TallyAnna

I have been reading the official London Underground information here:http://www.tfl.gov.uk/tfl/fares-tick...06/index.shtml
regarding Oysters and Travelcards. I am so confused! It seems as if with the Oyster, there is no need for the Travelcard. But, then the site states that your Travelcard can be put onto your Oyster. Huh? With the Oyster, would the 33% discount apply on River
Cruise boats?
Thanks for bearing with me. We leave on Wednesday and I feel like I'm cramming for a final exam.I think that its time now for sleep!
G'nite.

Merseyheart

I haven't been to London in a while, so the Travel Card has changed. Now it's on your Oyster, which is a prepaid debit card. When you get there, just ask the salesclerk what you need to get around London for a few days. I'm all for trip planning, but sometimes you can go into overdrive!

jody

When you ask for a 7 day travelcard you will be given an Oyster Card. You can keep it for future trips and have it reloaded for a specific amount or for a travelcard.

I don't know about the River Cruise discount but the Oyster provides 2 for 1 at several places..Last spring one of the places was The Eye. Check the website for what is on offer at this time.There were even some theatres listed awhile ago.

PatrickLondon

Oyster is simply a brand name for an electronic record of the payment you've made and the ticket type you hold.t

This saves TfL a lot of staff, and gives them a handy marketing database. So the ticket prices are adjusted to make it a no-brainer to get an Oyster rather than rely on cash or paper tickets wherever possible, though for the time being the very short period (1 and 3 day) Travelcards are still available as paper tickets.

If you buy a Travelcard, it gets you the discount on the river boats, whether it's a paper ticket or on Oyster.

Some people don't make a lot of use of public transport and they prefer to pay as they go, which can also be done using Oyster. The incentive for them is that the system will cap anything they spend in a day to what they would have spent on a one-day Travelcard. But the Oyster prepay option doesn't get them the discount on the river boats.

All you need to remember is:

- don't pay cash for single tickets: any other method will be cheaper
- a Travelcard is likely to be the simplest and cheapest option, and it all depends how long you want it to last for.

jm0754

I, too, was confused about the discount on the river cruise using a travel card on the Oyster (without the paper version how can they tell what is loaded on it). I emailed the cruise people and just got a response back saying it was no problem.

jgg

We were just in London for a week in March. We bought a 7-day travelcard, did not put it on an Oyster. You just stick the card in the turnstile, pull it out and go. Very easy. We didn't use it for a discount on a River cruise so can't answer that.

xyz123

jgg...

did you buy your travelcard before you came to London....the 7 day zone 1 travelcard is no longer available and the zone 1 & 2 travelcard bought at tfl stations (all underground stations) is now only available on oyster....national rail stations sell paper travelcards as do the ones you can buy outside the UK but if you think it's fast sticking in your paper ticket, it's 5x as fast just touching the yellow card reader!

jgg

Yes, we bought it before we left through BETS (Budget Europe Travel Service 1-800-441-9413). We also bought our Eurostar tickets for London to Paris from them. They were extremely helpful and answered several of my non-transportation related questions as well.

Robespierre

When you load a Travelcard on Oyster, you qualify for the much cheaper Oyster fares for extensions, such as to and from Heathrow. Paper cards don't allow you to do this. If you don't use the Tube outside Zone 2, of course this doesn't apply to you.

For fewer than about five days, pay-as-you-go can be cheaper. See http://tinyurl.com/kke22