The Anonymous Widower

Scaremongering Over Cashless Buses

I travel on London buses regularly and probably every other trip, I hear a message broadcast on the bus saying that from the 6th of July, London buses will go cashless.

Yesterday, when the message was played, I started talking to the young lady sitting next to me. We both agreed that we rarely see anybody pay cash on the 38s or 56s we regularly used, although we did think we’d been held up by a passenger scrambling for small chsnge. Transport for London (TfL) say the number paying by cash, has dropped below one percent for those, who use cash on the buses.

Speaking to one of tail-gunners on a 38 last week, she said that staff were looking forward to the cashless buses, as it should further cut the dangers of dealing with the public.

So it would appear from my small survey, that passengers and bus staff are in favour of buses going cashless. I certainly haven’t heard anybody sounding off on the Dalston omnibus about it being a bad idea.

However, there was this story in the Standard last night, which claimed up to two thousand passengers could be stranded every day in London, due to lost Oyster cards. Here’s the first couple of paragraphs.

But notice it is the Green Party complaining.

If this means that 770,000 people are given a free ticket every year at the cash price of a ticket of £2.40, this would cost TfL just under £2,000,000. Compare that with the savings of £24million from going cashless stated in this article on the BBC. The remaining savings would buy a lot of buses or fund other improvements.

You can just hear the rattle in the various canteens in bus garages, as they prepare the teacups for the inevitable storms.

June 25, 2014 - Posted by AnonW | Transport/Travel | Buses, Contactless Ticketing, London