Transport for London (TfL) is exploring whether Railcards can be linked to passengers’ contactless bank cards or phones, enabling them to enjoy discounts on their Tube travel.
Sir Sadiq Khan has revealed that the transport authority is looking at the possibility as part of wider plans to expand contactless ticketing across much of the Home Counties.
Owners of Railcards such as the 16-25 Railcard, the 26-30 Railcard or the Senior Railcard can all benefit from a 1/3 discount for journeys made on the Tube, Overground, DLR or Elizabeth line during off-peak hours on weekdays, or all day on weekends.
Daily ‘caps’ are also reduced with a Railcard, so long as journeys are made within off-peak hours. For example, journeys between zones one to three are ordinarily capped at £10 a day, but with the Railcard discount, the equivalent cap for off-peak journeys is £6.60.
However, Railcard discounts can only currently be used on the Tube by passengers who use an Oyster card to travel – despite the fact that the vast majority of Tube journeys are now made using contactless bank cards or mobile devices.
Even once a passenger has bought an Oyster card, accessing the cheaper travel can be difficult, as it requires a TfL staff member to ‘link’ it with their Railcard for them – and only some staff have the ability to do this.
The issue was raised with the mayor in a recent written question by Caroline Russell, Green group leader on the London Assembly, who asked if TfL “plans to make Oyster available digitally or to allow the linking of Railcard discounts to contactless cards”.
Responding, Sir Sadiq’s office wrote: “TfL is always looking at how it can improve the pay as you go system and this includes looking at whether National Railcards, which are a Rail Delivery Group led product, can potentially be associated to customers using pay as you go with contactless in the future.
“TfL is working closely with the Department for Transport and Rail Delivery Group to progress work to allow us to implement this in the future as part of our wider work to expand pay as you go with contactless in the South East. TfL has not yet agreed a date when this will be delivered.”
The Department for Transport announced earlier this week that contactless ticketing will finally be expanded to cover almost 50 train stations across the Home Counties on February 2 – including Basildon, Berkhamsted, Leighton Buzzard, Hemel Hempstead, Sevenoaks, Southend Central and Windsor and Eton Riverside.
The stations were due to get contactless ticketing on September 22 but this was delayed by last year’s cyber attack on TfL, which has been handling the roll-out.
The lack of awareness among Londoners that they can use their Railcard discount on the Tube was raised during last year’s mayoral election campaign, with rivals of Sir Sadiq arguing that he should do more to promote the benefit.
The saving is not advertised by TfL itself at any Tube station – though TfL points out that Railcards are not a TfL product and are therefore “for the train operating companies to promote”. TfL also has a section on its website explaining how people can access the discount.
Ms Russell told the Standard: “If the mayor is serious about meeting his own transport targets, then linking contactless and Railcards should be an obvious priority.
“I’m encouraged to see his response to my query, and look forward to working to make using public transport even more convenient, accessible and affordable for all Londoners.”