My Experience with bus driver's in London and how to skip that expense.

In the Summer of 2008, I took a long flight from Lagos, Nigeria, to London for a Holiday. When my flight arrived at the Heath-row Airport, I took a taxi to my hotel. The following day when I wanted to go out I didn't want to take a taxi again because the last taxi I had taken had been expensive. So, I decided to take a public bus. 

 When I entered a bus I took out a 20 pound note and the driver said to me that in London they don't accept money in notes inside a bus and he told me to get off if I didn't have any coins to pay. I get off and then I entered another bus but the driver told me the same thing. There was no where nearby to change the 20-pound note into coins so I had to take a taxi to get to my Hotel, which cost me a lot. 

 To me it was a big surprise that in London they don't accept money in notes inside buses because in Nigeria we do pay in buses with notes, and the driver never asks you to get off of the bus because you have coins. In Nigeria we don't normally use coins to pay inside buses because people don't value them or use them often because there is nothing they can buy in the market with them. 

However, even though we don't often use coins to pay inside a bus, you can still use them to pay in the bus if you have them. So if your planing to travel to London, bear it in mind that transportation in London is expensive and the only way to skip that expense is. For example, you can take a long walk as much as possible, maybe a 5-10 minute walk to get to the next station because many of the bus stations are much closer to each other than the bus map suggests. Or you can purchase the Oyster card which is cheaper. For example, a single one way journey fare will cost you 2.20 pounds but with an Oyster card it will cost you 1.30 pound.