Generally, any additional concession over and above the nationally stipulated (i.e. after 09h30 on Mo-Fr) only applies to within the county/authority area of pass issue. It does not apply in other Authorities' areas, even if that Authority has a similar extra concession for their own residents.
Your 'right' is for free travel in accordance with the minimum national ENCTS scheme conditions - there is no 'right' to be able to tap your pass on a reader on a bus.
You could start with lobbying your council of residence to accept London Freedom Pass holders at the same conditions as Hertfordshire residents! (and suggest which Hertfordshire activity the council should move funds from to do it?)
Thanks for this. I have a companion bus pass and thought that was only valid in my county, but Essex seem happy to accept it and I've even been asked in Bristol if others were travelling with me, so even that doesn't seem so clear cut.
For that 2nd point, I wish bus drivers knew this because it's not great having to argue with a bus driver in London when the issue is with their reader not my card. More recently a First Bus in Bishop's Stortford wouldn't read my pass and it's rare for this but they always act like its my fault, it really annoys me. How many people just pay to avoid confrontation? It's not right! Certain Stagecoach buses are funny sometimes with it too.
Why would Hertfordshire fund the conditions to change for pass holders, when TFL could just reinstate the anytime validity? These petty border disputes are why I think a more regional TFL/ south east regional transport authority would make more sense. Bring back London Country to sort out the bad traffic in the Home Counties.
IIRC, card readers on red London buses will only recognise ITSO smartcards whose issuers have paid TfL to put their Onboard ID* in the system. Only TOCs paid to operate National Rail contracts (not including Northern, ScotRail or TransPennine Express last I read) have done so, and the only ITSO tickets readers on London buses will validate are Travelcards.
Years ago a project to enable validation of ITSO-only ENCTS passes** by London bus readers was initiated, but it was ultimately deemed too complex and abandoned. That may change when the Hina card readers and iBus2 are deployed.
[* Digits 7 to 10 in the 18-character string, ranging from 0001 to 8000]
[** Freedom Passes are hybrid Oyster/ITSO smartcards so they're validated both within and without London]
About right and shows the fragmented nature of our bus and train companies. Outside of London, the individual bus companies all seem to have different readers. Whatever card readers Stagecoach uses on their buses seem to be funny with bus passes for some reason. Some regions like the North East and Manchester, I can just tap the bus pass just like an Oyster card and it just works, around where I live (Herts near Essex) the pass has to always be manually confirmed by the driver but in London, I just show the driver as the card reader can't read it. There's no consistency anywhere! And yet we see countries like the Netherlands and even Northern Ireland have a nationwide card for public transport, about time we caught up!
I hope London does sort it out because not all drivers seem to be trained properly to accept the passes. I assume eventually Oyster cards will end up obsolete and maybe then this issue will be fixed. Finally having a national standard for these cards on trains and buses.
