London Tube--fare payment?

Very simple. Nothing to set up. Just use your tap credit card.

https://tfl.gov.uk/fares/how-to-pay-and-where-to-buy-tickets-and-oyster/pay-as-you-go/contactless-and-mobile-pay-as-you-go

It has to be contactless, can be a debit or credit card. Tap on and off the tube and the system takes care of the rest to ensure you don't pay more than the daily cap. You need a card per person, but they can be linked to the same account.

One can still buy, and use, an Oyster card. If you’ve still got the card from the previous trip, it can still be used - top it up at a machine inside the Tube station if it needs a higher balance for taking rides.

If your credit card is contactless-enabled (is there a symbol on it that looks like three nested semicircles?), then there’s nothing needed to set it up - just hover it above the sensor at the gate, and the gate will open, both when you are going to a train, and again when you’re leaving a station after your ride. Hopefully, if it’s not a British credit card, your card doesn’t charge extra for foreign transactions.

People with a smartphone or smartwatch can set it up for contactless Tube payment.

Just make sure your credit card is “tap enabled” (has the little symbol, not just a chip). And even if it is, some US Visa cards do not work. TFL warns about this on the website section about payment. My husband’s B of A Visa did not work on the Tube or bus, although it functioned fine for tap and go payment elsewhere in London. AmEx cards all work.

If you happen to still have your old Oyster cards you can add cash value and use those as well.

Oyster cards still are sold and still work. You can buy one at the tube station at the airport; last time we were there they had uniformed staffers who could help although it is pretty easy at the machines. Also if you still have that Oyster card it may still work and be able to be topped-up (eg. funds added)

Even though you can use a credit card I'd rather lose an Oyster card than my credit card while traveling. My credit card stays safely in my travel wallet.

You can pay via:

-Oyster Card

-Contactless Credit Card

-Smartphone with Google Pay/Apple Pay

-Smartwatch with Google Pay/Apple Pay

Nothing you have to set up for Tube payments. It's very similar to Omny.

Here's more than you probably wanted to know:

https://tfl.gov.uk/fares/how-to-pay-and-where-to-buy-tickets-and-oyster/pay-as-you-go/contactless-and-mobile-pay-as-you-go

the difference between now and then if years ago is then, is that Oyster Cards cost £3 and you then added value (money) at machine where you tapped your card and fed the machine a credit card or cash and then tapped the card again and then went on your trips. At the end you could hold onto the card forever and use it on following holidays. Or you could cash out the card (sometimes a bit tricksy) and get both the value plus the deposit as it then was.

These days an Oyster card costs £7 and that is purely a purchase, and you never see that money again and can't travel on it. Then you go through the same rigamarole using a card to top up the value, many machines no longer take cash, especially the narrow convenient ones, and you need to keep an eye on the balance.

If you use a contactless credit or debit card, the amount is only put through after all your journeys at the end of the day, taking into account the same caps as on the Oyster, you don't have to pay to activate the process, nor do you have to top up. You can use a phone, watch, or card. Just use the same one to benefit from the capping. Slight bit of organization on your part, spend less.

I still use my years old Oyster Card.

Oyster Card or contactless; it’s a personal preference.

Don't forget, no matter if you are using a contactless method or an Oyster card, on the Tube you must tap in at your origin and tap out at your destination, but not when changing lines (special rules apply if using DLR). If using buses you need to tap in every time you board a bus but you do NOT tap out on buses. If you do you will be double charged. All buses within an hour count as one.

My England trip (London itinerary) our tour guide gave us an Oyster Card with £10.00 fare added. Wound up with 2 cards given to me from other tour members since I was staying extra days in London. Easy to add/check funds left on card at the fare machines.

Used my Apple Watch to pay when funds ran out with the cards.

Thank you for all the replies! Looks like I have plenty of options. Thank you.
Karen

Just a note for the Brits on here: to us, contactless means absolutely nothing. Credit cards and debit cards that allow tapping - that is, don't require a keypad and PIN, is what you mean.

It seems to me that making a one-time purchase of an Oyster card (as a foreigner) would incur far fewer additional charges than constantly tapping your credit card for every single ride. Those foreign transaction fees can really add up. Plus, I heard there is a weekly cap on transportation charges, so if you are traveling a lot during the week you won't get charged after a certain point. I'm not sure if that's true or not, or if it applies only to Oyster card users or also to credit card users.

