Transport for London (TfL) has warned tube, train and bus passengers paying with Apple Pay on iPhones and Apple Watches not to let their batteries run flat or they could get stuck at gates and face penalty fares.
TfL advises users that, as with other smartphone payment systems including EE's Cash on Tap, Apple Pay only works if a device has power. It warns that, if the battery runs out in the middle of a journey, a user will not be able to tap out, which means they could be charged a maximum fare.
"If an inspector asks you to touch your iPhone or Apple Watch on their reader, it will not be able to be read and you could be liable for a penalty fare," TfL says.
Will scenes of addicts tethered to outlets with electricity IVs spread?
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Transport For London Cautions Users Over Pitfalls of Apple Pay
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(Score: 1, Funny) by Anonymous Coward on Friday July 17 2015, @01:22AM
Am I the only one with the song MTA running through his head now?
(Score: 2) by Tork on Friday July 17 2015, @02:15AM
🏳️🌈 Proud Ally 🏳️🌈
(Score: 2, Funny) by c0lo on Friday July 17 2015, @01:51AM
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aoFiw2jMy-0 https://soylentnews.org/~MichaelDavidCrawford
(Score: 1) by Murdoc on Friday July 17 2015, @01:56AM
"Will scenes of addicts tethered to outlets with electricity IVs spread?"
Sounds like some scenes from Real Humans and Humans.
(Score: 4, Informative) by useless on Friday July 17 2015, @01:59AM
(Score: 2) by Dunbal on Friday July 17 2015, @02:08AM
Yes I was about to refer to this. Bit of a mixed message there.
(Score: 5, Interesting) by wantkitteh on Friday July 17 2015, @08:51AM
If I recall correctly, many years ago (10+? Can't remember exactly) someone did get arrested for charging their phone from a train company socket and it went all the way to court. The judge made the guy pay the train company for the electricity he uses (£0.01p) and the judge made the train company pay everyone's legal fees and for the court's time (£16k+) so I suppose the difference in this case is that it's somehow being framed as a criminal matter rather than a civil one by some braindead PCSO.
(Score: 2) by Tork on Friday July 17 2015, @02:13AM
Will scenes of addicts tethered to outlets with electricity IVs spread?
Maybe if you find an exceptionally clever way to phrase it.
🏳️🌈 Proud Ally 🏳️🌈
(Score: 2) by dyingtolive on Friday July 17 2015, @02:39AM
You can solve this issue with the slightest bit of awareness. If you know your device won't make it through the duration of your day, you can buy a battery to fix the problem for, like, 10 USD. I imagine prices over there are comparable.
Don't blame me, I voted for moose wang!
(Score: 2, Interesting) by josh64 on Friday July 17 2015, @07:26AM
Yeah that's true, set up a battery pack vending machine between the platform and the gates at the station.
If your phone is flat just buy a battery wait a few minutes for it to start charging and then tap off.
(Score: 1, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Friday July 17 2015, @10:13AM
You can solve this by not using a phone to pay for things. It is a time tested solution that has been working for centuries.
(Score: 1) by Francis on Friday July 17 2015, @02:12PM
Or turn it off if it gets below 20%. This technology only requires that the phone be on when checked.
(Score: 2, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Friday July 17 2015, @03:14AM
Doesn't need batteries.
Doesn't break easily if you sit on it.
Fits conveniently in wallet.
Costs 1/100th the cost of an iPhone.
Isn't habit forming.
Doesn't have people lining up for days to buy one from a specialty shop.
I still have my Oyster card and I haven't been in London in 6 years (though I miss being there badly).
(Score: 2) by BasilBrush on Friday July 17 2015, @10:03AM
But the need to take your wallet out to get the Oyster card is a downside. There's the chance of it being snatched there and then, and there is the possibility of pick-pockets seeing where you keep your wallet then following you to snatch it.
I wouldn't buy an Apple Watch just to use for this, but if I had one, I'd tend to use it for the tube, but also keep my oyster card in my wallet as a backup in case of power issues.
Likewise I have an Oyster card in my wallet right now, even though I haven't been in London for 6 months. So wallet space isn't the issue.
Hurrah! Quoting works now!
(Score: 1, Informative) by Anonymous Coward on Friday July 17 2015, @12:26PM
Can you enter with your smartphone, and then leave with the Oyster card? Because if not, you'd better be very good in predicting when your battery will fail.
(Score: 2) by MrNemesis on Friday July 17 2015, @02:00PM
Don't think there was anything in the EULA for the oyster card that says it has to be kept in your wallet; most people I know keep them in the little plastic mini-wallets you get with them or just loose. Alternatively keep them in your wallet and just don't take it out - they're RFID with a range of a few centimetres and so will work quite happily through fabric/leather.
Never had my pocket picked, but I don't see why a phone would be any less of a tantalising target and in my experience much easier to fumble when you're bonking with it. A watch maybe, but I wear my watch on my left wrist and the oyster reader is positioned on the right. Would be easier to just tuck the oyster card into my cuff.
Disclaimer: Living in London for the last 20 years which I guess means I've been using oyster cards for at least 12 of them. But I guess I'm a luddite in that I still only use a mostlydumbphone and never found the old paper tickets to be a problem...
"To paraphrase Nietzsche, I have looked into the abyss and been sick in it."
(Score: 3, Interesting) by BasilBrush on Friday July 17 2015, @06:10PM
Alternatively keep them in your wallet and just don't take it out - they're RFID with a range of a few centimetres and so will work quite happily through fabric/leather.
My experience is that with the Oyster card in my wallet, actually touching the pad only works about 50% of the time.
Hurrah! Quoting works now!
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday July 17 2015, @10:32PM
Be careful in London when leaving a station, plenty of robberies going on, bad guys on mopeds or bikes snatching nice phones when you walk on the street.
never heard of anyone getting their oyster card stolen.
(Score: 2) by wantkitteh on Sunday July 19 2015, @08:37AM
Only if you keep your Oyster card in your wallet. I don't, like many other Londoners. We have separate little plastic holders for our Oyster cards, often with photocards and season tickets in from other train companies when our commute brings us into London from outside town. Some people extract the RFID tags and put them into other objects - watches were popular a while back. My Oyster card's RFID is also stored on another system elsewhere so I can use the same card to open the door at a certain workshop. Saves carrying yet another card around...
(Score: 1, Funny) by Anonymous Coward on Friday July 17 2015, @10:09AM
In my wallet, right next to my Blue Oyster card.
(Score: 3, Informative) by bootsy on Friday July 17 2015, @01:58PM
For non Londoners you may be wondering why Transport for London as so keen on these alternative payment systems.
Oyster works really well and is very robust.
TFL have to pay the company that runs Oyster a fixed percentage on all transactions done using the Oyster payment system so they are very keen to have people use Contactless Credit and Debit cards as well as Apple Pay and anything else they can get their hands on.
They don't charge you less for using these so they make more money per trip.