Not much use for an inboundary off-peak day travelcard other than at the weekend.
Even at the weekend, the Network Railcard discount on a Travelcard only provides a saving for passengers travelling beyond the boundary of Zone 3, and for Zone 4 that discount is only £1.70 - eg Zone 1-4 cap is £11.70, and the discounted travelcard is £10.00.
Whichever way you look at it, this change really is of no consequence to most Londoners whatsoever.
It's certainly a minority, but the impact if you live in the outer zones can be pretty severe and there are more than one or two of us.
Before the pandemic this would have been of no consequence to me because I had a season ticket so there was no extra charge for travelling at the weekend. Now that I only commute 2 days a week, however, using public transport in London at the weekend is discretionary (I can stay at home or drive) and the Network Railcard discount is a big factor in any decision to do so.
I live in zone 6. It's a 49% increase if I switch to non-discounted PAYG. Unless I specifically intend to get drunk, I'm not going to do that, I'm going to drive.
TfL seem to think that Network Railcards and Two Togather Railcards can be added to Oyster.....
MD3142 Withdrawal of Day Travelcards on TfL Network
www.london.gov.uk
The way I read this (and I could be wrong) this is assuring the Mayor that should he make the recommended decision (scrapping day travelcards, effectively), then customers
would be able to add their Railcard discount (for all the Railcard types listed) to Oyster. They already can with some of them, of course.
edit: I am wrong: After reading this it clearly states at 1.45 that railcard discounts can already be added to Oyster. It said this in the consultation document and I responded to tell them this wasn't true of Network Railcards and to ask them if this would be addressed, but received no response. It looks like TfL officials ignored the consultation responses and then gave BS advice to the Mayor.
I don't think it says they already can add all the listed Railcard discounts to Oyster (although next time I'm at Abbey Wood ticket office I fully intend to try to get them to add my Network Railcard and see what happens, showing them a print-out of this document as evidence that they should). But it only says the current entitlement is for discounts off paper travelcards, with the oyster discount being something that
would be possible if/when the decision is implemented, so I would say they've got until January to put this in place where it isn't in place already.
They need to do some coding so that, on weekdays after 10am, oyster charges the lesser of (a) the non-discounted fare or (b) the greater of two thirds the standard fare or £13. Same with daily caps. And presumably with weekly caps where the minimum fare would be deemed as £13 multiplied by 5, I guess. I'd have thought that would take a bit of time.
Good news if this is true! And if it's not true it means the Mayor made this decision based on false information.