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Beefmeister
Original Poster
10,814 posts
99 months
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Just come back from a week in Hong Kong, where they have the 'Octopus' card which in principle is the same as London's Oyster card.
You put money on and use it for the Metro (subway) system, buses and trams. What marks it out for me though, was that pretty much every shop selling small value items also took it. Starbucks, Pret, 7-Eleven, supermarkets, pretty much anywhere you can think of all over HK.
It seems a real shame that the Oyster card isn't used more like this in London. I for one would love to be able to just have the one card that meant I could swipe my way through my day without bothering with cash. Anything under £10 - Oyster. Anything over - card. Easy.
It could have been a great opportunity with the Olympics too - why not make the whole Olympic village cash free? After using the Octopus in this way for a week I swear everything just went quicker, especially in a place like 7-Eleven or Starbucks.
Is there any reason why it isn't rolled out to more places in London?
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b14
278 posts
57 months
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It's a question of funding - TfL owns Oyster and the back end that runs Oyster. Someone would need to find a lot of cash to integrate the Oyster system into other areas and I'm not sure who would provide it.
It would be very good, espec for tourism but sadly I'm not sure it would happen. Instead you could get a paywave debit card from Barclays which has integrated Oyster and contactless payment, which is half way there.
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Beefmeister
Original Poster
10,814 posts
99 months
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True, I have that wave thing on my debit and credit cards, but it would just be nice to see it all integrated.
I guess it's just too large an infrastructure issue.
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5potTurbo
3,284 posts
37 months
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Beefmeister said: True, I have that wave thing on my debit and credit cards, but it would just be nice to see it all integrated.
I guess it's just too large an infrastructure issue. Hong Kong population's around 7.5m - they did it. I really like the Octopus system. I have a cheap Swatch type watch that has the Octopus data embedded in it from a few years ago, and used it again last year on a visit. 
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AbarthChris
2,188 posts
84 months
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Little bit of info...
Beef, you're right about the infrastructure. The problem is that the Oyster card is a proprietary system designed and owned by TFL. With it being essentially a one-off system, it has different coding and standards. Within the NFC (Near Field Communications) arena there is a group set up to create and develop a set of standards that would allow developers to create systems using these rules that would be able to talk to other systems.
Its been a while since I worked with this tech, but basically there is the investment behind the wave and pay system, but that is fundamentally different to the oyster card system, so retailers would not want to have to deal with 2 different but essentially similar systems.
The train operating companies and transport organisations have looked into expanding the Oystercard system into other regions, but its not viable, so they set up the ITSO organisation to create one system that all TOC's and bus operators etc could use. These standards, i believe, could be expanded to encompass retail items.
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Beefmeister
Original Poster
10,814 posts
99 months
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Thanks Chris, useful info.
So basically it could happen, but typically TfL probably went for the cheapest option (or the one offered by a 'friend' of someone) which means it's totally unworkable with other systems.
Maybe in a few years the contactless payment will take off and the tech will replace Oyster. In fact having just one card that did everything would be fantastic.
Bring it on!
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hornet
5,458 posts
119 months
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Noticed there were Oyster readers (as then unused) down at Brighton last time I was there. Given the amount of people who use them, it would make sense to roll them out much further than the London zonal system, but I guess you're into ATOC politics there. If you know how to use it (pink readers, OSIs and whatnot), you can save an absolute tonne using Oyster.
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sugerbear
505 posts
27 months
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Creating the infrastructure to manage cards/payments/call centres/payment terminals is not cheap.
Oyster wont be around in 5 years time, it will have been replaced by contactless cards (supplied by you bank) from the major vendors.
The reason is that Oyster wont be spreading is because it because TFL doesn't have the clout (or even need) to spread it to other payment channels.
In 10 years time your Visa/MasterCard (or some other payment vendor) will be able to be used on any transport system in the world. You wont need to buy a card, load it etc etc.
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sinizter
3,346 posts
55 months
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Just get the Barclaycard with the integrated Oyster and the Visa PayWave ... Sorted.
All on one card, which you can swipe/wave all day long.
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hornet
5,458 posts
119 months
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I can certainly see a move towards using a touch card system (even phones) to pay for small value things, but the idea of contactless payment scares me for some reason.
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sinizter
3,346 posts
55 months
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hornet said: I can certainly see a move towards using a touch card system (even phones) to pay for small value things, but the idea of contactless payment scares me for some reason. All covered by the credit card guarantee thing ... At these early stages, I wouldn't want contactless payment on my debit card, but I would like to have it on my credit card - which I do, and use whenever possible, which usually results in them staring at me wide-eyed. I also make it a point to mention to any retailers that I would like to use contactless payment, if they don't yet have it available at the point of sale, in suitable places of course.
