Oyster Weekly Capping

[BackOnTheTrain]

The introduction of weekly capping may well give extra impetus for people who hold 1st gen cards to swap to the newer version. It is worth remembering though that TfL would much rather people used bank cards and dumped Oyster altogether because "£££s saving to TfL".

I would happily switch from Oyster to bank cards if it were possible to get the disabled railcard discount applied to bank cards. I don’t suppose anyone has heard if this will happen?

 

[Clip]

MikeWH may know but I don't see a reason it couldn't happen as long as your online account with them has your nominated card details and that your account has a railcard and thus when it does its magic it only takes off the discounted rate

 

[IanD]

There are now updated press releases and TfL info about the updated Hopper ticket. There is a short video on the TfL page about the updated Hopper.

https://tfl.gov.uk/campaign/hopper-fare
Make a journey using pay as you go (contactless or Oyster) on a bus or tram, and you can now make unlimited bus and tram journeys for free within one hour of first touching in.

Interesting. So reading this, I can expect to have free travel for an hour, rather than having to pay £1.50.

Surely the wording should say "make unlimited additional journeys with out further charge within one hour".

 

[Matt E Raffles]

I'm hesitating to disagree with you as you seem to post with authority, but you appear to be contradicting the message I received personally from a TfL Director at the time of the contactless roll-out. Unless the method of calculating weekly caps is changed I cannot see how it will be possible to do so at the card-reader interface. The card would need to store the complete journey history for the whole week in order to calculate the most favourable combination of caps and extension journeys.

If the Oyster card really was able to handle such calculations then surely it would already calculate daily caps in the same way as contactless, which it doesn't.

The possibility of weekly capping on the Oyster card itself would not have been determined at the time of the Contactless rollout; both the functionality relating to Contactless and that available with Oyster have continued to be developed since then.

Weekly capping on Oyster will behave as daily capping does. In other words, lowest and highest zones will be determined and the cap applied will relate to the final reckoning of those at the end of the week's travel. In a similar way to daily caps, if a journey is made outside the zones already capped, the new cap will be set at the higher zonal range.

The 'clever' Contactless back-office methods of the cheapest combination of caps and extension fares will, as you suggest, only be available as part of the processing of Oyster taps through that system (this will be for both daily caps and weekly).

 

[MikeWh]

The possibility of weekly capping on the Oyster card itself would not have been determined at the time of the Contactless rollout; both the functionality relating to Contactless and that available with Oyster have continued to be developed since then.

That's good to hear.

Weekly capping on Oyster will behave as daily capping does. In other words, lowest and highest zones will be determined and the cap applied will relate to the final reckoning of those at the end of the week's travel. In a similar way to daily caps, if a journey is made outside the zones already capped, the new cap will be set at the higher zonal range.

This could be a disaster. Consider a commuter who lives in Herne Hill and works at Oxford Circus. His regular commute costs £4.50 each way but is capped at £6.80 per day. If he visits a friend in Epping one afternoon then he will trigger the bigger zone 1-6 cap of £12.50 and probably reach it. Tuesday to Friday will cap at the £6.80 daily rate but he then uses trains again on Saturday and Sunday incurring further £6.80 caps. Total charge for the week could be £53.80 on Oyster. With contactless it would be £34.10 plus £5.20 in extension fares.

The 'clever' Contactless back-office methods of the cheapest combination of caps and extension fares will, as you suggest, only be available as part of the processing of Oyster taps through that system (this will be for both daily caps and weekly).

Is it still intended that Oyster will eventually use the back office system?

 

[Matt E Raffles]

This could be a disaster. Consider a commuter who lives in Herne Hill and works at Oxford Circus. His regular commute costs £4.50 each way but is capped at £6.80 per day. If he visits a friend in Epping one afternoon then he will trigger the bigger zone 1-6 cap of £12.50 and probably reach it. Tuesday to Friday will cap at the £6.80 daily rate but he then uses trains again on Saturday and Sunday incurring further £6.80 caps. Total charge for the week could be £53.80 on Oyster. With contactless it would be £34.10 plus £5.20 in extension fares.

Well, although we have some detail of the technical aspects of Oyster weekly capping, we don't yet know what TfL's launch strategy will be. It would clearly be questionable to suggest that Oyster would always be 'best value' for a week's travel. As you say, there are some clear disadvantages of Oyster daily capping in comparison with the methodology available for Contactless; card-based weekly capping would have similar issues. I don't have any information other than the few technical details I have shared here.

Is it still intended that Oyster will eventually use the back office system?

Yes. It remains to be seen when Oyster card-based weekly capping will be launched. It is also unclear when the launch of back-office processing of Oyster taps will go live. If the two things coincide then the solution could be quite tidy. So far, there has also been no clarity on what is intended for people who aren't covered by the 'adult undiscounted' method that Contactless currently employs.

 

[rebmcr]

Sorry to 'necro' this thread, but with the launch of the Oyster App showing project progress, it seems the appropriate place to continue discussion of the planned upgrades.

Is there any more information about the rollout of future features, and/or is there a good place to be kept appraised of any progress around Oyster and the Backend?

 

[mattdickinson]

Sorry to 'necro' this thread, but with the launch of the Oyster App showing project progress, it seems the appropriate place to continue discussion of the planned upgrades.

