Wimbledon Passengers Hit By Oyster Over-Charging


Thousands of local commuters fail to properly complete their journey

Wimbledon commuters were charged more than £500,000 last year for forgetting to tap their Oyster card in and out at the station.

TfL have released the list of stations where Oyster card customers failed to complete the most number of journeys in 2016.

Each incomplete journey means passengers have to pay the maxiumum full fare, although they may only have taken a cheaper trip.

In some circumstances, TfL's software can recognise there has been a problem and allocate and automatic refund. Customers can also apply for one.

But TfL said 114,617 people failed to complete their journey at Wimbledon in 2016. This cost them £538,536 and made Wimbledon the 10th costliest station for incomplete journeys on the network.

Top of the list was Waterloo, with £1.83m worth of incomplete journeys, while Victoria had £1.34m. Only one other station in the top ten is outside central London - Stratford station, with £1.07m worth of incomplete trips.

The situation hasn't changed much since 2011 when the charges for incomplete journeys totalled £554,000 in Wimbledon. The station with the highest charges in 2011 was also Waterloo, with a figure of £2 million.

Shashi Verma, Director of Customer Experience at TfL, said: “We are constantly working to reduce the number of incomplete journeys, which we recognise are very often due to a simple oversight.

"Where we can, we give customers automatic refunds without needing to contact us. We also make it easy to obtain a refund online and through our local rate telephone number and regularly remind customers to touch in and out to guarantee the right fare.

"The maximum fare includes the amount that would have been due had the customer touched in and out.”

March 1, 2017