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Beefmeister
Original Poster
10,814 posts
99 months
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Ah great, moved to Finance. Thanks.
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Cheib
6,223 posts
44 months
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I am sure the banks probably don't want the Oyster card becoming more widely usable....I have no idea how much they make out of the current status quo but I am sure they don't want Oyster getting part of it.
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shakotan
5,683 posts
65 months
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Beefmeister said: Just come back from a week in Hong Kong, where they have the 'Octopus' card which in principle is the same as London's Oyster card.
You put money on and use it for the Metro (subway) system, buses and trams. What marks it out for me though, was that pretty much every shop selling small value items also took it. Starbucks, Pret, 7-Eleven, supermarkets, pretty much anywhere you can think of all over HK.
It seems a real shame that the Oyster card isn't used more like this in London. I for one would love to be able to just have the one card that meant I could swipe my way through my day without bothering with cash. Anything under £10 - Oyster. Anything over - card. Easy.
It could have been a great opportunity with the Olympics too - why not make the whole Olympic village cash free? After using the Octopus in this way for a week I swear everything just went quicker, especially in a place like 7-Eleven or Starbucks.
Is there any reason why it isn't rolled out to more places in London? Buying things in shops with Octopus works out more expensive than paying in cash though.
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ETOPS
1,636 posts
67 months
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shakotan said: Buying things in shops with Octopus works out more expensive than paying in cash though. How is that? Because something that's HK$5.49 would be rounded up to HK$5.50? Please, worst case, that is less that £0.005. Plus, you get automated generous top ups from your grocery store, making Octopus cheaper to use than cash.
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B Huey
4,881 posts
68 months
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It doesn't surprise me the Oyster isn't more widely used, they've been dithering for years about letting people use it on overground trains.
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shakotan
5,683 posts
65 months
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ETOPS said: shakotan said: Buying things in shops with Octopus works out more expensive than paying in cash though. How is that? Because something that's HK$5.49 would be rounded up to HK$5.50? Please, worst case, that is less that £0.005. Plus, you get automated generous top ups from your grocery store, making Octopus cheaper to use than cash. I only ever used it once, and founf that something that would have cost me around HK$15.00 ended up costing around HK$18.00 when I checked my balance.
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ETOPS
1,636 posts
67 months
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shakotan said: I only ever used it once, and founf that something that would have cost me around HK$15.00 ended up costing around HK$18.00 when I checked my balance. Rubbish. You pay the marked price, rounded up to the nearest HK$0.10
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shakotan
5,683 posts
65 months
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ETOPS said: shakotan said: I only ever used it once, and founf that something that would have cost me around HK$15.00 ended up costing around HK$18.00 when I checked my balance. Rubbish. You pay the marked price, rounded up to the nearest HK$0.10 Don't 'rubbish' me, you patronising oaf. It's quite possibly that my one-off experience was a result of the shelves being marked wrong, or a problem with the system. In any event, I paid more than what I was expecting, and thought "Bugger that for a game of soldiers". If it turns out that it was an error, and my understanding of the entire system is jaded because of that error, then fine, but don't tell me something didn't happen when you weren't there to prove otherwise.
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Edinburger
2,327 posts
37 months
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Beefmeister said: Just come back from a week in Hong Kong, where they have the 'Octopus' card which in principle is the same as London's Oyster card.
You put money on and use it for the Metro (subway) system, buses and trams. What marks it out for me though, was that pretty much every shop selling small value items also took it. Starbucks, Pret, 7-Eleven, supermarkets, pretty much anywhere you can think of all over HK.
It seems a real shame that the Oyster card isn't used more like this in London. I for one would love to be able to just have the one card that meant I could swipe my way through my day without bothering with cash. Anything under £10 - Oyster. Anything over - card. Easy.
It could have been a great opportunity with the Olympics too - why not make the whole Olympic village cash free? After using the Octopus in this way for a week I swear everything just went quicker, especially in a place like 7-Eleven or Starbucks.
Is there any reason why it isn't rolled out to more places in London? I've always wondered this. In HK the Octopus card can be topped-up at either 'Added Value' machines or direct from your current account and it is accepted everywhere - bars, trains, shops, I've never known anywhere in HK to not accept it, other than market stalls. I have a card and phone which do contactless payments from a credit card and that's progress but nowhere near as good as Octopus in Hong Kong and they've had that for many years.
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