TfL Ref: FOI-0107-1718 

Thank you for your email received by us on 17 April 2017 asking for information about the timescales for issuing refunds.

Your request has been considered in accordance with the requirements of the Freedom of Information Act and our information access policy.  I can confirm that we hold the information you require. You asked:

If a person pays for a ticket or travel card by a debit/credit card the amount is collected from the person's bank account almost immediately or shortly thereafter. If a refund needs to be made (for example, if a travel card is to collected within 3 days but touching in at the nominated station), what are the technical reasons for why a refund cannot be made within the same time period that a payment is obtained from a person's bank account.
If you are referring to an online refund request, a refund will be available the morning after the request is made. We process online refund requests overnight, ensuring they are available the next morning. As long as the refund request is completed before 23:00, it will be ready the following day.
When a customer places their refund request on our website, they  will be asked to nominate a specific station to collect it from. They can choose a Tube, DLR, London Overground, TfL Rail or National Rail station, the Emirates Air Line, a River Bus service pier or tram stop from the dropdown list.
To collect a refund, customers are asked to travel from their nominated location during the eight day pick-up window. They simply have to touch in to make their journey as normal and their balance will be updated as they pass through the ticket gates.
A customer can view the status of their refund request via their Oyster online account. To do this, customers have to follow the instructions below:
• Sign in to your online account at: https://oyster.tfl.gov.uk/oyster
• (Click on the your Oyster card number)
• Click on 'Order history’
• Select the relevant order number from the list
If their refund isn’t collected, we will automatically refund them within 14 days of the pick-up window expiring back to the payment card that was used to make the purchase. It can take up to 10 working days after the expiry of the pick-up window to be refunded back to their payment card.
In the unlikely event that a customer is not refunded by their bank in the next two weeks then we can investigate further. In these cases we ask customers to send us two weeks’ worth of bank statements (the day of transaction plus 14 days) to show us that the money has not been refunded. Our Refunds Department will then contact the customer directly to arrange the refund.
The automatic refund doesn’t apply to annual season tickets purchased online. If a failed refund relates to an annual season ticket, confirmation from Cubic is required and the service ticket will be dealt with by the Seasons team (manual refund).
If this is not the information you are looking for, please do not hesitate to contact me.

Please see the attached information sheet for details of your right to appeal as well as information on copyright and what to do if you would like to re-use any of the information we have disclosed.

Yours sincerely

Paulina Tuffour
FOI Case Officer

FOI Case Management Team
General Counsel
Transport for London