Contactless Fares Can Be Cheaper Than Oyster 

after algebra, geometry, trigonometry, calculus, linear algebra, combinatorics, differential equations ........ here comes travel in uk....

I only travel to London once or twice a month and always use Contactless because I'm too lazy to top up my Oyster. Makes me happy that laziness is saving me money!

Even though I’m 3 years late, I just wanna say that this video was definitely needed and really VERY necessary for people to know... thanks!

I remember comparing my oyster journey to a brother's contactless and was surprised to find he paid less. It's this aspect of travelling on public transport that I hate: never knowing if you are paying too much or not.

Just here procrastinating for my exam. You learn a new thing everyday

Is there anything in the universe as complicated as TfL's fares?

WOW--- really interesting video guys. Can't believe how much of a price difference it was!

If you have a railcard, say 16-25, then your daily off-peak cap is 1/3 lower, for example, £8.45 instead of £12.8 for zone 1-6 (2019). This cap apply to any kind of public transport. Railcards cannot be loaded to contactless so oyster is the only way to utilize this discount

Travelling to London soon. Watched many of these videos but yours is by far the best and easiest to understand. Thank you

Thanks Geoff, been enjoying your videos. I regularly use public transport to attend meetings in and around London and had noticed some time back that there was a small price difference between contactless and Oyster, with the later being slightly more expensive. Contactless was far more convenient for me to use and more recently I just use Apple Pay on my phone making my commute much more practical with not having to keep finding tickets in my wallet.

Thanks for this videos as it helped me save on a journey thru zone 1 while I was visiting London for a weekend

would be good to have an answer from TFL

wow london has some expensive public transport

So glad I swapped out to contactless last year now! Good to know!

Great video, as usual, have spent many hours watching your videos, keep up the good work

I always thought that TFL should have a day fare finder, where you can add multiple journeys and see how much you'll pay.

sadly contactless cannot give me national rail card discount which is 1/3 off. so to younger persons, oyster is defo cheaper

Ditched my Oyster card years ago in favor of contactless. Added bonus is you don’t have to bother topping off and you don’t have to worry about carrying and losing another card.

Omg glad i found this video 🙏🏻🙏🏻🙏🏻 Going to London this week for the first time ever and this Def will help me out. I guess no oyster card for me 😞

London fares are insane. A trip from Parramatta Station to Town Hall (which is about 30 km) and then two trips around the city cost 5 pounds on Sydney's trains.

What a useful video, guys! Will be watching more

Really fascinating stuff from Mr Marshall, I admire his energy, but now all less complex as use a £20 60+ Oyster Card, so all my journeys are free, lasts for six years until I’m 66, then I get my Freedom Pass.

I have noticed that contactless is cheaper than oyster and i have been scratching my head trying to figure out why that is. i regularly travel into Euston from Watford Junction (a mixture of peak and off peak). my peak fare is capped at £14.70 (on oyster it costs £16.60) and if i make one journey off peak, one peak it is capped at £12.50 (oyster would cost £13.4). i didn't understand why, but have been happy about it!

Wow thanks for the info! Is this still the case in Sep 2019?

Great video. Have you looked at the monthly or weekly oyster to see if they are better worse or equal to contactless? Or maybe found a threshold of journeys between the two which would favour the one or the other?

they didn't highlight if they were traveling during Peak or Off peak period. also there's a daily cap all day travel around £9 i believe

I guess it’s not fare. Get it? Hehe.

This is very useful informations:-) THANK YOU

A common misconception is the Number of zones you travel through equates to same fare. If I make an Underground trip from Hornchurch zone 6 to Whitechapel zone 2. It costs the same as going from West Croydon zone 5 overground to Whitechapel. Hornchurch is 1 more zones away from Whitechapel through the district line. Both trips same price

I got a London Underground Android Pay ad at the start of the video. ;)

There is one huge advantage of oyster over contactless that you are not considering... You can't add any discount to contactless.. if you have a railcard for example using oyster might be much cheaper.. you have discounted off peak travels and even lower off peak caps, for instance if you travel in zone 1/2 the cap is just over 4£

Everytime I travelled from Heathrow, to Croydon in zone 6, it was only about £5 something. I think there is a time limit, that lets you travel for one price, if you change trains in a certain time period.

