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Luckily we're in the Oyster Zone - so it's just normal contactless (this has been expanded to Radlett so I assume will be expanded elsewhere).
I worked out in our situation it was never worth weekly/monthly tickets, only PAYG or annual. But with annual the gain was so small that it wasn't worth the outlay, especially if you had some WFH.
hugo7-
Luckily we're in the Oyster Zone - so it's just normal contactless (this has been expanded to Radlett so I assume will be expanded elsewhere).
It can be ripoff though. Putney to Waterloo is £6/day (£3 each way at peak times) on contactless (which is cheaper than £6.50 of a paper return ticket or £3.60 for paper singles).
Cheapest annual ticket for that journey is £772, which works out at ~128 days of £6/day. That's only ~43 weeks of 3 days a week. Anything more than that it's worth getting a season ticket.
I don't as I'm only in the office 2 days a week and when my foot is back to running and playing 5-a-side I'd only be doing one off-peak single journey on the train each week:-
Thu: Cycle in - play 5-a-side in evening, pub and then off-peak train home (£2.50)
Fri: Run in, cycle homeRunning is about £1/commute (£60 running shoes tend to last 500 miles - run commute is 7 miles - and the rest covers wear/tear on running gear). Cycling is something around £50/year (1/10th of the cost of the bike, plus consumables like tyres/transmission/tubes/etc) so that works out at under 50p/commute (it'd be much cheaper if I was cycle commuting 5 days/week).
Back on topic. I did CB23 to SW18 on and off for 9 months whilst my US Visa was just a "few weeks away". I hated it. Motorbike/train/tube/train/walk (1h15-1h30 each way). Spent as much time as I could crashing on sofas/floors/etc.
I'd only ever move to a 1h+ commute if I was remote and only needed to go into an office that far away once every fortnight or so.
Long commutes seem a novelty at first but that soon wears off.
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I worked out in our situation it was never worth weekly/monthly tickets, only PAYG or annual. But with annual the gain was so small that it wasn't worth the outlay, especially if you had some WFH.
Similar here, based in Dartford and commuting into Charing Cross - made myself up a spreadsheet and worked out that even just one day WFH means you can start to save on the season ticket if you pick up one Off-Peak train over the rest of it.
Time-wise, we're 1hr 15min from door to desk at best or 1hr 35min if you don't catch the 'express' ones. Wouldn't want much more than that really, especially when you think a five day commute on the faster services means being out of the house for an extra twelve hours every week!
I'm fortunate that working from home is an option at least a couple of days a week and flexible hours means I can save time as well as take advantage of the Off-Peak services at £4.40 a time instead of £7.60 on contactless and save quite a bit compared to the annual option.
Greenbank
tonylast
Also don't think that only going in 3 out of 5 days a week means you can do it for 3/5 of the cost of a season ticket. In general going in 4 out of 5 days (on individual day returns) works out no cheaper than buying a season ticket.
Going in 3 out of 5 (on individual day tickets) is usually 3/4 of the cost of a season ticket, etc.
Plus if you do it with individual tickets then you don't have a season ticket for non-commuting trips into London (although weekend tickets are generally cheaper). Buying individual tickets every day is a huge faff too.