Oyster Pass

Follow signs to the UNDERGROUND (TUBE). There are ticket booths there where you can buy your Oyster.

For the sake of clarity, it's called an Oyster Card, not an Oyster Pass.

When I asked him why it was called an Oyster card he replied, "Because they couldn't spell lobster" :-)

We bought the pass for London proper about 1 1/2 years ago.We had to pay a small additional fee to get to and from the airport. It wasn't much and the folks at the ticket booth were wonderfully helpful.

We bought ours at the ticket window as soon as we got off the Heathrow Express at Paddington. We got the one week pass attached to the Oyster Card and it was super easy to ride the tube and the bus around London.

As everyone said, follow the exceedingly long hallways and signs to the Underground station. You'll come into an area that has an information booth to one side, another side that has machines along the wall, and then almost around a corner has 4 ticket counters. If you have coins, you can buy a card from a machine, but since we didn't we used the counter. Just say you want an oyster card with however much loaded onto it, or a travel card if you're going that route. You pay a 3 pound deposit, and whatever you get loaded on. It comes in a little case (advertising IKEA at the moment) if you get it from the counter, and there are little maps that are handy to keep with it.

Once you've got it, tap it on the reader (big round yellow button looking thing) to open the gate. You don't even have to take it out of the case. You'll need it again to open the gate at your exit point.

It's really easy, and well worth it. I'm not as big a fan of the paper cards just due to wrinkling them beyond use, or having to feed them multiple times. Someone more careful wouldn't have any problems!

You can also use the Oyster card on all regular city buses, including double decker. But NOT the roof-less double decker tour buses.

On the bus, tap the yellow dot with your card like you do at the tube turnstile, but do NOT tap it on the way off the bus.

I have an Oyster Card and have used it for the pasty 3 years when Itravel to London; I ordered mine before I left and brought it with me. One of the things that I like about it is that it is easier than carting around £ coins and also that the card never expires. It is like a prepaid credit card you load it with the money and as you exit the tube it shows how much "credit" you have left on it, if you are getting low you just go to a ticket machine scan the card and enter the amount you would like to add to the Oyster Card, put the money into the machine or use your credit card [I think you can use your credit card, I always put in a £5-10 note.]. If you don't feel comfortable adding the money that way many tube stations have ticket booths and they will add the money to the card for you, you just give them the £ or your credit card. The other thing that I love about the Oyster Card is that it never expires, if you don't use it for 2 years you call a toll free number and tell them you are wanting to use it again and they reactivate the card [there is a number for each card and you provide this info to the agent on the phone].

Is the toll free number the one on the back of the card - 0845 330 9876? Or is it a different number?

Numbers beginning '0845' are not toll free, they are so-called 'national rate' numbers. Calling from within the UK they are slightly more expensive than local rate calls, not sure about calling from abroad.

Free-phone numbers begin '0800' but won't be fee from abroad.

We bought ours right outside the doors to the underground (Terminal 5). We added to it several times, then the last evening, topped it up to what the fee for Heathrow would be (even though it was less that the minimum for the window, it was not problem). We got off the tube at Heathrow, went to the window, got 6 pounds back - had enough for coffee upstairs. The Oyster Card is easy to use (and you get a price break over point-to-point) - also, I definitely advise using it on the bus a few times - much better view than the tube and lots cheaper.