Great information, thanks. The explanation is almost as complex as a Brussels directive.

These videos are absolutely brilliant! SUBSCRIBED!

Rather good actually... More please.

How interesting! Does anyone know if contactless caps the amount to match a travel card? When I go from Slough to London (return) I get the (what I call) all day return including zone 1-6 travel. It works out much cheaper than buying separately a Slough to padding return + day cap for underground. But if I use contactless and just start going in from Slough to Paddington, then use underground etc, will it cap me for the travel card price (around £15) or will it charge me individual train prices plus day cap in London Underground?

Paper one day cards are cheaper than either, it's all day anywhere in the zones you pay for, for any number of journeys and the same applies to paper bus passes, and you can use your contactless payment card or chip and pin card on the ticket machine

I would use contactless if I could load my student oyster benefits onto it.

Thanks for this as I always thought Oyster was cheape then using contactless!

For the weekly capping of contactless, if I travel most of the time in zone1-2 during the week but will take one or two trips to zone 4, how will the weekly cap account for? Will it cap at zone 1-2 and charge the extension fee from zone 2 to zone 4? or will it cap at zone 1-zone 4 for the weekly price?

yay matts back love his one person fan club lol

I've stopped using my Oyster card after I had a load of issues with it in the past and "made do" with contactless. Glad to see that was the right decision. I will often go in via Morden/Wimbledon and then jet around Z1, so would expect similar things happening here. Do the zone caps work in the same way on NR/Overground services? If you play with the boats on a day out, do the strange fares there make Oyster and contactless balance out?

I enjoyed watching it.

Borrowed a friend's Oyster card when visiting UK last year. But then a cousin told me to use contactless and not bother with Oyster. Worked a treat. Won't bother with Oyster again (a bucket list item of mine is Reading to Shenfield assuming they get it running before I start pushing daisies).

If you travel between Harrow-on-the-Hill and Baker Street is it the same price if you travel with Chiltern Railways to Marylebone then get the Bakerloo rather than going direct on the Met?

how much will it cost me go euston... to excel. and on what routes please on a sunday after and return journey on monday afternoon

Thank you for that.

Hello! We are visiting London in February. I have some questions that you may be able to assist? Can you use the same contactless card for multiple riders? Also, do the cap daily the usage within zone 1 for contactless? I'm very confused about the capping.

0:50 Not talking on the tube. Well done.

Do contact less vs oyster while touching two pink readers.

so - next time in london I need a travel advisor... - so is there a kind of week ticket? or intelligent ticket like oyster seems? Or would it be always cheaper to directly use contactless payment with mastercard?

I use the bus a lot and buy a monthly fare for this I rarely use the underground but when I do would it be advisable to use my contactless card rather than topping up my oyster card?

oyster doesn't have a weekly cap as it were, but it has weekly travelcards, which i guess are the same price. if you want to travel outside the zone you have your travelcard is for you need to top up, whereas contactless just charges you removing the extra step, but it still is a facility oyster has. also, given how "zone centric" everyone is in London, i doubt they'd ever go out of their travelcard area to have to worry about topping up. what contactless doesn't have is a monthly cap and oyster has this. if you're as bad at managing money as i am you might prefer paying for your monthly ticket at the beginning of the month when you have money rather than spending it as you go and realise you can't afford to get to work halfway through the month because you've spent it. saying all that, i now cycle which is "free" ( i put it in quotes because you need to buy a bike, a lock and pay for the occasional maintenance) so when i do use the tube (raining, too cold, going drinking, etc) i use contactless as oyster is just a card i'd have to faff around with

unless you have a disabled persons railcard (or any other railcard of course)

Londons fare is atrocious. In Athens I pay less than a euro for my commute on the train.

How about if we travel outside zone 6 from zone 4 and return?