I use OMNY in NYC and like the swipe as you go feature, but I'm paying in my own currency so I'm not getting charged extra fees for each ride. Also, I can use my phone to swipe both my son and me into the NYC subway, but in London I read that you have to use a different credit card for each person in your group. That sounds really inconvenient.

I'm heading to London in a few weeks and see you can only buy the travel Oyster card outside the country, but France isn't listed as a location selling them. I did see, however, that it might be possible to buy one on the Eurostar. Has anyone done that?

Another bonus: The London tube website says with the travel Oyster you can get your unused money back. Has that worked for anyone?

Laura

Hi Karen -

If you’ve still got your original Oyster card, it should still work fine. Mine is a museum piece which I dig out for our occasional forays to ‘that London’ (or as I’ve memorably heard it referred to, ‘London village’!). Just ensure that it still has enough credit on it to function - you can top up at the terminals in tube stations without having to get involved with humans.

Personally, I prefer to use my Oyster card over my ‘tap and go’ credit card. It’s just personal choice - I believe there are less ramifications if I do something dozy and lose my Oyster card as opposed to my credit card.

Ian

I'm heading to London in a few weeks and see you can only buy the travel Oyster card outside the country, but France isn't listed as a location selling them. I did see, however, that it might be possible to buy one on the Eurostar. Has anyone done that?

That is not correct. You CAN buy the Visitor Oyster in advance and have it mailed to you. Or buy a regular Oyster Card at any ticket machine. There is no difference in how the Visitor Oyster and the normal Oyster work.

I'm not aware of you being able to buy them on Eurostar.

Visitor Oyster cards certainly used to be sold from the bar on Eurostar trains; some rail sites say they still do.

We know they USED to be sold from the bar on Eurostar, but you are asking for current information. The Eurostar website doesn't mention that they are now, nor does either the TfL website or Visit Britain.
The Man in Seat 61 doesn't mention it either, he simply says that Paris single metro tickets and carnets of 10 are still sold onboard. I was under the impression that paper carnets for Paris were no longer sold (but old ones were still valid) so am unsure as to whether even that information is still valid.

Visit London & Nederlandse Spoorwegen (international site) say that they still do. Certainly it is the case though that the need to sell them is very much diminished since when they started in 2008.

Personally I wouldn't rely on this anyway as they could easily be out of stock whatever. The availability of Paris Metro carnets used to be variable for example.

Worth pointing out that you don't pay foreign transaction/conversion fees on each trip you make. TfL totals up all the journeys made in one day, applies any relevant caps and bills you for the days travel just ONCE at 0429 the following day.

Any fees would thus be paid just once on the previous days travel totalled-up.

I'm amazed that some people still travel using credit cards that have foreign transaction fees. There are plenty that don't.

Those foreign transaction fees can really add up. Plus, I heard there is a weekly cap on transportation charges, so if you are traveling a lot during the week you won't get charged after a certain point. I'm not sure if that's true or not, or if it applies only to Oyster card users or also to credit card users.

There is a daily cap on how much you pay on London transport. It doesn't matter which you use--Oyster card, Credit card, Google/Apple Pay. As long as you use the same payment method all the time, the cap will automatically kick in.

You can read about caps and Travelcards here:

https://tfl.gov.uk/fares/find-fares/tube-and-rail-fares/caps-and-travelcard-prices

Don't worry about a visitor Oyster Card. Just purchase a regular Oyster Card when you arrive in London. There are machines at every station that are very simple to use. Put your credit card in, tell them how much you want to load on the card, and an Oyster Caard will pop out.

Have you thought about getting a credit card with no foreign transaction fees? There are plenty of them.

It seems to me that making a one-time purchase of an Oyster card (as a foreigner) would incur far fewer additional charges than constantly tapping your credit card for every single ride. Those foreign transaction fees can really add up.

Aside from the excellent points made above, mathematically it works out the same (aside from differences due to fluctuations in the exchange rate), since foreign transaction fees on a credit card are almost always charged as a % of the transaction (usually around 3%), not a flat fee per transaction.

So it doesn't matter whether you load £24 with your credit card once onto an Oyster card, or tap with your credit card eight times to pay eight £3 fares. Either way you've spent £24 in total and will be charged 3% of the total -- with the Oyster card it's 3% of £24 at once, with the contactless it's 3% of £3 charged 8 times, but in both cases it adds up to 3% of £24.

