TfL cashless bus consultation
Response from Leonard Cheshire Disability
October 2013
Do you agree with the proposal?
No.
Description
This response is on behalf of Leonard Cheshire Disability. We are the largest social care provider for disabled people in the UK. To inform our response, we consulted with 50 disabled people in the capital to capture their experiences of travel on buses and the impact of buses going ‘cashless’.
We have several concerns about the impact of going cashless on disabled people, for the following reasons:
Practicality: Several respondents described the difficultly they faced using Oyster cards (and bank cards), and the additional barriers that would present to using buses. Several said that they would be unable to use buses if there was an entirely cashless system.
Inconvenience: Most respondents said they had faced significant problems topping up their Oyster card. People with limited mobility, found it very difficult to get to a shop or tube station to top up their card, and some respondents described the additional burden that keeping track of the balance on their Oyster cards could cause: “You need to be aware how much credit you have on your card which means that you have to have registered your card tobe able to view credit online”.
Several also found it extremely inconvenient to visit a specific location to ‘pick up’ credit they had purchased online. For many people, this undermined the potential benefits of online top-ups. Unless they were specifically travelling to the tube station, they often had to go out of their way to top-up.
Further, those who were often accompanied by a carer or support worker described potential problems with the need to ensure that the people accompanying them also had an Oyster card, or Freedom Pass, before they could travel – adding an additional burden to getting out of the front door.
We support the idea of respondents being able to run up a one journey ‘debt’ on Oyster cards, to allow people to get to their destination. However, we are not convinced that this policy would be sufficient to guarantee that people will not end up stranded away from home, or unable to leave the house, as a result of buses going ‘cashless’.
60% of respondents in our survey said they were worried they would not be able to get on TfL buses when they needed to, and a further 20% said they were concerned they would have to travel further than they would otherwise need to in order to ensure they did not run out of credit.
Information: Almost half of the respondents (43%) did not have a FreedomPass, including the overwhelming majority (92%) of those living in residential care. This suggests that any move to a cashless system will need a significant change of behaviour among disabled people.
People lack information about Freedom Passes, with 67% of the reasons given for not having a pass relating to a lack of knowledge around Freedom Passes, and how to access them: 47% said that they did not know whether they were eligible for a freedom pass, 27% said they did not use the bus often enough to get a Freedom Pass and 7% said they did not know what a Freedom Pass was.
There was also very little awareness of the free bus travel for passengers using wheelchairs among our respondents. This suggests there is a significant need to inform disabled people about Freedom Passes and no move should be made towards a cashless system until a significant majority of people are aware of their entitlements.
Safeguarding: We are concerned that going cashless could result in safeguarding issues. Two thirds of respondents (67%) indicated that they did not believe current TfL safeguarding policy would be sufficient to prevent them from experiencing a significant threatto their health, or the risk of crime, as a result of being denied access to a bus. There was also significant concern that children and relatives who were not disabled would encounter the same issues, and be left unsupported.
If No please tell us why and what we can do to make the proposal acceptable
One of the key problems that disabled people face in using public transport is a lack of information about the available services and support. There is significant confusion regarding the process of acquiring a FreedomPass, and the costs associated with holding one, which could be easily dispelled with some outreach work from TfL. There is also a very low awareness of free wheelchair travel on buses, and of general rules regarding access to buses, for example when a buggy is parked in the wheelchair space. A specific communication campaign aimed at disabled people would alleviate a significant proportion of the concerns expressed by the disabled people we spoke to, and also enable disabled people to engage more fully with their communities via the bus network. We would welcome the opportunity to work with TfL on such a campaign and use our significant networks as the largest provider of social care to disabled people.
A communication campaign around where and how Oyster Cards can be topped up,including around the proposed new rules for a one journey ‘debt’ facility would also be helpful. A communication campaign will not, however, resolve all of the issues disabled people relayed regarding the ability to top up Oyster cards, or their durability. We suggest that efforts should continue to make the Oyster card network as accessible and convenient as possible, and ‘extra strength’ cards or an equivalent should be made available for disabled people.
We also suggest an extension of TfL’s existing safeguarding policies. It would not be fair for a disabled person to be left stranded without the ability to return home, simply because they have forgotten or lost their Oyster card or FreedomPass, or been unable to top them up. We suggest that in the circumstances that a disabled person needed to travel by bus and had no other appropriate options available, that they be allowed to do so for free.
We fully support TfL’s approach to providing free bus travel to wheelchair users, and suggest that in cases which may present safeguarding issues, that approach is rolled out to all disabled people. Free access to buses should also be rolled out to those who are unable to use cards as a result of their disability, as any other approach would effectively render them unable to access bus travel in the capital.
We also believe that the impact of any change should be monitored, to see if disabled people or other marginalised groups suffer a significant impact.
Do you currently use cash?
While 65% of our respondents had used cash on TfL buses at some point, the majority (44%) only used cash a few times a year – usually as a result of running out of travel credit (33%) or forgetting or losing their card (29%). However, there was a relatively substantial minority who either do not have an Oyster Card/Freedom Pass/Contactless bank card (12.5%) or who simply preferred to pay in cash (17%).
Further, 20% described having experienced significant problems with using an Oyster card in the past, and a further 25% said they had never used an Oyster card – indicating that the barriers to disabled people travelling primarily with the use of an Oyster card are likely to be substantial.
In our residential services, there was also significant concern regarding the durability of Oyster Cards – many of our residents discussed issues they have had with cards in the past.Several reported their cards losing functionality, meaning that residents had to travel to tube stations to resolve the problems, even when these locations were miles away.
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