Ah. This is most interesting. I discovered this discrepancy last August. I don't think I have full journey history but I posted the below on a london transport related forum but didn't get a response. This was starting in zone 1 and going out to zone 6 and back. So it works both ways! >>> I thought oyster and contactless were meant to cost the same (apart from a 7 day cap on cards that is not available on oyster). Yet when I was in London last weekend, I was travelling with a friend, exactly the same journeys, which included going out to zone 6 (Ruislip) and back. Yet my travel on contactless was capped at 9.80 (which is the cost of zones 1-4) and my friend wasn't capped until 12.50 (which is what I expected to pay for 1-6). There was some bus journeys as well so whether I've come across a rare bug I don't know. I did wonder if the cost would change before being formally charged, but no, 9.80 has appeared on my statement now.

It's been a long time since I've been to London, so when you say "contactless," are you saying any credit or debit card you might get from your bank that has contactless, or Apple Pay/Android Pay, will work?

This is so interesting! Does anyone know if now, 2 years after this video was published, this is still the case?

has this been updated for 2020? what happens with apple pay? does the same principle apply?

January 2020 I spent &112 on contacteless, if I had the monthly bus pass on oyster I would have saved £30,00 as monthly bus pass cost £81. This add also should alert any oyster or contacteless users on the tube about fines on when touching your cards in and out preferably with a hammer as their conveniently machines does play a lot of tricks. TFL is out there to make buckets on all the different ways they charge one trip from another.

What about the oyster card that most students have, which is linked to our 16-25 railcards and will be charged 1/3 cheaper on all journeys?

Would this ‘trick’ work with any contactless visa debit card or just the british ones? I have a Transferwise one as I am here in London only for a year as an au pair.

I use my student oyster card cos it seems like the cheaper option. I'm curious tho if I could find a cheaper way? At least I know to use contactless when I don't have my student oyster anymore

Why do I seem to be watching so many videos about London, England from here in Canada?!

Good morning. I thinking about how to top up my oyster card. I can remember, that I paid cash last time im London. Now my oyster is empty and I have to top up in LHR in july. Could you help me? I want to catch money at the ATM in London, because it's ceaper. Are there other fares at the ATM in the city as at LHR? And can I use my Maestro like normally with the PIN or do I have to use it contactless (so top up the chip on my Maestro) ? Hope you can help me. I'm so lucky to come to London with my husband for our summer vacations ( 18 days )

Below are the details of the potential journey's I will be making for anyone wanting to check. FYI it will be a weekend so offpeak fares apply. Journey 1 King's cross St pancreas (Z1) to Baker street (z1) - £2.40 using the hammersmith and city line Journey 2 Baker street (Z1) to Willesden Junction (Z2) - £2.40 using the bakerloo line Journey 3 Willesden Junction (Z2/3) to Watford Junction (Z9+) - £1.80 using the overground line Journey 4 Watford Junction (Z9+) to Willesden Junction (Z2) - £1.80 using the overground line Journey 5 Willesden junction to (Z2) to Oxford circus (z1) - £2.40 using the bakerloo line. Journey 6 oxford circus (z1) to Euston (z1) - £2.40 using the Victoria line journey 7 Euston (z1) to Camden Town (z2) - £2.40 using the northern line journey 8 Camden Town (z2) to Euston (z1) - £2.40 using the northern line Journey 9 Euston (z1) to King's cross st pancreas (z1) - £2.40 using the northern line Total of the journeys would be £20.40 without any caps applied. With the zone 1-9+WJ cap it would be £18 (which TFL are claiming on FB, I would be charged on both contactless and oyster) but if I'm using the logic on this video, I would be charged the zone 1 to 2 cap ( £6.80) as I made 5 journeys (Journeys 1,2,5,6,7,8,9), and then charged the journey 3 and 4 £1.80 which would come to £10.40 Is that right or does it not apply in this instance for contactless?

Interesting. On a related note, what happens with contactless cards vs Apple Pay/Android Pay linked to the same card? Does it link together on the fares side or count separately? If I used Android Pay for one journey, and the contactless card itself for another, would they count towards the same cap? If not, could I use my card and lend my payment enabled phone to a friend to use to travel together, or would it throw a fit for the same account to be used twice?

