contactless cards

trailingspouse

Not sure if this is the right place.

My elderly parents are off to London in a couple of days. They're going down by train, a journey they have been doing often enough for decades. They will then need to travel on the Tube - again, not a problem in itself, my father could probably draw the map from memory.

BUT - the problem is that now the easiest way for them to pay for their Tube journey is to use their contactless debit cards. My father refuses to do this. Mum thinks it's a brilliant idea, and has no issue with it. But Dad is a stubborn so-and-so, and has decided that contactless isn't secure, so won't use it at all, for anything. He used to be a bank manager, so still thinks he 'knows' about this sort of thing - but he retired 25 years ago, and things have changed!! His refusal to use contactless isn't a problem in normal life, as there is always an alternative way to pay, but I want to convince him that it's safe. Help!!

I've tried telling him that millions of people do it every day without a problem...

Vortigern

I don't think you'll change his mind.

As regular visitors to London, surely they'd have Oyster cards?

If not, they should be able to get Oyster cards at a Tube ticket office. Check the TfL website for details.

TadleyBaggie

Are they travelling by train and have senior railcards? If so, if you add a daily travel card to the train ticket it only adds about £3.50 to the overall travel cost.

stockton_2

Lots of people do not like contactless, not just older people. It is his choice.
An Oyster card would seem to be the ideal thing.

If he does have a senior rail card and wants to add it to his Oyster he needs to be aware that not all main line Tube stations have ticket offices, only self service automated machines, which can be baffling to the uninitiated. There are usually tube personnel in attendance so make a bee-line for one of them and ask for help.

RG2015

As a former bank manager and now a pensioner i imagine the financial argument would hold most sway. The cost of one-off tube tickets is usually significantly more than the cost of the same journey via contactless or Oyster. Have a look on the tfl website to see how much extra he would pay.

Furthermore, the queues for buying tube ticket both for ticket offices and machines are often quite dreadful.

Yes, an Oyster card is an option but that requires a deposit of £5 and in addition needs to be kept topped up unlike contactless cards.

whitewing

Could your mum just use hers and let your dad sort himself out!

EachPenny

You could try appealing to his understanding of the value of money (which as an ex-Bank manager he hopefully has?)

Use the TfL single fare finder on their website to work out the cost of their planned journey by cash payment vs Contactless/Oyster.

An often quoted example is Charing Cross to Embankment (quicker to walk than get down to the platform!) By cash (e.g. a paper single ticket) it costs £4.90. By contactless card or Oyster £2.40. Two people doing a return journey at that price difference will save enough to buy a bottle of wine to have with their dinner. Ooops, I forgot London prices means maybe a small glass of wine each.

Another factor is you can only get paper single tickets from the machines in the stations now, the ticket offices are closed. As a result there are usually significant queues of people waiting to buy tickets, so speed of travel is another advantage as with contactless/Oyster you just walk straight to the gate.

That said, I'm not entirely comfortable getting my contactless card out in crowded stations, especially as you really need to do it while walking towards the barriers rather than getting there and holding everybody up while you search for your wallet/purse and then look for the card.

As a result, I always use Oyster, topping it up with a cashback credit card at some point during the day when I find a quiet station or have a bit of time to wait for the next train.

The Oyster/contactless system lets you set up an account with the facility to view every journey (time of entry, time of exit, amount charged) so you can check that you've been charged exactly the right amount - maybe this would pique your father's interest?

To save as much money as possible it is worth knowing:
* There are peak times in the morning and afternoon, fares are usually higher at these times
* If a journey can avoid Zone 1 you get a much reduced fare by touching on a pink card reader at one of the interchange stations (see TfL website for more details) E.g. Stratford to Richmond (peak) £2.40 avoiding Zone 1 or £5.60 via Zone 1
* Always touch in and out at stations at the start and end of the journey - even if staff tell you not to bother because of congestion
* You cannot 'split' your journey like you often can on National Rail. If you touch out and back in at a station to go and buy a sandwich then you will be charged for two separate journeys.
* TfL have a very handy map on their website which compares walking time to tube journey time - always consider walking rather than a short tube journey!

Hope they enjoy their trip

lr1277

I can't talk about the MSE aspect of using contactless cards, but I do prefer the oyster card for logistical reasons.

I hate getting my wallet out, then getting my card out to use at the barrier, then putting the card back in the wallet and stuffing the wallet back into my trouser. Also potentially, when I open the wallet, lots of things could fall out.
With an oyster card, it is kept in a separate pocket to the wallet and there is no faffing with opening and closing things.
Just my personal preference. Though as pointed out above, you do need to keep it topped up, but I can live with this.

RG2015

I love contactless and wish the £30 limit could be increased. I have no fear of fraud as the banks guarantee refunds for fraudulent contactless use.

I am concerned though that a former bank manager refuses to use contactless cards. Does he have insider knowledge that banks may not always be honest with their customers.

macman

RG2015 wrote: »

I love contactless and wish the £30 limit could be increased. I have no fear of fraud as the banks guarantee refunds for fraudulent contactless use.

I am concerned though that a former bank manager refuses to use contactless cards. Does he have insider knowledge that banks may not always be honest with their customers.[/QUOTE]

He retired in 1992, long before contactless cards were even thought of, let alone online banking...
OP, he will either have to use PAYG Oyster, or use cash fares-and pay considerably more if the latter. And, without Oyster or contactless, he won't be able to use London buses at all.

EachPenny

RG2015 wrote: »

I love contactless and wish the £30 limit could be increased. I have no fear of fraud as the banks guarantee refunds for fraudulent contactless use.

That does rely on the customer checking through their statement line-by-line to make sure there are no incorrect or fraudulent transactions, not something that everybody does. I would probably not encourage my parents to use contactless as they neither have the time or inclination to check their bank statements that carefully. For me fraud isn't the main concern - it is things like cardclash, genuine errors by shops etc that I would be on the lookout for.

RG2015 wrote: »

I am concerned though that a former bank manager refuses to use contactless cards. Does he have insider knowledge that banks may not always be honest with their customers.

I think it fairly safe to assume that contactless cards are not as secure as they could be

The main issue for me, as mentioned by IR1277 too, is that keeping your contactless card safe is difficult on a public transport system if you have to keep on getting it out. Keeping your cards safely zipped away conflicts with the need for speedy access.

If I lost my Oyster card with a max of £10 credit I would be upset. If I lost my contactless debit card I would be worried, upset, and spend the next couple of hours on the phone cancelling the card and arranging a new one. And if the card was the only one I had my next concern would be getting home with no money and no ticket.