Sight-seeing with 17 & 12 year olds

[PapaWighty]

My wife & I are planning a 3 day sight-seeing trip with our 17 & 12 year old daughters.
What is the cheapest way of travelling via the underground ?
I've looked at Oyster cards for 16+ & 11+ year olds but they come with a £20 & £15 admin fee.
My other option is "Pay as you go".
However, I have been told that we can't all use my contactless card each time the 4 of us enter/exit a station.
Confused is an understatement !

You can pay on your phones. Don't you all have contactless cards or payments set up on your phones?

If your 12 year old doesn't have a phone, I'd give them your debit card to get through the barriers.

So yes you're correct, it's one method of payment per person

You need to go online and get the 12 year old an identity card which will give cheaper or even free travel. Look at the TFL website. There is a limit to how much one person can be charged for travel per day and per 7 days but travel in London is expensive. Buses are cheaper.

For the 12 year old, instead of applying for a Zip+ photocard and paying the admin fee, did you read about the "Young Visitors Discount" ?

I found the details on this page: tfl.gov.uk/fares/free-and-discounted-travel/11-15-zip-oyster-photocard?intcmp=55575#on-this-page-5

Young Visitor discount
If you don't live in London and you're visiting with children who don't have an 11-15 Zip Oyster photocard, they can get discounted travel for up to 14 days with the Young Visitor discount:

50% off adult-rate pay as you go fares and daily caps on bus, Tube, tram, DLR, London Overground, Elizabeth line and most National Rail services
50% off adult rate tickets on the Emirates Air Line and Thames Clippers River Bus services
The discount can be added to a standard Oyster card or Visitor Oyster card by a member of staff at:

Any Tube or London Overground station
Visitor Centres (except Gatwick Airport)
The children must be with you when you ask for the Young Visitor discount.

But you have to have an Oyster card for that which has a £15 admin fee @erinaceus

Can you get a day ticket at tube St for your kids and you and wife use contactless? Do you have more than one bank account? I just have them on Apple Pay on my phone

It’s worth looking at a map as a lot of places are within walking distance of each other.

They are a fiver and you get the money back if you return it.

I would get the visitor discount on an oyster for the youngest and use contactless for the rest of you. Use a different card for each.

do you know anyone who has an old PAYG oyster lying around? If you already have one, you can get a TFL customer support person at any tube station to turn it into a young visitor's card for the duration of your stay. Just takes a couple of taps. No ID card needed for short visits.

If not you can get a visitor card posted for a fiver, but I'm not sure how long that takes.

When we went our older DC used their phones to pay then DH and I tapped the younger ones through with our debit cards and then ourselves with our phones.

You can just get a card at the station and have a memeber if staff apply the discount.

I think that for this you can use a regular Oyster card, with the Young Visitor discount applied(?)

A regular Oyster card can be had with a £5 refundable deposit.

I agree with others, use this for the youngest and then use contactless payment cards or regular Oyster cards for your older child, your wife and yourself.

I'm going from what the OP said about the admin fee. Is that wrong then?

We’ve just come back from London with a 4 yr old and a 12 yr old. We bought the 12 yr old a day travel card each day - I think it was £7.50. the 4 yr old was free. It saved us the hassle of trying to get a young persons travel pass. The rest of us just used our phones to go through. Just remember to click in and out if you use the DLR!!!
Getting advice from staff at Euston underground was hopeless - no ticket offices, ram packed with people - easier to use the ticket machine TBH.

Do you have different accounts on your cards / phones?

Do you have different accounts on your cards / phones?

You don't need to. They register separately, which is why you should use one of the other, so it's fine to use the card for one person and phone for another. The money comes from the same account obviously but the phone and card are considered separate payment methods.

It's not correct for getting a card in the station and having the visitor discount applied.

The admin fee applies if you want to apply for a 11-15 year old or 16-17 year old Oyster card. These cards have the age-related discount already applied and have a photo of the user on them, I guess the admin fee is related to the production of these personalised cards.

A regular Oyster card only costs £5 refundable, and is not personalised. Then the Young Visitor's discount is applied to the regular card, but this only lasts for a fortnight.