My journey from Cannon Street to Chafford Hundred (via Tower Hill) was cheaper on Contactless compared to the identical journey made on Oyster

In Belgrade, Serbia, price for month ticket with no daytime travel limit is like 40 pounds. And lot of people do not pay the ticket, but evade controls.

Do you think this will apply in any kind of underground travelling situation? Can oyster ever be cheaper than contactless?

Interesting outcome. Will TfL be addressing this, or will we be more likely to ditch our Oyster cards in favour of our contactless cards?

Interesting stuff! I'm using an adult PAYG Oyster with at 16-25 Railcard linked to it, which reduced the daily caps! As soon as I turn 25 and my Railcard expires, I'm moving to contactless!

So I’m coming from Sydney and visiting London for the first time. Is that right, I can just tap my American Express Card through all the stations even from Heathrow to Cockfosters?

It's contactless cheaper after 10am? I travel Watford to West End.

Is this still applicable? I’m in London next week for a few days for the first time and just want to use my bank card if it’s still as good an option as oyster.

Nice! Thank you

if you were to visit all the tube stations in a fastest time record attempt- how much would it cost? (don't worry I'm not after your record) I'm just wodering if you would be charged for every station/ every time you went in or out of a zone or just once for each zone- as long as its the same journey?

Ready,set,GO!!!

I have a problem. I sent y my 5 oyster cards more than a month ago and I still have no news about the refund. I'm from Spain and I don't know what to do. I can't call because I don't know how to speak English. Help plis

Only ever use contactless, so good to know!

If a person travelled off peak on oyster from zone 6 to zone 2, zone 2 to zone 1, capped the journey cost to £6.50, and then did zone 1 to zone 2, having still hit the cap, and then gone from zone 2 back to zone 6, would it be £9.50 on oyster or not???

How does the contactless system work. Do you need to download a specific app for it to register your journeys. Also for contactles after how many journies does it cap and become free.

so contactless could be any payment card ? also do you need to swipe out the contactless card when exiting the tube ?

Gosh, I didn't know that. What if you didn't complete your journey? I mean, what if you didn't take the final trip back to Moor Park? Would Oyster have been cheaper.. What a confusing system!

I'm spending 3 days travelling the tube at the end of the month. I've signed up to contactless and I'll use it for a day, with pre-purchased travelcards for the other days. I'm highly dubious of getting screwed if I forget to scan out or not scan a pink terminal or if I make multiple changes (I will be doing Tube Challenges) in a short space of time.

I started doing the night bus on Thursday Morning at 01:25 did five bus journeys finish at 04:15 at Liverpool Street only been charged £1.50 for 3 hours of bus journeys thats by contactless

How safe are we with TFL with all our Bank details in their Data Base... just a Matter of time

The problem comes when something goes wrong with the contactless card aka, you can't touch out or there is an incomplete journey. Staff can sort most oyster problems out however contactless you need to talk to the bank, then tfl and then your bank again! If only we still had ticket offices at specific locations. Contactless is useless I only use oyster, it's just far better.

lmao. Always knew this and dumped oyster as I always noticed it came up cheaper for expensive journeys.

useful video cheers

This video is a year old. Is there not a daily cap on Oyster travel now?

Plus, if you have a cashback contactless credit card, you can save up to a further 5% on the ticket price.

What is the situation for Students ? I understand there is a student card, how does it compare to contactless?

Does that mean if you travel everywhere just as you do if you bought a travel card for the day the journey is cheaper using contactless?

how do they tell which payment method you use

I thought this seemed expensive for tourists but all the tourist attractions are in zone one and two which have a £6.50 cap right?

THAT IS VERY INTERESING

Do you still tap your contactless card when exiting the terminal?

It's a shame that contactless doesn't have monthly or annual caps as well because at the moment an annual oyster is much much cheaper than contactless and you get the golden rail card on top of it. It seems there's a lot of pushing to get people to move towards contactless, but Oyster is still cheaper if you don't use it as pay as you go.