Santander Cycles
| Category | Price | Seller | Device |
|---|---|---|---|
| Travel | Free | Transport Trading Ltd. | iPhone, iPad, iPod |
The official Santander Cycles app from Transport for London is the only app to send bike release codes straight to your smartphone. So you can skip past the docking station terminal and get on your bike quicker.
Simply register with your bank card, and use the app to ‘Hire now’ from a nearby docking station. Follow the instructions to get your bike release code. Tap the code into the docking point and you’re good to go!
You can also:
• See up-to-the minute information about which docking stations have bikes and spaces available
• Plan a journey with an easy to follow map
• Receive notifications – for example, summarising the cost at the end of your hire
• View your recent journeys and charges
• Save your favourite docking stations
Each bike release code is valid for 10 minutes at your chosen docking station.
Please note the app doesn’t reserve bikes. If there are no bikes available at the docking station, don’t worry. Use the app to find a nearby docking station with bikes, and get another bike release code to use there. You won’t be charged until you use the release code.
You must be 18 or over to hire a bike, and 14 or over to ride one. For full Santander Cycles terms and conditions, see tfl.gov.uk/santandercycles
Reviews
Read the terms carefully
pzcd790
Thought I could hire the bike for £2 over a 24 hour period, ending up paying £20 after I realized you need to dock the bike afterward 30 min of use. Clever marketing ploy.
Foreign visitors
MallocTheFree
I got the app and paid the fee. Then the verification of your device occurs by sending an SMS code that expires in 15 minutes, but the 15 minutes must be compared between local London time and the time in your home time zone because it expires immediately. I tried nearly a dozen codes and all expire instantly
Not really suited for tourists
Robin’s account
This app is very helpful for locating stations to collect or drop off bicycles. It tells you both the number of bikes available as well as spaces available to drop off. However, it is of limited use for actually reserving and paying for bikes, at least if your party has more than one person. The app will only allow one rental at a time, which means that all the time you put into setting up your payment method, etc. is really wasted if you have more than one in your group. On a positive note, the kiosks at the rental sites accept cards and allow you to select multiple bicycles at a time. So download the app for tracking and an easy way to locate bikes, but do your actual rental onsite!
£2 just to sign up!
interlard
We used the bikes 3 times yesterday, but gave up on this app. The kiosk is appalling (you have to constantly request unlock codes and you go through about 7 disclaimer screens every time before a ticket falls out with the code illegibly printed on it). But it was preferable to being charged £2 for nothing via this app. You also need to wait 5 mins between rentals, for no reason.
Useless
Photonomad
Who designed this app? A five year old child could do a better job. The 'Signup' page is very confusing and lacking adequate instructions. Having only one field to enter a password without a second confirmation field is big mistake. The obligatory spam/junk email avoidance questions are not 100% clear if you are actually agreeing to receive junk emails etc from TFL and Santander or opting out of this. Then before pressing 'next step' you are not given any indication that your smartphone will switch to camera mode in order to capture an image of your payment card. This didn't work at all and the app wouldn't respond to the 'cancel' or 'enter manually' options. What should be a simple process was very frustrating. Needs a lot of refinement. And disappointingly it only appears you can only essentially hire one bike at a time - it's useless if you are with family/friends and want to take out a couple of bike on the one account. In addition the 'status' of bikes or spaces available at individual docking stations displayed on the app is not a 'live' reflection of actual conditions. I'm not sure what the delay is but kinda makes this element a waste of time unless it's updated accurately and more frequently.
Awful
NYC is home
The old Barclays Bikes App wasn't great but it was much more useful than this app (and I wish I still had it, if only to locate stations more effectively). This app needed a lot more planning and testing. Difficult to use in so many ways. Needs a substantial revision.
Mr.
Calayrthebiker
Uploaded and used it today with a US credit card with a chip. App told me where to find a bike and how many available. When locating a docking station it informed me of available docks. You must have internet on your phone. ?
Useless! Lacks the right kind of information and functionality.
ParisPerfect
Terrible! As if designed by someone who does not use the bikes, lacks the right functionality or information for a regular user. 1) lacks functionality to extend rides when no docking station is available (so you end up being charged money when you should not) 2) not up to date on where docking stations are (I actually docked at a station that did not appear on the app) 3) finding a docking station is too fussy. unlike the Barclays app, you can't find a docking station by navigating the map (the stations don't update if you shift the map left or right, up or down) - you have to know the full post code (it won't take SW7) or input the names it knows (St. James's is an area of central London but it thinks I mean Hammersmith) 4) when you look at the map, the icon showing how full a docking station is displays percentage availability not actual numbers (unlike the Barclays app) so you don't know if there is 1 empty spot or 10 - the icon may look similar depending on the total number of stands
Crashes all the time
Hhttttt
Just downloaded this app and it has crashed twice in less than 5 minutes. Good thing I kept the old Barclays cycle hire app. This app is unusable.
