A good reason for Londoners to refund their TfL tube or bus season ticket due to coronavirus

This article is closed to new comments. Feel free to ask your question in the HfP forums.

• John says:

  12 Apr12 April 06:00

  No actually it is not “2 monthly and 2 weekly” passes. It would be 2 monthlies and the exact number of days pro-rated for a third month.

  A monthly pass is 3.84 times the price of a weekly, and an annual is 40x the price of a weekly. You can have tickets for precise periods pro-rated to the cost of a monthly. Thus an annual is the price of 10 months 13 days, which is why there is no refund if only 6 weeks remain (but could be as much as 7 weeks in some cases).

• James says:

  12 Apr12 April 06:49

  i dont actually know how many people will want to return to the office every day once restrictions are lifted.

  Its obvious restrictions will remain for quite a few months with people still observing social distancing rules. Meaning trains are a big issue. THen workplaces might have to only allow half the people into the office on certain days. To enable social distancing rules in the office.

  How this will help TFL’s budget issues, is another matter.

  • Nick says:

    12 Apr12 April 19:39

    I agree! But a lot of people genuinely believe that life will be back to normal by the end of May!

• Sal says:

  12 Apr12 April 07:41

  Just to flag that if your season ticket or travel card is on an oyster card, if you want a refund tfl will cancel your travelcard and refund any oyster credit remaining on the card. The card will then cease to work and you will need to apply for a new oyster once you are ready to start using tfl transport again.

  • Alex Sm says:

    12 Apr12 April 10:27

    This is the least of the issues tbh

  • Phil says:

    12 Apr12 April 12:07

    If when the card is cancelled, and someone needs to make an essential journey, they can always use their contactless bank card until getting a new Oyster card in the future.

• Pete C says:

  12 Apr12 April 08:42

  I cancelled my annual travelcard last week, and whilst a pro-rata refund would have been around £300, the actual refund was £18. Better than nothing, but the way they calculate it means it is likely very underwhelming!

  • TGLoyalty says:

    12 Apr12 April 09:31

    Is there no way of knowing your refund before cancelling as if the choice was £300 of value vs £18 refund I would have just stuck with the season pass. Even if I only got to use it a handful more times.

    • Federico says:

      12 Apr12 April 09:35

      There’s an aprox refund given when you do the request online.. my annual travel card started 1/3 paid £1696 and got back on the 3/4 £1530 but I paid the admin fee

    • Sal says:

      12 Apr12 April 09:52

      And if you do it over the phone their staff will provide a refund amount then you can decide whether or not you want to proceed. Takes 7 days for the money to drop into your bank account after that.

      • koroleon says:

        13 Apr13 April 09:26

        I had an old oyster card and the refund could not be processed online so I called them. The agent explained that the oyster card will be cancelled and mentioned the £5 admin fee but said nothing about the refund amount, so when I received it it was a shock. Called to complain and they couldn’t care less – and they would definitely not revert the transaction.

• Charlieface says:

  12 Apr12 April 09:45

  What happens if you buy a new season ticket now, can you refund it immediately…

  • Genghis says:

    12 Apr12 April 09:52

    Be v careful with TfL and MS. Been there, done that.

    • Charlieface says:

      12 Apr12 April 10:08

      Go ahead…

      • Rob says:

        12 Apr12 April 11:19

        Slightly difference scenario here because TFL is expecting you to cancel. It’s not as if people are taking out a ticket and cancelling it for cash a week later without any good reason.

        • Alex Sm says:

          12 Apr12 April 12:50

          Exactly. Extraordinary circumstances require extraordinary solutions

      • Charlieface says:

        12 Apr12 April 14:55

        But I do like to hear of stories of MS going wrong if only to assuage myself that I’m not missing out.

    • Bazza says:

      12 Apr12 April 19:27

      Me too. I had to go as far as the pelimanry letter for a small claims court action against someone senior.

• Alex Sm says:

  12 Apr12 April 10:22

  I got a refund but still think that it is grossly unfair to calculate it in a way how they calculated it because I got back 56% of the amount I paid while I only used 4 months out of 12, meaning that 10% of the annual travel card cost (140 pounds) was pocketed by TfL. But perhaps getting something is better than getting nothing, so I will probably have to reconcile with this “commission”.

  They told me on the phone that they calculate it by taking out 4.90 daily from the total cost of the TC, so a slightly different calculation from the described above.

  Also, you can get refund in three ways: to original method of payment, to your bank account, credit to your TfL account (similar to airline voucher). Obvs, the second method is great to keep your spending/points in place (I am already facing a deduction of Avios because of all these refunds!)

  • Craig says:

    12 Apr12 April 12:22

    I couldn’t work out if it was grossly unfair. On balance I don’t think it is unfair at all. Surely if they just gave you a pro rata refund, then anyone who needed a travel card for one month would buy an annual pass and then cancel after one month? So they can’t do that as they need to give people the benefit of the annual price who have the travel card for the whole year.

