Great Western Coffee Shop

So after 5 years of safe travelling I managed to mislay my annual season ticket on Monday morning. I lost it somewhere between entering the station (as i went through the barriers) and being sat in my seat on the train.  I was so sure it would be handed in at Maidenhead but, two days later, it hadn't and I had to concede defeat and order a replacement (duplicate ticket).

This leaves me in the unenviable position of being on my final replacement for the year.  I am in effect carrying ^4000 in cash with me every day, just tucked into my trouser pocket.  Thats 215 working days, or 430 train journeys, or 1720 ticket barrier operations before I am off of probation.

Whilst I understand the logic for not dishing out replacements willy-nilly this has caused me to think about the current scenario some what...

a) If I did lose my duplicate then, in your experience, will i forced to pay for another?  Or will a degree of pragmatism prevail?
b) Given that I am pretty sure that someone is now travelling gratis for a year with my lost ticket it made me question how many times I have been asked to provide my photocard for inspection.  And the answer is... never, in 5 years.  Does that seem wrong to anyone here?
b) Will Crossrail have smartcards so that for TV passengers we can have a 21st century solution to paper tickets?

I also started to think of solutions to this problem and came up with the following:
- For annual season ticket buyers they have the option to pay for a year's travel just like today but are only issued tickets on a rolling 1 month basis.
- Every month they go and collect the next rolling ticket.
- Benefit to the passenger is that they only have to worry about the next 4 weeks rather than a year; and the benefit to the TOC is that they get less ticket fraud.
- And for those worried about the impact to the planet of printing 12 tickets per year rather than 1 I would reply that I already go through more than 12 tickets per year due to de-magnitisation.

I'd be interested in your thoughts!

More and more TOCs are having the roll out of ITSO smart cards as part of their franchise agreement. I wouldn't be surprised to see a roll out as part of the next franchise agreement that kicks in later this year.

I think your idea has merit,  but think the expansion of smard cards is such that we'll see them become the default method of issuing season (and other) tickets in a few years time.

Smart cards beat my idea hands-down.  I didn't realise that this was a potential option and I thought we were stuck with paper until Crossrail or even beyond...

I also recently lost a season ticket - in my case somewhere between an on board check and home although I suspect it was in the putting away after the check.

In my case though it was a 7day so the loss is better and worse. Better because this isn't the ^1000s for an annual but worse because there are no replacements and if you are lucky enough to have it handed in then it will probably get back to you after the 7days! What is most annoying to me is the lost photocard :(

As for ticket checks... I have never been asked for the photocard because I always present that for inspection anyway. However I have heard somebody asked "and may I see the photocard for this?" during an inspection. On the other hand a friend of mine presented a season with photocard during an inspection once - the photocard was in one of those ticket wallets and had a collectable football sticker over the photo. Despite the player having a very different skin colour to my friend the inspector thanked him and carried on his way..!

Smart cards seem a utopian future, I cannot wait.

NickB,

Have you considered insuring your Season Ticket? Many home contents policies cover Season Tickets as 'personal money' but with a relatively low limit.

You'd have to inform the insurer of the value to have it specifically covered, for an increased premium.

Thanks for the suggestion.  That could be well worth investigating.

I'm on my third annual ticket since January now, I normally have to replace them 3 or 4 times a year.

My local station has had smart card readers since before I moved to the area in 2010 although they have only just been switched on. No indication of when you can actually start using them though.

I wonder if those credit cards which offer "purchase protection insurance" cover such eventualities?

I did once ask one of the clerks at the Maidenhead ticket office why we didn't have a smart card system, like the Oyster on LT. His response was that there were problems with fraud or something.
This may be because there is no photo-card counterpart with the Oyster.
On the other-hand, there would be no ticket to lose that has to be taken out of it wallet 8 times a day!
I do remember him proudly wearing his RMT badge and tie :-X
W.E