King’s Cross to Sidcup 26/07 - Rail replacement contactless

I’ll be travelling from King’s Cross to Sidcup tomorrow and just noticed engineering works are taking place tomorrow so the route is King’s Cross - Victoria (underground) - Lewisham (rail) - Sidcup (rail replacement bus)

As I’ll be using contactless after touching out at Lewisham what is the process after that? Do I have to tap in and out on the bus somehow or do they just ‘not care’

Rail replacement buses in the London PAYG area are de facto free because there is no mechanism to charge the PAYG rail fare. They also cannot charge bus fares because they usually aren't registered bus routes, and charging a bus fare would result in the rail journey being split in two, this incurring a higher overall fare.

Very occasionally - generally for longer term closures - RRBs will be registered as bus routes, but I think it's only TfL that do this.

If you ask the TOC they will say that you need to buy a paper ticket or eTicket but in practice al almost nobody (other than those making longer distance connecting journeys) would do so.

johntea said:

I’ll be travelling from King’s Cross to Sidcup tomorrow and just noticed engineering works are taking place tomorrow so the route is King’s Cross - Victoria (underground) - Lewisham (rail) - Sidcup (rail replacement bus)

As I’ll be using contactless after touching out at Lewisham what is the process after that? Do I have to tap in and out on the bus somehow or do they just ‘not care’

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It’s probably be faster and cheaper to do a St Pancras- Blackfriars- Lewisham on a Thameslink + Southeastern, rail only journey.

Or even faster if using a LU metropolitan to Farringdon then Elizabeth Line to Abbey Wood for SL3 bus which is about £1 more than the original LU + NR zone 1+2 journey

Thanks for the clarification...I've never had to use a rail replacement bus in London before amazingly

The St Pancras - Lewisham rail journey looks like a good idea too, don't think the SL3 would benefit me too much as I'm staying at the Premier Inn next to Sidcup station and SL3 looks to stop about 15 minutes away

johntea said:

SL3 looks to stop about 15 minutes away

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SL3 has a stop at Sidcup Station so shouldn’t be much in it

There’s no Thameslink through London Bridge today, Victoria to Lewisham trains seem to be suffering difficulties too.

OP might be better off travelling to Farringdon and getting the Liz Line to Abbey Wood for the SL3 (which drops off close to the station and the Premier Inn in Sidcup).

Ended up doing the St Pancras - Farringdon - Abbey Wood - SL3 in the end for a bit of fun