7 Day Travel Card vs. Oyster Card

The Oyster card is just a holder--it has no inherent value until you add £ to it, or a travel card.

No problem going over it for you. First, though, we need to know a little about your plans.

How many is "we"? Any kids? Do you know about the 2 for 1 discounts at some of the more expensive attractions?

First trip to London? Europe?

How much do you intend to use the bus/tube? Will be going out of town during your 10 days?

Then we can discuss which would be the best option in your particular circumstances.

Also do you already have your own contactless payment method (card or phone)?

Nigel.....we are two adults who will be in London for ten days. We have both been to London but not since the early 1970's. We have an out of town day trip to Cambridge with London Walks and we will be taking a trip to Bletchley. Also, we will be using the tube to get into town from Heathrow. We have been to Europe approximately ten times. We have already purchased tickets to Churchill War Rooms and a tour of Parliament on a Saturday with Fat Tire. We are active and in our late 60's and would prefer to walk when possible but know there will be times when this will not be an option. There are some days we may plan an attraction or two but other days when we just like to wander. Our base is a flat in South Kensington.

www.tfl.com Transport for London explains the complicated list of fare packages. The Oyster is an electronic "wallet" rather than a fare; it holds whatever money you put in and withdraws the correct fare for a journey. It does have a daily max which may give a very busy passenger a break on the day. Beyond the money, it makes riding the rails easy; just tap to enter the platform and tap when you exit.

Just don't buy a Visitor Oyster. Those can't have a travel card added to them, among other restrictions. IF you buy from the ticket machines at the Tube stations, you will get a regular Oyster which you can then add a Travelcard. Buying the Oyster from a shop might or might not get you the right one.

The advantage of the 7 day Travelcard over an Oyster is that if you take more than 3 trips a day within the zone the Travelcard covers, day 6 & 7 is "free" compared to the daily cap on the Oyster. The Oyster covers any travel outside the zones the Travelcard covers.. The problem is if you buy a Travelcard that covers more zones than you will be traveling in, you lose money compared to the Oyster. The Oyster by itself automatically figures out which zones you went through and applies the daily cap, so you will pay the least possible overall daily capped rate (except for the "free" days from your Travel card if you never stray from the zones you purchased coverage for).

Confusing? Somewhat.

"What is the advantage of adding the "7 day travel card" to the regular oyster card?"

As said, an Oyster is a just a way of storing fares. You buy it for £5, but it doesn't do anything until you put something on it. That "something" can be cash for Pay As You Go fares (PAYG), or a Travelcard.

You use the Oyster by tapping on the sensor to get into the Tube (Underground), and tapping again at the other end of your journey to get out. For buses, you just tap on entry.

If you put on PAYG money, every time you use the Oyster it deducts the correct fare (Tube fares are based on zones as well as time of day - peak or off-peak). However, when it reaches the same amount as a 1 day Travelcard, it stops deducting for the day. This is referred to as "capping." So, with a PAYG Oyster, just tap in and tap out, and the Oyster system does the rest.

However, the PAYG Oyster does not yet have weekly capping - only daily capping. So, using a PAYG Oyster for 7 straight days is more expensive than buying a 7 day Travelcard, which goes right on your Oyster. You tap in and tap out the same way, but in this case, you've already purchased 7 days of unlimited travel in the zones your Travelcard is good for. A 2 zone card is £34.10, and the daily cap for 2 zones is £6.80, so you save £13.50 with a 7 day card compared with 7 one-day caps.

You can have a Travelcard and PAYG credit on the Oyster at the same time. This is handy if you travel outside the limit of your Travelcard. For instance, I bought a 7 day, 2 zone Travelcard at Heathrow, but Heathrow is in zone 6. I asked (there are people at the airport Oyster machines specifically to help), and since I was traveling off-peak, the additional fare to be added was £1.50. That was my only trip outside zones 1 and 2, but if I were going to places like Hampton Court or Kew Gardens, I could have put on more PAYG money to cover these trips as well.

Contactless payment refers to credit or debit cards that just need to be tapped to a sensor to work, rather than the metal chip which has to make direct contact with a reader. If your card is contactless, it will have the Wi-Fi "waves" symbol on the back. Apple Pay and Android Pay are also contactless. With contactless payment, you get not only daily capping, but also weekly capping from Monday to Sunday. Most European credit and debit cards are now set up for contactless payment. But most US cards aren't. If yours is, and if you have no foreign transaction fees, then you can use your card to pay for fares by tapping it in and out. You will see most locals doing this.

However, if like most US cards, your credit or debit card isn't contactless (or if it is but you have transaction fees), then you should get an Oyster, and put on a 2 zone 7 day Travelcard, as well as some PAYG credit (say, £20). This will cover your first 7 days, as well as giving you some credit for trips outside the two inner zones. Then, when the 7 day Travelcard expires, it will start using your PAYG credit. When your Oyster gets low, replenish it at any machine in any station.

When you leave, if you wish you can get a refund for the credit left on the Oyster, as well as the Oyster itself. However, in order to do this, you apparently have to have used the same method to fill and refill the card each time (cash or the same credit card). Or, you can just save the card and its value for a future trip, or give it to someone else to use (the cards are fully transferable). The reason not to buy a Visitor Oyster is that it is not refundable, and it confers no other advantage in exchange.

Or for a final confusion, as you are two people you could perhaps benefit from the promotion by the national railway companies which allows two people entry for the (full price) price of one at many of the more expensive attractions such as St Pauls Cathedral, Westminster Abbey or The Tower Bridge Experience or the Tower of London.

All those places and many more have participated, but I haven't checked this morning to see which are active at the moment.

If you want to learn about the scheme have a look at https://www.daysoutguide.co.uk/2for1-london

The trick is that to take advantage of the scheme you need to travel to the location using a train ticket. Sounds difficult if you are already staying in South Kensington... Ah, but there is a way.

In addition to a Travelcard which can be loaded onto an Oyster you can actually buy an actual paper Travelcard which is printed on a railway ticket. Only available at national rail station ticket windows you can buy a one week paper Travelcard if you provide a passport sized photo (a weekly Travelcard is in fact a season ticket and all railway season tickets need to be supported by a photocard). A railway paper Travelcard valid in the zone where the attraction is located is a valid train ticket for the purposes of the Days Out promotion.

A weekly paper railway Travelcard as above is about the same price as one stored on your Oyster, but it has a magnetic strip and needs to be fed into the ticket barrier and retrieved - you can't tap it on the reader, and you need to take care of the paper version because it is thin and fragile.

You can be confused because Underground stations can also sell paper Travelcards if you request them to, but those are not valid on the promotion. Underground will print tickets with the TfL Roundel in the corner. You must have a ticket with the National Railways "crows feet" on the corner or the attraction won't take it. This is all explained on the FAQs page of the above link, complete with full colour photos of what is and isn't valid.

If you will go to a few of the covered attractions anyway it will be a possible money saver, at the cost of a bit of a trick to get and you have to carry both that Travelcard each but probably an Oyster too for those times you are outside the nominated zones, such as to and from the airport if you go by Tube.

Ask questions here if it sounds too complicated.

Wow, I may need another advanced degree!!! At this point we are thinking to add to the Oyster (we have 2 given to us by friends with still some value on them) and maybe purchase the 7 day travel card. Thank you all so much!! What a wealth of information!!