(17 Feb 2021, 6:28 pm)streetdeckfan wrote I did actually see quite a few people using Pop cards to pay on the bus, but they looked like they were carers and the like, so I'm guessing they were provided by work so they don't have to go through the faff of claiming expenses.

The difference with the Robin Hood cards is journeys are fixed price, so there's no need for them to tap off to calculate the price, which I think is the main 'issue' with the network round here.

I definitely think the "tap off" element is solvable. To give an example - the Go Ahead operation in the Thames Valley (Oxford Buses/Thames Travel/Carousel) seem to have a full tap on tap off system which they call Freeflow. While some services are flat fare, there are quite a few "intercity" services like the X40 which have a wide range of fares.

That said, even the most expensive singles seem to be fairly cheap down there, so there's not too much of an issue if you accidentally get charged a maximum fare (the biggest gap I can find is £2.00 vs £4.20 depending on whether you're making a short hop within Oxford or a long journey to somewhere like Reading).