments, (and ticket offices, but that's another discussion). When I'm not in London, I'm usually in Bournemouth. In the time it takes for one person to get on a bus, fumble around for their wallet, ask the driver for a fare, get cash out, drop the cash, pick it up, give it to the driver, get the ticket, get the change, put their wallet away then go and find a seat, a half mile long queue of traffic has built up (a mile in rush hour in some places). And there are five more people waiting to board. (Granted, some of them will have exact change or a season ticket). In London, a dozen people would have got on, tapped in and the bus would have been on its way. Simples.

This may not be appropriate in the countryside, for example in the Yorkshire Dales, where a contactless bank card may not be able to be authorised due to lack of mobile phone signal for the ticket machine, but even then, isn't there some way that payments can be "stored" anyway? That's what the rail gourmet person told me on a train up to Waterloo once - even if there's no signal, the transaction is presumed to be OK and is stored until signal can be obtained.

 

[fowler9]

I really can't see what all the fuss is about. High time that people took a bit of responsibility for themselves rather than expecting everything to be handed to them on a plate. Nearly everybody in London travels free, has a season, or uses Oyster. It won't affect foreign tourists as they take care with such issues, it will be people in the UK who don't like it, probably Londoners themselves.

You are talking like the bus companies are doing people a favour and are not now part of a business which they are. People want things handing to them on a plate? Well as I said, it is now a business not a service, how long do businesses think they will get away with giving what they want, and not what the customer wants.

 

[Robertj21a]

You are talking like the bus companies are doing people a favour and are not now part of a business which they are. People want things handing to them on a plate? Well as I said, it is now a business not a service, how long do businesses think they will get away with giving what they want, and not what the customer wants.

I agree with you when talking about the UK as a whole but this thread relates just to London. The bus services in the capital are heavily overloaded for much of the day, and night, so are certainly not looking for extra business. In those, fairly unique, circumstances, it's becoming more important than ever to load passengers as quickly as possible.

 

[rmt4ever]

Presumably drivers are supposed to ask if the passenger has a contactless card. This would take care of most situations, and in the unlikely event of the passenger not having one, then it is likely someone on the bus could use theirs in return for cash.

I can see all kinds of problems with that. If the passenger that used their debit or credit card for the other passenger joining the bus, then alights at the next stop and a RPO joins later, how is that passenger going to prove they paid in the absence of the card?

I think it's a disgrace that someone without an oyster or contactless card has to pay £8.90 now to use the bus once!

 

[Deerfold]

This may not be appropriate in the countryside, for example in the Yorkshire Dales, where a contactless bank card may not be able to be authorised due to lack of mobile phone signal for the ticket machine, but even then, isn't there some way that payments can be "stored" anyway? That's what the rail gourmet person told me on a train up to Waterloo once - even if there's no signal, the transaction is presumed to be OK and is stored until signal can be obtained.

So long as the card is not hotlisted it should work - there is no time for authorisation as a card is tapped on a reader. You do need a back office system to process the payments which may not be viable for smaller systems.

I can see all kinds of problems with that. If the passenger that used their debit or credit card for the other passenger joining the bus, then alights at the next stop and a RPO joins later, how is that passenger going to prove they paid in the absence of the card?

I think it's a disgrace that someone without an oyster or contactless card has to pay £8.90 now to use the bus once!

Most places that sell a Travelcard with sell you an Oyster card - you can get a refund for any outstanding credit and your deposit by returning it.

I do think it's a shame that NR stations within the Zones won't sell them.

 

[Tetchytyke]

High time that people took a bit of responsibility for themselves rather than expecting everything to be handed to them on a plate. Nearly everybody in London travels free, has a season, or uses Oyster.

Expecting to be able to get on public transport and use money to buy a ticket is hardly "expecting everything to be handed to them on a plate".

There are plenty of places on the edge of London where on one bus you can only use cash and on the other bus you can't use cash at all. It's ridiculous.

This decision is political. The next step, after closing ticket offices, will be to remove cash facilities at Tube stations. After all there's auto top-up. Never mind the fact that auto top-up means TfL have £20 of your money in their bank account earning interest for them, and never mind that £20 is actually quite a large sum of money, and never mind the dangers of going overdrawn.

Most places that sell a Travelcard with sell you an Oyster card - you can get a refund for any outstanding credit and your deposit by returning it.

That's all well and good, but where do you return the card to? The ticket offices will be closed next year, so the only choice is to post it off for a refund.

Seems a lot of faff to save an amount of money TfL could probably find down the back of the sofa.

 

[Deerfold]

There are plenty of places on the edge of London where on one bus you can only use cash and on the other bus you can't use cash at all. It's ridiculous.

Confusing, perhaps. Ridiculous seems a little strong.

This decision is political. The next step, after closing ticket offices, will be to remove cash facilities at Tube stations. After all there's auto top-up. Never mind the fact that auto top-up means TfL have £20 of your money in their bank account earning interest for them, and never mind that £20 is actually quite a large sum of money, and never mind the dangers of going overdrawn.

I'm against the closing of Tube stations. There's plenty of people for whom Auto-top up is not a good idea.

That's all well and good, but where do you return the card to? The ticket offices will be closed next year, so the only choice is to post it off for a refund.

I was simply pointing out that spending £8.90 is not the only option.

Seems a lot of faff to save an amount of money TfL could probably find down the back of the sofa.

TfL are not rolling in money. There's been a lot of office staff left in the last couple of years.

There's even been cuts in frequencies on some bus services.

 

[Busaholic]

A cash fare of £5 (exact money only, no change given, placed on top of afarebox then deposited therein by the driver, followed by issue of a ticket) would solve all the problems except the one that TfL is too high and mighty to demean itself to handle cash. It would happen relatively rarely, probably mostly in the middle of the night when a few seconds extra are not important, and would make a nice tidy profit for TfL when they are having to make cutbacks thanks in part to ludicrous decisions like paying statues (sorry, conductors) to double-man buses which the bus companies refuse to buy or lease themselves knowing they'll have no use for them outside London (or even Outer London). A mayoral candidate promising to reintroduce the cash option would garner more votes than they lost.

 

[jon0844]

Charging a flat rate £5 with no chance would lead to everyone claiming TfL was seeking to profit from the poor and vulnerable. Seriously, it would be the most stupid solution ever in the history of solutions! And it still means having to handle and process cash!

The current solution will to be let some people travel for free, presumably not widely advertised, which is a problem in itself - but certainly less of a PR disaster.

 

[Deerfold]

A cash fare of £5 (exact money only, no change given, placed on top of afarebox then deposited therein by the driver, followed by issue of a ticket) would solve all the problems except the one that TfL is too high and mighty to demean itself to handle cash. It would happen relatively rarely, probably mostly in the middle of the night when a few seconds extra are not important, and would make a nice tidy profit for TfL when they are having to make cutbacks thanks in part to ludicrous decisions like paying statues (sorry, conductors) to double-man buses which the bus companies refuse to buy or lease themselves knowing they'll have no use for them outside London (or even Outer London). A mayoral candidate promising to reintroduce the cash option would garner more votes than they lost.

You seem to be missing the point. The key is that it costs to have cash handling facilities (not that TfL is too "high and mighty") - these costs are largely fixed and the number of people using cash is declining. So long as you accept cash these costs stay - the cost of somewhere secure at each garage, the secure transfer of this to/from the bank As soon as you accept any cash on buses there are no savings - and with a £5 fare you'd probably have very few people paying it and probably not even covering the cost of handling it.


I doubt most Londoners will be swayed to vote by a promise to reintroduce cash fares (whilst promising to save ticket offices might).