"Those foreign transaction fees can really add up."

So many cards nowadays don't charge foreign fransaction fees, so you're only looking at the exchange rate margin, which is going to be the same regardless of whether you tap tour contactless card at the barrier, or when you add credit to your Oyster. And you're paying £7 per Oyster card, so it's doesn't really make sense to use it unless you already have one.

And you're going to be using your card for virtually everything jn London anyway, so why not use it for public transport as well?

Either way you've spent £24 in total and will be charged 3% of the total -- with the Oyster card it's 3% of £24 at once, with the contactless it's 3% of £3 charged 8 times, but in both cases it adds up to 3% of £24.

Which amounts to 72 cents. A lot less than the £7 just to buy the Oyster Card. You can't even buy a cup of coffee for that.

But it's not charged Eight times for eight journeys, it's charged once.

Transport for London totals up the daily travel made and bills you ONCE not after each journey. After caps that could be barely 25p in 3% fees (about USD 0.32)

The daily cap for Zones 1+2 is £8.50 for example; any journeys made over a daily cap are effectively free.

I have looked at all of the web links and still cannot tell what to use for payment for children. They do not have credit cards and the fare is discounted, but if I use one of my credit cards, how do I designate the child fare?

You can't, the Young Visitor Discount can only be added to an Oyster Card. If Under 11 though, they travel free with a paying adult.

Each paying traveller needs their own payment method, you can't share an Oyster card or bank card or phone.

You can use payment methods which share a bank account, so someone using a bank card and another using a phone linked to that bank account would be fine. The phone is treated as a unique payment method.

Same as a joint account with two or more cards linked to it, each card is treated individually when making a transaction.

I have looked at all of the web links and still cannot tell what to use for payment for children. They do not have credit cards and the fare is discounted, but if I use one of my credit cards, how do I designate the child fare?

You can’t designate a child’s fare with a credit card. If the child is 10 or under, they don’t need a ticket when you are with them. If the child is over 10, you can buy an Oyster card (7 GBP) and ask the person at the ticket counter to add a “young visitor discount”.

thank you

It seems to me that making a one-time purchase of an Oyster card (as a foreigner) would incur far fewer additional charges than constantly tapping your credit card for every single ride. Those foreign transaction fees can really add up.

Not really, even with a credit card with an FTF, it is cheaper than buying an Oyster card. Typical cards charge a 3% FTF (if at all), to exceed the 7 GBP cost of the Oyster, you would need to spend just over 200 GBP on the Underground (233 GBP). Capping at ~10 GBP per day, that's 23 days of travel before you break even, longer if those days are consecutive, then it stretches to over a Month (weekly cap is ~50 GBP)

If you are a regular visitor to London, don't mind stopping to load funds onto it, don't care if you leave a balance on, fine. But for most any visitor, tap in/out is just cheaper and easier.

It's all six one way, half dozen the other. For TfL there's Oyster, contactless, and mobile pay. I don't see that one is better than the other and I'm not quibbling over a £7 Oyster card purchase or a 3% foreign transaction fee. It's not necessary to become invested in another's preference for payment options.

Interesting discussion about fares, but perhaps it would be better on a thread of its own.

Karen, the OP, was last active in March, getting ready for her trip in April - this thread was last active in January until woken up yesterday.

To save Karen from emails every time a post is added it would be polite to be seperate.

Where better to discuss alternative methods of paying fares than in a thread started for that specific purpose?

Bringing kiddos into the equation is an excellent example of how the Oyster card can be useful to travelers.

Re: children's fares: you can apply 4 weeks ahead for an 11-15 zip card using the child's passport. You can designate it for pick up at a TfL Visitor Centre at one of the airports (if you are arriving during opening hours) or other visitor centre. It gives free bus and tram fares and child rate tube. You use it like an Oyster and load it with value. The child can use it even if they turn 16, if their birthday is after September 30. You need the child and their passport for pick up.

I didn't organize properly this year but managed this year. The card was made and waiting as expected at LHR. A useful souvenir. Makes even more sense of you have multiple children!

I prefer my OG Oyster. Friends have given me theirs and I have no idea where they've gone. Better to lose those rather than my CC, which has foreign transaction fees but has benefits that are useful in my everyday life.