Great Western Coffee Shop

Hi All,

Dont know if this has been covered yet but noticing that the mixing desk on FGW is now showing the Highest Fare first on the left hand side decreasing to the right.

It was never like this and I thought the prices were high, just looked at chilterns and it the old way, is this a ploy to catch people?

Basset

Just tried a sample journey on FGW's Mixing Deck and I get the fares in ascending order in the fares panel as I always have. Cheapest, top left, to most expensive, bottom right.

What were the specifics of the journey you was looking, basset44?

Hi Bignosemac,

Just tried cardiff to hayes and halington on the 13th August at 17.00 on Windows 8 will try to copy image not that good

http://tickets.firstgreatwestern.co.uk/gw/en/JourneyPlanning/MixingDeck

Basset

I've just tried those journey criteria and I get the fares panel to display fares in ascending order.

A screenshot of your result would be interesting to see.

Hi bignosemac

hope this is right

Basset

Interesting.

Is this the full FGW booking engine via a browser or an App?

hi bignosemac,

Computer based using Windows 7 at work think I noticed it last night at home on my laptop as well.

thought I check it out this morning and I go to FGW site this happens when I went to chiltern the old way come up on theirs

Will try a different computer later we have a few around

Basset

Aha, I've been able to repeat your results basset44. Well sort of.

Switching from my usually browser (Chrome) to Firefox, I get a different layout for the Mixing Deck with fares in descending order. I guess the cookies I have saved for the FGW website on Chrome have kept things as they were.

I've checked Internet Explorer and that replicates your results as well.

Chrome:
(http://i598.photobucket.com/albums/tt68/bignosemac/FGWMDch_zps3520178b.jpg)

Firefox:
(http://i598.photobucket.com/albums/tt68/bignosemac/FGWMDffox_zps8607b0be.jpg)

Internet Explorer:
(http://i598.photobucket.com/albums/tt68/bignosemac/FGWMDie_zps8f2b9c50.jpg)

So that's one booking engine, Mixing Deck, with three different layouts. Two of which show fares descending. Firefox has the Outward and Return options one above t'other. The others are side-by-side.

Why the changes so soon after switching booking engine suppliers? No idea. Time to ask FGW I think. These IT types, always got to tinker haven't they? You just get used to something and then they change it.  ::)

I hope my saved cookies keep things on Chrome as they were (and should be).

hi Bignosemac,

Thats it I always do disk clean up and remove cookies on my computer, noticed it when I looked to book tickets i thought I already had, the cynic in me would think that FGW are trying to catcch people out you get used to seeing the lower price first etc.

Had a look at East coast lowest left to right along with chiltern me thinks FGW up to no good?

Basset

Yep I can confirm that's how the mixing deck looks for me too using Firefox.

Chatting with FGW via Facebook and they've confirmed that they are tinkering to see which layout customers like best. Although how they can get accurate feedback when they only way to change styles is by doing stuff with cookies - something that only the tech savvy will be able to do.

I've not been able to get the original layout on the browsers I use infrequently, despite trying to match cookies with those stored on Chrome. Even I'm not tech savvy enough.

What's worse is that FGW provide a User Guide for the booking engine, but that only refers to the original layout.

They are after feedback on the layouts, so do give it. I've given mine: Stick with the original with fares ascending.

Blinkin' tinkers.

I understand from later posts why they're doing it, but I'll confess that my first selections when it changed were from the wrong end of the scale, and if I hadn't been very careful I would not have selected the lowest appropriate fare ...

If you don't see a fare immediately that you think you might pay, it's unlikely you'll scroll around to see if there's a cheaper one. That's psychology.....leave cheapest -> most expensive alone....

At least they haven't yet implemented the (in my opinion) horrendous layout that Red Spotted Hanky have forced on their customers via The Mixing Deck.  It really makes choosing a train by fare (rather than time) rather difficult.

There is a way round that for RSH. If you look under your cookies for tickets.redspottedhanky.com you might find

ExperienceCookie: DisplayMode

That needs changing to Default from Alternate.

Which reminds me http://fantasyfooty.games-redspottedhanky.com/default.aspx might be of some interest as there is effectively up to ^15 of train travel available.

Removing that cookie and then going to this link should also work:

http://tickets.redspottedhanky.com/rsh/en/journeyplanning/MixingDeck

My Fantasy Footy team is already compiled, although I know diddly about the Prima donna League these days. I've made Gerrard my captain. Until seeing the player options I didn't even know he was still playing.

I managed to earn ^8 worth of points for RSH Fantasy Wimbledon, and my RSH Fantasy Grand Prix entry is still going. F1 is a sport I do know something about, but I'm not doing particularly well. Currently ranked 2193rd out of 6094. At least I'm in the top half of the table.

But ultimately it's all a bit of fun and the RSH loyalty points up for grabs make it worthwhile. So do enter the latest iteration at the link posted by fourbee.

 ??? What on earth has possessed FGW to use the new layout for choosing tickets online !!
It is AWFUL - is a trainline revamp ? East Coast from now on (except for Sleeper booking  ::) ).

I still have the FGW website in mixing deck mode, so could be being rolled out on one browser first (I use Firefox, maybe you use Internet Explorer?).

Sounds like you might have the "ExperienceCookie" which has affected other sites and puts it in "Fares View" mode.

If this is the case, there is some advice on how to restore it here (change redspottedhanky to firstgreatwestern where mentioned):
http://www.firstgreatwestern.info/coffeeshop/index.php?topic=12702.15

And just on your other point, FGW no longer use the trainline back end, it is ATOS/WebTIS.

 ;) Thanks for the help.

For continuity, I've merged the two threads about the new Mixing Deck layout into this one thread.

http://tickets.firstgreatwestern.co.uk/gw/en/JourneyPlanning/MixingDeck now redirects to
http://tickets.firstgreatwestern.co.uk/gw/en/journeyplanning/FaresView for me with (Firefox 21).

I do appear to have the "ExperienceCookie", but what caused that cookie to be set (is there something I can avoid clicking to avoid that happening again) and how come it happened to occour just as 'Sleepy' encounted the new layout?

Tried deleting the cookie, but it doesn't seem to have worked. I am still redirected from the MixingDeck URL to the FaresView one. Any ideas?

Not sure on that one. Mine is still OK, but I am using an old version of Firefox (14) and do not get redirected.

East Coast and Southern are still using the old style AFAIK. Plus Southern used to (still do maybe?) their rainy day guarantee for a refund without admin fee for some uncollected tickets.