London Oyster card advice please

MrsE_2

Senario - If I buy an Oyster card for someone & they live a distance from me & I wish to top up online for them.
How does it work with my credit card details?
Are they stored?
Can the person access them because they hold the card?
Will it top up automatically & they can help themselves to as much as they like, using it excessivily?
Can I set it to top up a certain amount each week/month?

JasX

It depends,

One way you could do it perhaps is get the Oyster card. Set it up online but keep it so only you have access to the online account. If it's only PAYG you could even keep it all in your own name.

That way you could keep complete control of the topping up and the other person just uses the Oyster card.

You can only set auto-topups to trigger when the balance falls below a certain amount unfortunately so the person using it could in theory run up a large bill. However if you did this manually you could simply top it up yourself once a month with £x and turn any automatic topping up off.

Concerns:
If you have online access to the account you'll be able to see all the comings and goings of the person using the card, where they tap in and out and when, the person using the card should probably be made aware of this and be happy with the arrangement

If you intend to buy weekly/monthly travel cards I think the account *ought* technically to all be in the person using the card's name but nobody would ever check this in a million years when travelling (but could cause obstacles if the card is ever lost and they are trying to re-map the account to a new card. PAYG the card can be in anyone's name and used by anyone else.

Manual/online top ups need to be 'picked up' physically somewhere so you'd need to indicate somewhere for this to happen. (If they have a local station you know they regularly use fine -I think there will be a 4 day window to pickup the top up after you do it online if they fail to pick it up you get it refunded. You need to process the topup online the day before it is due to be picked up).

Do note *sometimes* picking up an online top-up can be a bit buggy, you'll always get the money ok but it might not also register you tapping in and you might get a maximum fare charge in the process, easy to claim back/correct but you need to spot that it's happened.

marvin

MrsE wrote: »

Senario - If I buy an Oyster card for someone & they live a distance from me & I wish to top up online for them.

Yes

MrsE wrote: »

How does it work with my credit card details?
Are they stored?

Select payg and select amount then select the station where they will next touch their card and the amount is activated then.

Only if you do an auto topup I think

MrsE wrote: »

Can the person access them because they hold the card?

It requires a user name and password to log into account keep these secret no.

MrsE wrote: »

Will it top up automatically & they can help themselves to as much as they like, using it excessivily?

Not if you follow above and Only if you with account access set it up

MrsE wrote: »

MrsE wrote: »

Can I set it to top up a certain amount each week/month?

I think only if you buy a travel card.


Just logged into my account to check some of this.

JasX

Ps checked my account and it does indeed have one of those 'tick to save card details' boxes. So you should be ok to share the online login details and just hop in to top up without saving the card details when you do it manually if you prefer to do it that way (and they can check for and claim back their own incomplete journeys that way)

JasX

marvin wrote: »

Select payg and select amount then select the station where they will next touch their card and the amount is activated then.

Also just to clarify you don't need to specify the station where the person will *next* touch their card, just one they will definitely be passing thru in the next few days. Of course they will not get the money onto their card/account until they do touch their card at the nominated pickup location...

marvin

JasX wrote: »

Also just to clarify you don't need to specify the station where the person will *next* touch their card, just one they will definitely be passing thru in the next few days. Of course they will not get the money onto their card/account until they do touch their card at the nominated pickup location...

Ahh ok the site does not make this clear which is why I have never topped up online as I never know exactly what station I will be going to as it depends on parking.

Thank you for that.

dzug1

JasX wrote: »

If you intend to buy weekly/monthly travel cards I think the account *ought* technically to all be in the person using the card's name but nobody would ever check this in a million years when travelling (but could cause obstacles if the card is ever lost and they are trying to re-map the account to a new card. PAYG the card can be in anyone's name and used by anyone else.

.

Doesn't the information held by TfL say whether the user of the travelcard is male or female? A dead giveaway if a card registered to a male is being used by a female or vv.

yorkie2

marvin wrote: »

Ahh ok the site does not make this clear which is why I have never topped up online as I never know exactly what station I will be going to as it depends on parking.

Thank you for that.

I never know, either. And I often arrive into King's Cross at peak time, when there can be queues for the ticket machine, and I'm in a rush.

So I enabled auto top-up. You do have to nominate the initial station to activate the auto top-up, however once it's activated, it will automatically top-up at any location when required.

Although that doesn't meet your requirements of setting a "limit", you can choose an amount, and you can monitor usage from your account on a regular basis, and also be alerted by e-mail whenever an auto top-up occurs.

MicktheMiller

marvin wrote: »

Ahh ok the site does not make this clear which is why I have never topped up online as I never know exactly what station I will be going to as it depends on parking.

Have it waiting at your destination instead then. That wont change, presumably, and you can still pick up an order there :beer:

MicktheMiller

dzug1 wrote: »

Doesn't the information held by TfL say whether the user of the travelcard is male or female? A dead giveaway if a card registered to a male is being used by a female or vv.

This information is not stored on the card. It is generally only held for discount cardholders (such as students and OAPs) anyway.

However the poster is right in that technically, since the season ticket represents a contract between the named holder and TfL, and since these tickets are non transferrable, technically you would be breaking the rules. It really wouldn't matter though and you would never be called up on it.

Pay as you go credit is completely transferrable so that wouldnt matter.

marvin

MicktheMiller wrote: »

Have it waiting at your destination instead then. That wont change, presumably, and you can still pick up an order there :beer:

Misses the point the point was that the website makes it sound as if you have to first use the card again at the designated station not that it can be any station on your journey.

Now I know that I can do this provided there is enough credit on my card for this journey.