Always touch in on a yellow card reader at the start of your journey and touch out at the end to pay the right fare. (On a bus or tram you only need to touch in.)
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If you don't tap off, your card will be charged the maximum fare.
London buses are card only, so you cannot buy a ticket with cash. Use a Visitor Oyster card*, an Oyster card, a Travelcard or a contactless payment card to pay your fare. Unlike the Tube zone fare system, a single London bus journey costs £1.75 no matter how far you go.
Touch in at the start of your journey and touch out at the end on yellow card readers using contactless (card or device). Only touch in on buses and trams. Find out more about touching in and out. You can pay for someone else's travel with your contactless card or device if they're travelling with you.
London buses are all cashless, so you need an Oyster card, Travelcard or contactless payment card to ride. Bus fare is £1.75, and a day of bus-only travel will cost a maximum of £5.25. You can transfer to other buses or trams for free an unlimited number of times within one hour of touching in for your first journey.
You can pay as you go using contactless (card or device), an Oyster card or a Visitor Oyster card. It also offers great value as pay as you go is cheaper than buying single tickets and you get daily and weekly capping.
Why have I been charged 10p/£1? If you use a Mastercard, your bank statement may show a “pending” 10p or £1 charge for your first tap (10p for UK Mastercards, £1 for International Mastercards). This is just a temporary charge to check the card is valid – we do not collect the payment.
If you fail to do this, you are liable for a penalty fare and we only consider an appeal in exceptional circumstances. You can find a guide to appealing a contactless penalty fare below.
If you don't have a default set on your card and you forget to tap off at the end of your trip, you'll be charged the fare to the last stop on the train line or bus route and with your fare type and any applicable loyalty discounts applied.
Why have I been charged 10p/£1? If you use a Mastercard, your bank statement may show a “pending” 10p or £1 charge for your first tap (10p for UK Mastercards, £1 for International Mastercards). This is just a temporary charge to check the card is valid – we do not collect the payment.
If you still feel you've been incorrectly charged, you'll then need to contact TfL to resolve this for you. If you've been charged a maximum fare because you've touched in with one card and touched out with another, we're only able to refund the charge that applied to your Barclays debit card or Barclaycard.
If the time between touching in at the start and touching out at the end of your journey is more than the maximum journey time limit, you'll be charged two maximum pay as you go fares. A single maximum fare is: up to £9.40 in Zones 1-9. up to £26.00 beyond Zone 9, including on the Heathrow Express.
London's buses are no longer accepting cash. Transport for London (TfL) said dwindling numbers of passengers using money to pay for their journeys had prompted the change. Research shows that 99% of customers use Oyster, prepaid tickets, contactless payment cards or concessionary tickets.
When you use contactless or Oyster to pay as you go, there is a maximum amount of time that you can spend making a single journey on Tube, DLR, London Overground, Elizabeth line and National Rail. If you spend longer than the maximum journey time for your journey, you could be charged 2 maximum fares.
London buses are all cashless, so you need an Oyster card, Travelcard or contactless payment card to ride. Bus fare is £1.75, and a day of bus-only travel will cost a maximum of £5.25. You can transfer to other buses or trams for free an unlimited number of times within one hour of touching in for your first journey.