Disparity in Oyster vs Contactless inspections

[Tetchytyke]

Set the incomplete journey charge too low and it could encourage fare evasion.
Set it too low and someone who genuinly forgets to touch in for a one-stop journey on the DLR (where it is very easy to forget to touch in) is penalised disproportionately.

The incomplete journey fare can be resolved by ringing TfL. If you’ve forgotten as a one-off with a history of touching correctly they’ll resolve it, if you keep forgetting then they won’t. I think that strikes the right balance.

This is the issue with the revenue check charge. My understanding is that they won’t refund this and so you do have the issue that if it’s made too high then taking £50 or £100 out of someone’s bank account is a really bad thing to happen. At least you get at least 21 days to pay with an actual Penalty Fare.

I’m not sure what the answer is. It isn’t fair that forgetting with contactless costs you £16 but forgetting with Oyster costs you £50 or £100. But making the Contactless charge £50 or £100 is really bad. The best thing would be to apply the revenue protection fee to the Oyster but there’s no chance that TfL would ever get that idea past DfT.

 

[Hadders]

The incomplete journey fare can be resolved by ringing TfL. If you’ve forgotten as a one-off with a history of touching correctly they’ll resolve it, if you keep forgetting then they won’t. I think that strikes the right balance.

But what about the cases where the incomplete journey charge is less than the peak single fare?

 

[kijeta]

The reason you can’t give RPIs access to ‘live’ tap data is because it’s not real-time enough to be reliable enough for that purpose.

I agree with this. Refer to this post: https://www.railforums.co.uk/threads/gtr-keygo-during-revenue-inspection.302790/, showing that KeyGo RPI scans attempt to use online "live data" instead of the transient ticket (which is offline and written immediately onto the card during entry), and the issue it caused to @ns274.

 

[Cdd89]

I agree the current implementation is not fit for live inspections, but disagree that this is a technically insurmountable problem. Once speed and reliability is where it should be, the system can operate on the basis that, if any station has not returned a recent heartbeat, then the entire system is in degraded mode whereby touch data cannot be used for revenue inspections.

But upgrading the inspection standards of Contactless isn't necessary to eliminate the inequity: if TOCs don't need live touch data on Contactless then they shouldn't get it on Oyster. It is true that they can't deduct a £16 revenue inspection charge on Oyster when the deposit is £7, but that is not the only revenue problem caused by Oyster having a low deposit, and I don't think the £16 charge is a deterrent anyway given how infrequently inspections take place.

 

[MikeWh]

when the deposit is £7

Where have you been? The deposit was scrapped years ago. It's now a £10.50 fee (unrefundable).

 

[Benjwri]

I agree the current implementation is not fit for live inspections, but disagree that this is a technically insurmountable problem. Once speed and reliability is where it should be, the system can operate on the basis that, if any station has not returned a recent heartbeat, then the entire system is in degraded mode whereby touch data cannot be used for revenue inspections.

How would you get over the revenue device having no signal though? There still isn’t signal on a lot of the underground, and plenty of black spots on trains.

 

[Bletchleyite]

How would you get over the revenue device having no signal though? There still isn’t signal on a lot of the underground, and plenty of black spots on trains.

Most underground stations on the Underground have wifi these days, extending that to all of them wouldn't be too hard. How often are on board revenue inspections carried out on board on the Tube? I've experienced that once ever, about 20 years ago on the Central Line.

== Doublepost prevention - post automatically merged: 18 Aug 2026 ==

I agree the current implementation is not fit for live inspections, but disagree that this is a technically insurmountable problem. Once speed and reliability is where it should be, the system can operate on the basis that, if any station has not returned a recent heartbeat, then the entire system is in degraded mode whereby touch data cannot be used for revenue inspections.

Surely only that station would need to be in that mode, not all of them.

 

[blimmo]

Surely only that station would need to be in that mode, not all of them.

I think the point is that you wouldn't know if a card with no visible touch in had been touched in at the offline station. Seems fixable by asking the passenger which station they touched in at and then if they answer the one that is known to be offline they can be let off.

 

[Starmill]

Some observations. The TOCs (effectively the DfT) were very unhappy that the original revenue protection fee was only an incomplete journey. I'm not at all surprised that it has gone up. I hope it doesn't go up beyond the level of the zone 1-6 daily cap, because I share the concerns about instantly deducting a penalty from someone's bank account.

Whenever talk of live data is mentioned I will say two words: Kidbrooke and Twyford. Both suffered their station computer being offline for an extended period (more than a week). All the touches were recorded and stored, then uploaded to the central system when the computer was reconnected.

The up-to £30.40 incomplete journey charge is in my opinion excessive. It's justified at Reading where it is the peak single from Paddington. If they genuinely are charging £30.40 at places like London Bridge then it is going to cause problems. If anyone here gets an incomplete charge at any of the London terminals involved then I would be very keen to know what it is, and what happens when you try to resolve it.

The charge for Northern etc in Manchester will soon be £60. If one of your taps drops but not the other one, it's actually £60 + incomplete journey, so currently up to £64.60 but by the time it's rolled out probably more. Also non Visa / Mastercard cards are invalid. I wouldn't expect any of this information to be clearly explained prior to boarding either.

You would be very unlikely to be using the Paddington National Rail barriers when travelling within London. Almost all services at the 'high level' station are GWR ones which have their first stop at Slough or Reading.

I agree it is somewhat more problematic at the Reading end but London is such a popular destination that I would imagine the majority of all contactless users will indeed be travelling to/from London.

It was originally proposed that a lot of local journeys from Reading would be covered, as it is it's only Twyford etc.

I also worry about the charge (even without an increased rate) from stations like Prittlewell or Thorpe Bay, where one or two stop hops are also common.

 

[saismee]

I think the point is that you wouldn't know if a card with no visible touch in had been touched in at the offline station. Seems fixable by asking the passenger which station they touched in at and then if they answer the one that is known to be offline they can be let off.

Sounds plausible, it's not as though the passenger could easily guess, unless it was a major station and they had overheard multiple people saying it.