Great Western Coffee Shop

From today, the standard validity of TER tickets changes from 61 days to 7 days. See LES TARIFS VOYAGEURS: CONDITIONS G^RALES DE VENTE SNCF (http://medias.sncf.com/sncfcom/pdf/tarif-voyageurs/Tarifs_Voyageurs_sept_2014_complet.pdf) (just the 216 double-width pages of it - several sets of regulations plus a national fares list). This was presented in the news as an anti-fraud measure.

This limit does not apply to trains with compulsory reservations, for which tickets which will be dated (all TGVs and some Intercit^s), and the 7-day limit was already in force on Paris suburban trains (R^gion Ile-de-France). This 7-day limit is the validity from the ticket date, and interacts with a separate pre-purchase limit of three months, i.e. from purchase to use. If you have used one of the standard station machines on which you have to make interminable selections by spinning a wheel, you may recall being offered a choice of 61-day validity periods (about ten to cover a month, I think). That now has to change, so I guess the machine will have to offer even more choices, or even all 60 future 7-day validity periods.

Incidentally, I also looked in those regulations for break of journey. There is a general requirement to complete the whole journey within 24 hours, in excess of which a new ticket is required. Outside Paris barriers are rare, so a break within a day is no problem. International trains are not covered by these regulations at all, so maybe even the French internal part of a journey on classic old-fashioned cross-country trains would not exceed 24 hours. Oddly, for a rather legalistic document, I can't find anything to cover the impact of delayed train running on this. There are provisions for delays of over an hour, including a right to go back home or to continue within 24 hours (Annexe 7).

While looking through that big fares document, I came across this standard formula for calculating the "normal" fare. You may find it interesting in the usual way, as an alternative way of doing things. (The fares are in Volume 6, from page 137 of the PDF. My translation, with the table left as a graphic as it won't copy at all well.)

1. Formation des prix

1.1. Basic general fares

1.1.1. Calculation of basic general fares valid from 2 January 2014

The second class basic general fare (for journeys in certain trains other than TGVs) is calculated using the formula : P = a + bd.
P being the fare, a a constant, b the fare per kilometre and d the distance.

The full fare for a journey in 1st class is determined from the fare calculated for 2nd class to which is applied a factor of 1.5. The resutling amount is rounded up to the nearest 10 cents.

1.2. Specific fares
Specific fares apply to journeys on routes served by TGVs, INTERCITES day trains, and INTERCITES night trains, on which reservations are compulsory.

(There follow 80 double-width pages of specific fares, so the formula isn't such a huge simplification. )

Midday news item on the 7-day limit has found some people who don't like the change, though perhaps not very many (e.g. students getting trips home bought by doting parents). Also, that only 11% of fines issued on trains are ever recovered, due to false IDs. Plans are afoot to tighten up on that (France is a country with a tradition of compulsory ID cards, after all).

Currently you are asked to buy a ticket on the spot if you don't have one, with additions that vary with your infraction, the distance, class, etc. Typically these are about ^30, but can be less if you do at least have a ticket for the journey. Failing to stamp is either ^10 or ^25 (with nothing to say what decides). Having to formally ID and issue a fine adds ^30-38. SNCF would like to raise these fines quite a bit.

So on par with a English Penalty Fare then? Although I say it's less if you count double the single fare options.
Considering it's stealing from the state I'm surprised they are so low.