TFL Oyster Refund Stash

[ashleyman]

I had an email this morning saying I'd failed to collect a Refund on my Oyster card.



I followed the instructions and went online, logged in and clicked the refund number and pressed Resubmit as asked. I then got put back to the Refund History page where there were about 30 Refund Numbers some as far back as 2014. I clicked on a random one in the list from 2015 and found it was also outstanding, so I resubmit that. Clicked another, same thing. I ended up going through all 30 and found over 20 refunds had not been collected and were outstanding all varying from £3-3.50 so around £70 in money owed to me that I didn't know about.

I had thought that when I got the email saying Refund Ready, you just tapped in as normal and the money would go back on your Oyster card but apparently in the first instance all refunds are allocated to specific stations and if you don't travel through that station then you won't get your refund. After a few days it expires and you have to manually ask for it to be ready. The page now says ready to collect at any station.

There must be thousands of people like me with outstanding refunds. TFL must have a huge stash of uncollected money that belongs to other people. If you haven't checked yours. Do it. You might be surprised.

[Speed 3]

I don't but it does drive me mad that they have it set up as a default that you have to re-travel through the station applicable to get it reloaded to your card.