Tapping in London as Google Wallet

[trainmania100]

I went to London the other day, parked at Richmond (big car park near Twickenham bridge), tapped on the gate line with my card NFC and tapped out at my destination, Strawberry Hill.

Few hours later I depart strawberry hill back to Richmond with a break at Twickenham. So I tap out and in at Twickenham, what else can I do as I don't actually have a physical ticket.

Return to Richmond upon leaving Twickenham.

The short return trip from Richmond to Strawberry Hill and back applied a £13 charge on my card.

I did enquire about costs to Canon Street via Strawberry Hill as. "Travel card" quoted at £16. However I didn't pay much attention to the man at the kiosk as the panel of glass between us and rubbish speaker wasn't powerful enough to overcome the communication barrier.

£13 seems a rediculous amount of money for a return with break of journey, considering a trip across the Thames included is only £3 more.

What did I do wrong here? This tapping system seems a complete rip off and surely it should have recognised the endpoints A B and C that I was within the bounds of the £7.20 anytime return quoted by the Southern Railway tickets website and the "from £6" quoted by Oyster.

So in principal ;
1. Tap in Richmond
2. Tap out strawberry hill
3. Tap in strawberry hill 2 hrs later
4. Tap out Twickenham (break of journey)
5. Tap in Twickenham
6. Tap out Richmond, journey end

On a physical anytime return ticket quoted £7 on southern website you'd usually tell the gate line staff you're having a break of journey and they let you through but it seems here it has charged me individual singles the whole way?

Never used the tap system before so not sure what I was doing

 

[Edvid]

TfL PAYG fares are set for single journeys only. Break of journey is not recognised other than for short (time-limited) connections between separate stations within a certain distance.

Click on the link below and it'll detail your individual journeys / charges. You'll have to enter the details for your physical card (the one you registered with Google Wallet to generate the virtual card).

Security check - Contactless and Oyster - Transport for London

contactless.tfl.gov.uk

 

[Hadders]

I'm not sure you've necessarily done anything wrong. What you have to do is touch in at the start of your journey and touch out at the end with the same card. If you do this you'll be charged the correct fare, assuming you don't exceed the maximum journey time (70 or 80 minutes for the journeys you made). There's a daily cap based on the number of zones you travel through. Charges are consolidated and come through as a daily charge so I'd wait a couple of days to see the full picture.

You can check your journey history without an account using the link above.

Peak/Off-Peak fares are determined by the touch in time. It's not clear what time you touched in so I'm going to assume they were at pff peak times.

Richmond to Strawberry Hill £3.00 (Zone 4 to Zone 5)
Strawberry Hill to Twickenham £2.70 (both stations Zone 5)
Twickenham to Richmond £3.00 (Zone 5 to Zone 4)
So the daily total for the journeys you made should be £8.70 assuming all travel was at Off Peak times

If you don't touch in or out then you get charged a maximum fare. It is possible that this has happened here, we really need to see your journey history to understand what has happened. If you could access this from the link above and paste it into this thread we can take a look.

 

[trainmania100]

Thanks for the replies, unfortunately it was over a week ago so it doesn't show up. My bank statement shows a rounded £13 and I definitely tapped in and out as Richmond has a gate line requiring tap out.

At a guess I'd say I forgot to tap in at strawberry hill on the return but I can't see why that would change much unless it needed that for me to be able to tap out at Twickenham without a full charge

 

[Haywain]

unfortunately it was over a week ago so it doesn't show up.

You can look up what you have been charged on the TfL website.

 

[Edvid]

Thanks for the replies, unfortunately it was over a week ago so it doesn't show up.

7 days is the limit for unregistered travel.

If you register an account with TfL, you can review up to 13 months of journey history.

 

[swt_passenger]

At a guess I'd say I forgot to tap in at strawberry hill on the return but I can't see why that would change much unless it needed that for me to be able to tap out at Twickenham without a full charge

That’s exactly what happens, if you accidentally don’t touch in (eg Strawberry Hill), the touch out at (eg Twickenham) will not be recognised as the end of a particular journey, so something called a maximum cash fare will be charged. These charges don’t get used as part of any daily capping either.

Regarding your break of journey point, in the unlikely event staff let you out and back in without touching, (which they shouldn’t), then there’s a real risk that you’d be charged for two incomplete journeys, ie one started with no end, and another ended with no start.

 

[Watershed]

PAYG fares don't always have a direct relationship to the cash fares. With PAYG you are charged for each journey you make, based on the zones you travel through and the 'modes' you use (National Rail, Tube etc.) - you can see the TfL fare finder here. Break of journey isn't really a concept for PAYG, so in some cases a cash fare can be cheaper if you plan to break your journey.

PAYG costs are limited based on the appropriate daily/weekly cap for zones you travelled through. For travel in Zones 4 and 5, the daily cap is £15.30 (this is actually the Zones 1-5 cap - there isn't a Zones 4-5 one anymore).

If you touch in and don't touch out, or vice versa, this is deemed an incomplete journey as the system doesn't know what journey you made. You will be charged a maximum fare, which usually corresponds to the fare for travel to/from Zone 1. Maximum fares don't count towards your daily/weekly cap. You can 'resolve' incomplete journeys (i.e. enter where you travelled to/from) up to 3 times a month, and you'll be refunded the difference to the correct fare.

 

[trainmania100]

I have registered for an account and it shows a £7 charge for an incomplete journey with unknown start point
Therefore it seems I did forget to tap in at strawberry hill.
Thanks and I have pressed the refund button to see if I'll be eligible for £4 refund.
Thanks

 

[Vexed]

If this is a journey you'll be making more often in the future, you might want to consider getting an SWR Tap2Go card, which is a seperate Pay As You Go scheme valid only on SWR services* and does support break of journey.

This tapping system seems a complete rip off and surely it should have recognised the endpoints A B and C that I was within the bounds of the £7.20 anytime return quoted by the Southern Railway tickets website and the "from £6" quoted by Oyster.

The £7.20 walk up return fare allows break of journey and is available on paper, eTicket, and Tap2Go.
The £6 off peak PAYG fare (made up of two £3 singles) doesn't allow break of journey and is available on Oyster, contactless, and Tap2Go.

As you found, Oyster and contactless only use the PAYG fare structure that doesn't allow beak of journey.

It's complicated! Hopefully I haven't made it much worse by adding the Tap2Go smartcard into the mix.

*some exceptions apply