​Pay as you go with contactless arrives at three Hertfordshire stations

Welwyn Garden City, Hatfield and Welham Green are the latest Govia Thameslink Railway stations to welcome the convenience of pay as you go with contactless.

Pay as you go with contactless generally offers the cheapest single fares towards London by customers simply touching their contactless payment card or smartphone payment app on the yellow readers at the station.

Govia Thameslink Railway (GTR), parent company of Great Northern, has worked with Transport for London and the Department for Transport (DfT) to extend the contactless system to WGC, Hatfield and Welham Green - in addition to the Key Smartcard, KeyGo and paper tickets.

Thameslink and Great Northern Managing Director Tom Moran said: “The arrival of pay as you go with contactless at WGC, Hatfield and Welham Green marks the completion of this year’s ambitious roll-out project, which has seen 13 stations on the GTR network welcome the convenient payment method. We have worked closely with the Department for Transport and Transport for London to bring contactless to our stations, giving customers greater choice and generally lower single fares.”

Shashi Verma, Chief Technology Officer at Transport for London, said: “It is great that we have been able to work with Govia Thameslink Railway to complete the latest expansion of pay as you go with contactless on their services. Almost 25 million journeys in and around London are now made using contactless every week, making travel more convenient and accessible for all.”

Mike Guerra, of Welham Green Rail Users Group, said: “I am pleased that it will now be possible to obtain just-in-time ticketless access for rail journeys into London without having to queue for tickets at a busy ticket vending machine. For passengers used to TfL’s pay as you go system where contactless card use is becoming the norm, this is an important step, perhaps looking forward to a time when ticketless travel will be the norm across the national transport system.”

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Notes to editors

Create an account

Customers using contactless payment cards can quickly and easily view their journey history online by creating an online account at http://contactless.tfl.gov.uk . From there, they can personalise cards or devices by clicking on the pencil icon to make them easier to identify and hide any that are no longer used. They can also check their journey history on the go by using the fee TfL Oyster and contactless app.

Fares information

Pay as you go generally offers the cheapest single fares. However, there are occasions where a paper single or return ticket will be cheaper, and passengers are encouraged to check fare options before purchase.

The full range of paper tickets remains available so that customers can still benefit from discounts and offers that are not available with pay as you go, such as Thameslink’s GroupSave. At weekends, super off-peak paper tickets are cheaper than the pay as you go fare.

For more information and advice on the use of contactless, visit https://www.thameslinkrailway.com/tickets/oyster-contactless-and-plusbus/contactless-travel

Capping

From next year, price caps for contactless users will be introduced at WGC, Hatfield and Welham Green. In the meantime, any journeys to or from these stations will fall outside of price capping.

Popularity of contactless

Across London and the surrounding areas, around 60 per cent of all pay as you go journeys are now made using contactless. This is up from 25 per cent just a few years ago. Since it launched on Tube and rail services in September 2014, more than 3.1 billion journeys have been made, showing how Londoners and visitors have taken to using contactless payments as part of their daily lives. From next year, price caps for contactless users will be introduced at WGC, Hatfield and Welham Green. In the meantime, any journeys to or from these stations will fall outside of price capping.