Contactless or Oyster monthly ticket?

emigre

I could do some advice here. I currently use a monthly ticket costing me £194 a month to travel within zones 1-4 for my commute. I also like to pop into the museums in London on a Friday and go into the town centre to pick up my groceries on the weekend via the bus. When I'm off, I like to bum around the sights of London and some shopping. I've been doing this for a few years, I haven't thought too much about the individual cost per trip.

I'll be undergoing an office move where there's less space so I will be working from home twice a week. Because of this, I'm trying to work the economic way forward. On days where I end up bumming around the city, I can take advantage of the daily cap (£10.10).

My thinking is I go contactless and just PAYG, I'll end up saving money. I'll still be travelling within zones 1-4 so working to the cap my commute to work will cost £30.30, put another couple of quid for any bus fates and my commute should cost £35 a week and my monthly travel cost should now be £140 a month and give me a decent saving.

I'll be interested in other's thoughts if they've been in a similar situation of working out new travel costs.

Mr_Singleton

If using the tube I’d ALWAYS recommend using an Oyster.... giving TFL direct access to your bank account via contactless is just plain stupid.

As a point of interest to prove what a rip-off abusive monopoly TFL is..... in March I loaded an all zones Paris TravelCard onto my Navigo and got change from £65. Yet your 1-4 London TravelCard cost just shy of £200. Rip-off, rip-off..... RIP-OFF!!!

Andy_L

Mr_Singleton wrote: »

If using the tube I’d ALWAYS recommend using an Oyster.... giving TFL direct access to your bank account via contactless is just plain stupid.

As a point of interest to prove what a rip-off abusive monopoly TFL is..... in March I loaded an all zones Paris TravelCard onto my Navigo and got change from £65. Yet your 1-4 London TravelCard cost just shy of £200. Rip-off, rip-off..... RIP-OFF!!!

ISTR that the whole of the Paris Metro only about the same size as zones 1-3 in London so it's something of an orange & apples comparison between them. AIUI the metro also gets a higher level of taxpayer subsidy than TfL

peachyprice

Mr_Singleton wrote: »

If using the tube I’d ALWAYS recommend using an Oyster.... giving TFL direct access to your bank account via contactless is just plain stupid.

As a point of interest to prove what a rip-off abusive monopoly TFL is..... in March I loaded an all zones Paris TravelCard onto my Navigo and got change from £65. Yet your 1-4 London TravelCard cost just shy of £200. Rip-off, rip-off..... RIP-OFF!!!

You do know that the Paris Metro is subsidised by their government and London is one of the only major cities that isn't, yes?

giraffe69

If using the tube I’d ALWAYS recommend using an Oyster.... giving TFL direct access to your bank account via contactless is just plain stupid.

Are TfL any more dangerous to use contactless with than say, Starbucks, WH Smith, Boots etc? Your tin hat and obsession with the evils of TfL are showing and not for the first time.

Mr_Singleton

giraffe69 wrote: »

Are TfL any more dangerous to use contactless with than say, Starbucks, WH Smith, Boots etc?

Yes....
TFL are making £100’s of Millions from incomplete journeys..... consumer groups are complaining as are MP’s at the industrial scale of this TFL cash cow. “Between 2011 and 2015, TfL had gross revenue of £349m from incomplete pay-as-you-go journeys, but paid £72m in refunds.”

I’ve not personally ever been over charged using contactless at any of the places you mention above nor have I heard anyone else being over charged either.

I’d be happy to see any evidence that shows any company(s) other than TFL over charging on contactless.

Mr_Singleton

peachyprice wrote: »

You do know that the Paris Metro is subsidised by their government and London is one of the only major cities that isn't, yes?

Yes, your correct but this is the FIRST year that there is no direct Govt. subsidies. RATP the Paris equivalent of TFL received Govt. subsidies providing 20.7% of its 2018 income which makes you wonder my TFL fares are ~300% higher.

A Treasury spokesperson said: 'London has received more than £10bn in government transport funding since 2010”

..... are you claiming that the below isn’t a subsidy?

'Transport for London will now receive more than £800m per year from its new powers to retain business rates’

While shops & business go to the wall in large part due to horrendous business rates it seems it’s not only commuters that TFL is shafting!

Jamie Oliver & Philip Green have both said business rates were a key factor in going bust or shutting numerous shops.

peachyprice

Mr_Singleton wrote: »

Yes....
TFL are making £100’s of Millions from incomplete journeys..... consumer groups are complaining as are MP’s at the industrial scale of this TFL cash cow. “Between 2011 and 2015, TfL had gross revenue of £349m from incomplete pay-as-you-go journeys, but paid £72m in refunds.”

I’ve not personally ever been over charged using contactless at any of the places you mention above nor have I heard anyone else being over charged either.

I’d be happy to see any evidence that shows any company(s) other than TFL over charging on contactless.

Incomplete journeys don't happen all by themselves. They happen when people either don't tap in, don't tap out, suffer card clash, use a different card or card/phone combo to touch in and out, run out of charge on their phone. See the pattern there?

peachyprice

Mr_Singleton wrote: »

Yes, your correct but this is the FIRST year that there is no direct Govt. subsidies. RATP the Paris equivalent of TFL received Govt. subsidies providing 20.7% of its 2018 income which makes you wonder my TFL fares are ~300% higher.

Yes, this is the first year they have recieved xero subsidy, it's been incrementally reduced over the last 5 years

A Treasury spokesperson said: 'London has received more than £10bn in government transport funding since 2010”


..... are you claiming that the below isn’t a subsidy?

'Transport for London will now receive more than £800m per year from its new powers to retain business rates’

None of which is going to London Underground. Transport funding covers a large range of services

While shops & business go to the wall in large part due to horrendous business rates it seems it’s not only commuters that TFL is shafting!

Jamie Oliver & Philip Green have both said business rates were a key factor in going bust or shutting numerous shops.

And rebates are availabel to all sorts of businesses.

Mr_Singleton

Andy_L wrote: »

ISTR that the whole of the Paris Metro only about the same size as zones 1-3 in London so it's something of an orange & apples comparison between them.

Depends on how you define size.... The Paris Metro has more lines, more stations, double the number of employees and is the second busiest in Europe after.... Moscow??? If you only use the total length of the lines then yes TFL is longer.

Mr_Singleton

peachyprice wrote: »

Incomplete journeys don't happen all by themselves. They happen when people either don't tap in, don't tap out, suffer card clash, use a different card or card/phone combo to touch in and out, run out of charge on their phone. See the pattern there?

Woot woot, spoken like a true TFL apologists. Yes I do see a pattern and the pattern is...... “it’s NEVER EVER! TFL’s fault” because unlike there train signalling the barriers are 100% accurate 100% of the time.

I used to use AndroidPay that gives a record of touching in and out on its app. Despite this TFL claimed I’d not touched out so charged a max cash fare. Once I told the refundline guy I had touch in out receipts he tried to claim that Google we’re trying to defraud TFL.

TFL has no intention of sorting this out because as I said it’s such a huge cash cow.