marylsommers: I can't ride two bikes at once, yet Transport for London charges me twice

Sunday, March 6, 2011

I can't ride two bikes at once, yet Transport for London charges me twice

TfL says because I have two keys on my account I will always have to pay double to hire a bike - but that doesn't seem fair

I enrolled for the Barclays bicycle hire scheme in London and have two keys on my account. Instead of being charged �1 a time, I am charged �2 for each use, even though I mostly go out on my own. I phoned Transport for London which said I will always be charged �2 because I have two keys. Apparently if I had four keys I would be charged �4 every time. I challenged this logic and was told the system can't tell how many keys I'm using, despite the fact that they have unique bar codes. Am I being charged correctly? AF, London

Preposterous as it sounds, these are indeed TfL's rules. It assumes that a family of four with four keys on one account will always cycle every journey together. As you didn't realise this, TfL has agreed to refund your overpayments. It can see from your account that you had used one key on 49 occasions, a �49 overcharge. This proves that TfL could, if it chose, charge per bicycle.

Now that you know, you tried to cancel one of your keys, but by mistake TfL cancelled both. It blames a recent system reboot. Once your account was again up and running you made a short trip and returned the bike, making sure the green light confirmed it had been docked correctly, and paid �1.

TfL then telephoned to say this particular bike had been reported missing and you would have to pay �300 if it wasn't found. This sounded suspiciously like another computer blip. Whether missing or not, TfL reports that the bike has now been found and it has refunded �49 to your bank account.

You can email Margaret Dibben at your.problems@observer.co.uk or write to Margaret Dibben, Your Problems, The Observer, Kings Place, 90 York Way, London N1 9GU and include a telephone number. Do not enclose SAEs or original documents. The newspaper accepts no legal responsibility for advice.

Margaret Dibben

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