Oyster Card

How much do you plan to ride the Underground in the course of two days? My wife and I obtained Oyster cards for six full days in London and averaged only about 1.5 trips per day. Sometimes it's just easier to buy point-to-point. But if you do want/need an Oyster, you can get them at ticket windows or newsstands throughout the Underground system.

I know we want to see the major sights. May be doing the hop-on/off bus tours. So I dont know if we would be using it that much. We have never been to London before and really not sure as to what we are all wanting to see/do.

Does a "trip" on the tube mean that you go from point A to B or from A to B and Back again?
Does an Oyster Card make more sense than a 1 day paper travel card if you are riding the train/bus more than three times a day?
thanks,
Alex

For Alex,

A trip on the tube is one-way ... from point A to B. The cost of the trip depends on how many zones you travel through.

The Oyster Card is just a vehicle for storing your tickets; you can load pay as you go (PAYG) money or a travelcard (of a week or more) or both on the card. If you use PAYG, your daily fare is capped. You will not exceed the cost of a comparable one-day travelcard.

Single tickets paid with cash almost NEVER make sense in London. For example, a single ticket paid with cash for a journey in zone 1 is 4 GBP. That same journey paid with PAYG money on an Oyster card is 1.80 GBP. That means that even if you just take 2 trips and don't bother to collect back your deposit, using the Oyster card is still cheaper than paying cash for single tickets.

All of the info about Oyster and fares can be found on the Transport for London site which is tfl.gov.uk

Whether you want to get an Oyster card or just want to use daily paper cards, depends on your plans. An Oyster card makes more sense than a daily paper travelcard if you plan to just take 1 or 2 trips a day. There are other reasons when Oyster is better than one-day card.

Just get pay as you go. For 2 days worth of travel, 10-15 pounds will suffice, maybe even just about 13. I think it caps off at 6.10 per day. You can also use it on the city buses. Just remember when you use it on the tube, tap in and out at the yellow dot, but on a bus do NOT tap out, just in. Otherwise it will charge you again.

The cost of a travelcard and the daily price cap with an Oyster card are the same. For travel in zones 1-2 it is £7.20 for peak travel (before 09:30 on weekdays) and £5.60 for off-peak travel (after 09:30 on weekdays and anytime on weekends).

Buy your Oyster card at the King's Cross/St Pancras Underground station.

The Oyster "Pay as you go" works great - just pay the one-time fee (that you can get back) and load with enough for your two days - maybe 10 pounds or even less - you can top it up if you need to, but you can get a refund of what's left under 5 pounds. If you have time to do it, take the bus instead (cheaper and a free visual "tour"). The thing that's nice about the "pay as you go" is that it never uses more than what you would have paid for a travel card - and usually less. London is very walkable, too.

I'm curious to know what happens if you tap your card and you don't have enough for the fare. Flashing lights and sirens? Also, does it let you know when you're getting low on funds?

Teresa - if you don't have enough credit on the card the barriers won't open and it will say "seek assistance" on the machine. There are no sirens!

You do get a message on the machine if you are running low on funds. The balance on your card does show up on the machine when you first start your journey and at the end so you can keep an eye on it.

Thanks, Laura. I didn't want to be dragged away to Fare-Dodgers' Jail! ;-)

Do you need an oyster card for children? Never mind just ordered a zip oystercard online. Kids travel for 1gb on tube and free on buses.