    • Alex Sm says:

      12 Apr12 April 12:49

      People wouldn’t claim a refund in normal circumstances as they would use the travelcard! Maybe 1-2% would but it’s another story

  • Matt says:

    12 Apr12 April 12:35

    If you’re not commuting for a couple months then you’re quids up though. My GWR season ticket is £6120 and I think I’m due about 55% refund based on 4.5 months use. If that’s the case then I’m already quids up as the refund is backdated to 17th March. From now on I’m about £500/month better off. The tragic death rate aside, normality is going to seem a bit crap when the commute into London starts again and my season ticket needs renewing. And that’s before we start thinking about how we as nation are going to pay for the enormous debt we’re building up right now. Middle to higher earners i.e. HfP demographic are going to foot the bill for the next decade or two.

    • Alex Sm says:

      12 Apr12 April 12:47

      It’s a deeper existential question which I am not prepared to deal with right now especially when we faced a situation when my partner who lost two of his self-employed jobs cannot claim any benefits apparently because either I earn too much (which is a slight overstatement to say the least!) or he is not hitting some kind of a threshold. Very unfair – and they want me to foot someone else’s bill on top of that? No way

      • Sarah says:

        12 Apr12 April 16:58

        It’s called means testing. Not everyone will think its fair, but if you’re lucky to have a high enough salary or savings already then its fair enough you’re not entitled to benefits.

        • Phil says:

          12 Apr12 April 17:08

          Agree. Otherwise everyone will want a piece of the pie.

        • Alex Sm says:

          15 Apr15 April 01:38

          Maybe it’s time to follow progressive EU member states’ suit and offer universal basic income? at least to people who lost their jobs – without darwinist calibration / triage of ‘means testing’ etc

• Shoestring says:

  12 Apr12 April 11:58

  Had anyone seen anything as regards ST on commuter trains?

  • Lady London says:

    12 Apr12 April 16:52

    What’s ST?

• Chris H says:

  12 Apr12 April 12:03

  If you are NOT happy with the refund they are offering, or you are worried that when you go back to work you will have to find enough money for a new 12 month pass, try this!
  CHANGEOVER:
  They allow you to change your season ticket destination without penalty or taking off 6 weeks worth of value.
  For me I changed a season ticket destination from Hatfield into central London to a season ticket from Hatfield to the next station (Welham Green) season ticket.
  They calculate what the cost of each ticket would have been when I bought the original, and refund the WHOLE pro-rata difference.
  ie: Original cost £3500
  The cost of the one station pass if purchased on that date £500
  The refund the pro rata difference £3000 / 52 – times the number of weeks remaining which for me was 20 = £1154 This will save me approximately £58 for every week I don’t need it.

  So even if you only have 6 weeks remaining you should get some refund, and keep an active season ticket (even if only for one station)
  I do not known if they can / will backdate it from the date you last used it.
  My thinking was that when I return to work and need a season ticket for the whole journey again, I will only have to reverse the calculations and pay a bit extra (£58 per week remaining) until the end of the normal run out date, and not the full amount of another annual pass.
  I hope some of you find this helpful. Search on “Changeover”.

  • Lady London says:

    12 Apr12 April 12:56

    very, very nice @Chris H

    • The Urbanite says:

      12 Apr12 April 14:15

      Yes, you get a pro-rata rebate on changeovers. You can change over to a ticket between any two stations. Some do it between the two cheapest stations in the UK, others between the two cheapest stations in the South East to retain their Gold Card.

      • Lady London says:

        12 Apr12 April 16:53

        ….and the two cheapest stations in the UK are….?

        • RWJ says:

          12 Apr12 April 17:24

          Probably Ryde Pier Head and Ryde Esplanade on the IoW.

        • The Urbanite says:

          12 Apr12 April 18:36

          Dockyard (Devonport) – Devonport (Devon) is £3.20 for a weekly.

          Hatton to Lapworth is £4.30 a week and you get a nice Gold Card. Cheaper than hops in Lichfield, Ryde or Pevensey.

  • johnny_c-l says:

    12 Apr12 April 14:44

    I have been battling to get the train company I bought my annual ticket from to do a changeover for precisely this reason but it is proving to be a nightmare. Neither their website, flagship ticket office or call centre can do it so I’ve ended up going down the formal complaint route to try and force this through. I’ll probably give it another couple of weeks but might have to end up being ripped off and accepting the refund.

    • The Urbanite says:

      12 Apr12 April 21:53

      Ticket offices are hit and miss – not all staff are created equal and as a result are unpredictable. Changeovers involve doing quite a few sums and not everyone is comfortable with the process.

      Try a large station – if a team leader is around they tend to be well trained on changeovers. Smaller stations – many do have very knowledgeable staff but as you’ve found, you may be out of luck on the day depending on who is serving.

This article is closed to new comments. Feel free to ask your question in the HfP forums.