Why is being 1 stop out of zone 6 so difficult?

A question about : Why is being 1 stop out of zone 6 so difficult?

It's so convoluted.

Is it cheaper to journey into zone 6 and go from there?

Is it cheaper to get a return ticket or use oyster [does oyster upgrade the ticket into a return for you or charge you two singles?]

It's horrible with rip-off prices the second you step one stop out of zone 6 and an insanely over complicated number of options.

National rail indicates that oyster will do the equivalent of a return journey so i'll probably go with that but it is absurd.

Oh just to really rub !!!!! in our faces the town 10 minutes up the road has been designated zone 6 as a 'special exception' but we are not! It's not easy to get to it from here by public transport either.

Just had a look and zone 6 to kingston is Ј5 return with oyster but zone 7 [about 3 mins. between the train stops] is Ј12! How can this be justified? Why is it the london zones aren't even in london sometimes they just stick them where they feel like it and expect people not to feel hard done by.

Best answers:

• have the zone boundaries actually changed, or did you just not realise where they were before you moved to your location?
• Purchase the tickets from the Train Line during works time, and collect on your way home if you can.
  Its just a formality then. Don't forget Quidco.
  I suspect there are others in your situation, where they don't realise and I would start to tell people what you have found and they may start to do the same.
• I get a similar issue when I travel home (into zone 3) from Gatwick.
  It is much cheaper to get a ticket to the rail station I have to change at, exit, and re-enter using Oyster for the last part of the journey, than it is to buy a ticket for the full journey.
  The price difference between Oyster areas and wider rail leads to other journey changes too, for example, the cheapest way for me to get to Stansted is to use a combination of rail and Underground to get across London (cheap as all within Oyster zones), then get Easybus to complete the last part of the journey, which would cost far more using rail.
  It is just companies maximising profit, variations on that theme are present within most industries. The rewards are there for customers who research and understand the structure, but the amount lost to those consumers is outweighed by those who pay more than necessary for convenience.
• I'd have thought the boundary of the zonal areas correspond to the Greater London boundary.
  Where are you exactly? Sunbury/Kempton Park (I assume) are in the Borough of Spelthorne, whilst Kingston is a London Borough Council.
  The boundary has to be somewhere
• I'm over the border in Surrey.
  As i understand the epsom and epsom downs situation is due to a dispute between train companies, but why for example has Caterham been given 'exceptional status' to be a zone 6 station when it's no where near the boundary and there are many stations between it and the nearest zone 6 station?
  It's to hilly to cycle there, you can just about get a car with a weak engine over it and i don't want to be bothering people to drop me off and pick me up. P:
  People are saying the boundary has to be somewhere but why can't it be graduated based on journey time/distance rather then a massive hike the second you go from zone 6 to 7. I know which is fairer and less confusing.
  I think things where ok when i was at uni but they have hammered the commuter belt with price hikes while sheltering london to the point where the price difference is now absurd.
  At the end of the day it is london and it will warp everything around it, transport included, but nothing makes sense about the current system. It's confusing, messy and grossly unfair.
  Oh also because we so close to london all the transport links are central london centric. We have the whole of south london between us and central but it is far, far easier to get into central which is direct and only takes 25/30 mins then to get to most of south london which is just under an hour and at least 1 or 2 changes.
  Most of south london might as well be in Beijing for all its accessibility. Yet geographically it is drastically closer to us...
• You want the Caterham fares to be higher priced?
  They used to be, but they were lowered which makes sense because it's a rural branch line, and there are loads of empty seats on the branch and it makes sense to reduce the fares to levels that increase patronage.
  I did think of this, on one hand it's strange but on the other hand it gives me an oppurtunity for big savings if i jump through a few hoops.
  The fares do not have a 'massive hike' between Zone 6 and Zone 7.
  I don't know but my journey today would have been Ј7 dearer if hadn't started at a zone 6 station.
  Some fares are rather costly, and I agree it is absurd how high fares are generally, but you can often find ways to bring the costs down.
  I don't see too much wrong with the current Oyster system, except that Zones 7-9 should fully surround London, and the other lettered zones should be re-numbered 10 & 11 and also fully surround London, and the dreaded mixed mode including Zone 1 premium should be abolished. If I could have one more wish it would be for the LU/NR rates to be harmonised, but not in a way that causes any existing fares to increase.
  I don't think the entire Oyster PAYG system is unfair, just a few tweaks as mentioned above would make it fairer, but they'll never happen!
  There should be more orbital railways, and there are some proposals for exactly that.
  I would love to see more orbital railways because while it is slightly cheaper to get to south london, the inconvenience outways the savings imo.
  I'd like to see it tweaked so the fair increase from zone 6 to 7 is more gradual, like i said before i understand what a great force london is but it very frustrating to be in my position. If the difference was Ј3 I would pay it but I can save Ј7 by going to zone 6, that's to drastic for one station [4 minutes] journey time imo.
• Can you get tickets to the boundary of zone 6 along with zone 1-6 travelcards? Boundary tickets can only be bought for ticket offices I believe.
• It is all confusing. I live outside the London boundary but in zone 6.
  A single from my station into central London is Ј6.80 but using oyster or contactless is only Ј3.60. Absolute bargain.
  But then in January the one day off peak travelcard (Ј8.90) or oyster off peak cap (Ј8.50) goes and the cap will be Ј11.70.
• Ah we get this; 5 minutes past Borehamwood (edge of zone 6) is Radlett - for some reason that's not in any zone, but travel further out and you get to Watford; which exists in zone 7.
  I'm sure it's only been done as Radlett is quite a wealthy village. If you look at maps like this (https://cdn.londonist.com/wp-content/...4/01/zones.jpg) places like Epping get to be in zone 6 but it squashes up in the north of London.
  It's also a lot less rural than places such as Rickmansworth.
• I found this very interesting. I live one stop outside the Oyster Zone C, in Billericay (just past Shenfield). My daughter comes to visit from East Ham.
  She stays the night so she needs to pay single fares. She brings her bike and takes the train from Manor Park to Shenfield. The National Rail Anytime single fare Manor Park to Shenfield is Ј7. The Oyster off peak single fare is Ј3.20.
  Alternatively she could pay Ј9.50 for a ticket Manor Park to Billericay, or use the Oyster to Shenfield and pay Ј3.30 just for the one stop from Shenfield to Billericay, combined cost Ј6.50.
  How stupid is all that? For Ј19 she could have a round trip all the way with National Rail. For Ј6.40 she does the journey with a bit of a bike ride at each end.