Is there any more information about the rollout of future features, and/or is there a good place to be kept appraised of any progress around Oyster and the Backend?

The latest due date for Oyster weekly capping I have seen is October.

 

[mattdickinson]

The latest beta version of the TfL app states that Oyster weekly capping is now available.

 

[A Challenge]

Does this include the 'cheapest combination' extension fares feature of contactless weekly capping as well?

 

[Del57]

Does this include the 'cheapest combination' extension fares feature of contactless weekly capping as well?

Hi. I contacted TFL about when the weekly cap might be introduced to Oyster cards and their response does perhaps suggest that the weekly Oyster card cap will never be introduced. Please find their reply below:

"Thank you for contacting us about weekly capping. Unfortunately Oyster cards wont have the Weekly capping feature, this is because on an Oyster card you can buy a 7 Day Travelcard which the same price as a Monday to Sunday cap using a Contactless bank card.
I have attached the link below which will direct you to the TfL website and provides all information regarding Daily and Weekly capping.
https://tfl.gov.uk/fares-and-payments/contactless/what-is-capping
Thanks again for contacting us. If there is anything else we can help you with, please reply to this email. Alternatively, you can call us on 0343 222 1234 and we'll be happy to help you."

 

[plcd1]

Hi. I contacted TFL about when the weekly cap might be introduced to Oyster cards and their response does perhaps suggest that the weekly Oyster card cap will never be introduced. Please find their reply below:

"Thank you for contacting us about weekly capping. Unfortunately Oyster cards wont have the Weekly capping feature, this is because on an Oyster card you can buy a 7 Day Travelcard which the same price as a Monday to Sunday cap using a Contactless bank card.
I have attached the link below which will direct you to the TfL website and provides all information regarding Daily and Weekly capping.
https://tfl.gov.uk/fares-and-payments/contactless/what-is-capping
Thanks again for contacting us. If there is anything else we can help you with, please reply to this email. Alternatively, you can call us on 0343 222 1234 and we'll be happy to help you."

Well that reply's a complete load of rubbish. The system upgrades are being progressed now. Ticketing and Review Update 112, released under a FOI request, confirms that all of the system upgrades should be in place by the end of November. It goes on to say a specific launch date has yet to be confirmed because commercial negotiations are ongoing with the TOCs about how revenue allocation rules will be changed. It seems that the broad message of a launch in the fairly near future has yet to be communicated within TfL.

Politically it would be hugely damaging for Oyster weekly capping not to materialise given the many statements by the Mayor and his former deputy about its introduction. It will happen.

 

[MikeWh]

Politically it would be hugely damaging for Oyster weekly capping not to materialise given the many statements by the Mayor and his former deputy about its introduction. It will happen.

Agreed. But the devil is in the detail and I'm not convinced that the initial offering will be as good as contactless if odd journeys are made outside of the usual zones.

 

[Del57]

Well that reply's a complete load of rubbish. The system upgrades are being progressed now. Ticketing and Review Update 112, released under a FOI request, confirms that all of the system upgrades should be in place by the end of November. It goes on to say a specific launch date has yet to be confirmed because commercial negotiations are ongoing with the TOCs about how revenue allocation rules will be changed. It seems that the broad message of a launch in the fairly near future has yet to be communicated within TfL.

Politically it would be hugely damaging for Oyster weekly capping not to materialise given the many statements by the Mayor and his former deputy about its introduction. It will happen.

Yes the reply was rubbish and gives very little information. You wonder how well informed the all the enquiries team at TFL are about future developments especially with the general push to get people to use contactless cards more.

 

[ForTheLoveOf]

It would appear Oyster capping has quietly started on the 7th for tram and bus users. It's said to start "in Spring" for rail users (presumably to allow for the much greater scope of gatelines etc. to be updated and tested to make sure it's working properly).

 

[James H]

Today's update to the TfL Oyster/contactless app also refers to weekly capping in the changelog

 

[plcd1]

It would appear Oyster capping has quietly started on the 7th for tram and bus users. It's said to start "in Spring" for rail users (presumably to allow for the much greater scope of gatelines etc. to be updated and tested to make sure it's working properly).

Except that TfL were tweeting late last week that its start date has gone back a week. This is because of the impact on TfL systems of the o2 network outage last week. It could only start on a Monday (i.e. today) given how weekly capping is over a fixed period of time (Monday to Sunday).

It's correct that tram and bus capping is starting sooner than rail. The comments I've seen about rail mode capping is much more to do with ongoing negotiations with the TOCs about the revenue implications of weekly capping than the technology. The technology has been in place and being tested for months. I also suspect that the plan to extend PAYG (and by implication capping) to a range of stations outside London may also have a small impact in that when the Oyster equipment and data is in place it will require testing. However that's really a separate initiative to Oyster weekly capping which has been under development for many years and has been delayed for a number of reasons.

 

[MikeWh]

It would appear Oyster capping has quietly started on the 7th for tram and bus users. It's said to start "in Spring" for rail users (presumably to allow for the much greater scope of gatelines etc. to be updated and tested to make sure it's working properly).

Well, it was always going to start on a Monday. It was supposed to be today until O2 screwed things up last week. Therefore it will now start on December 17th, the last Monday it could realistically start this year and be worthwhile.