Oyster at Paddington - Remote Completion

[RJ]

I wrote a letter to FGW to comment on something and decide to raise an issue. Despite running services overnight into London Paddington, the Oyster validators are all swiched off for several hours. This causes travellers who have touched in at stations like Ealing Broadway and Southall to have an incomplete journey and vice versa.

I asked First Great Western to comment on why the validators were deactivated and if they felt it was acceptable to make it necessary for passengers to call an 0845-prefixed helpline to get the charge corrected, as a matter of course.

This was their response;

"I note your comments regarding the oyster card readers being switched off at London Paddington over night and the problems this has been causing, as you have not been able to swipe out upon completion of tour journey. I can confirm that we have discussed this matter with Transport for London and this process was put into place as customer (sic) can claim back the additional monies and because Transport for London have a system in place which is intended to help people who forget to touch out or are unable to do so and aims to calculate their likely journey and charge the appropriate fare. This system is called remote completion and Oyster will be able to confirm whether this is an option for you."


No such system is in place for this situation at Paddington. I'm sure that what they're talking about only works if somebody makes a journey regular journey and forgets to touch in, a maximum of once per week though I hope one of our Oyster experts can elucidate on that. I think it is unfair that the passenger has to go through all that rigmarole just to pay the correct fare on Oyster, when all FGW has to do is leave the validators on overnight. Housekeeping does not take all night.

 

[transmanche]

Could be related to this?

 

[island]

That's a bit of a nonsense.

 

[34D]

Does this relate to journeys that straddle 04:30. Or are they switched off from earlier than that?

 

[RJ]

It's nothing to do with that - else they would do the same thing at their other stations.

 

[greatkingrat]

What about passengers starting at Paddington? Could FGW issue a penalty fare if a passenger has a PAYG Oyster that was not touched in because the validators weren't working?

 

[yorkie]

What about passengers starting at Paddington? Could FGW issue a penalty fare if a passenger has a PAYG Oyster that was not touched in because the validators weren't working?

The PF would be invalid and would be evidence of misuse of PF legislation, I would hope that such an incident would be reported and escalated until a satisfactory apology and assurances were given.

 

[Nym]

The PF would be invalid and would be evidence of misuse of PF legislation, I would hope that such an incident would be reported and escalated until a satisfactory apology and assurances were given.

But this is the world's greatest evil of First Group, so now you've given them the idea it's only a matter of time until we see roving gangs of RPIs PFing innocent Oyster PAYG Users...

</Sarcasm>

 

[MikeWh]

This system is called remote completion and Oyster will be able to confirm whether this is an option for you.

No, the system is called auto-complete as far as I know. As has been said, it relies upon a pattern being established and will re-imburse the overcharge using the automatic refund feature. There are also a few special cases where retrospective refunds are applied, usually where a continuation exit has created a here to here journey.

I think that reply from FGW falls far short of acceptable and I intend to attempt to follow up through my contacts at TfL/Oyster.

 

[RJ]

This system is called remote completion and Oyster will be able to confirm whether this is an option for you.

No, the system is called auto-complete as far as I know. As has been said, it relies upon a pattern being established and will re-imburse the overcharge using the automatic refund feature. There are also a few special cases where retrospective refunds are applied, usually where a continuation exit has created a here to here journey.

I think that reply from FGW falls far short of acceptable and I intend to attempt to follow up through my contacts at TfL/Oyster.

Thanks. They should not be routinely deactivating the validators on the basis the money can be claimed back.

They have fobbed me off on this issue and another so I think it's time I stepped things up a little.

 

[87015]

No, the system is called auto-complete as far as I know. As has been said, it relies upon a pattern being established and will re-imburse the overcharge using the automatic refund feature. There are also a few special cases where retrospective refunds are applied, usually where a continuation exit has created a here to here journey.

I think that reply from FGW falls far short of acceptable and I intend to attempt to follow up through my contacts at TfL/Oyster.

They can set up manual auto-complete (for want of a better term) - which would say that anyone who touches in/out at Ealing Broadway, West Ealing etc between certain hours but doesn't touch in/out anywhere else would be presumed to have travelled to/from Paddington, regardless of journey history. I think thats what was happening during the Olympics at West Ham where the temporary footbridge was not supplied with Oyster validators.

The onus would be on FGW to get that set up via TFL.

 

[34D]

Surely this is a simple training issue as (as I understand it) the barriers can either be:

Attended - barriers shut until an oyster card/ticket presented
Non-attended - gates left open (as no person about) but barriers able to accept the insertion of a ticket and the presentation of an oyster card
Off - gates left open, but not possible to put a ticket in or swipe an oyster card

Is this sort of correct?

 

[island]

Not all platforms at Paddington are barriered, but there are standalone validators. Also, not all barriers at Paddington accept Oyster.