Great Western Coffee Shop

In all seriousness, I was told by a comp manager on a ride recently that they were going to be cracking down on this, as it was a franchise requirement.

Edited to fix quote. bignosemac

Zifa's are not cheap.

But you can get them here.
http://www.zifferndruck.de/en/index.shtml

The problem is with those stampers is the fact that they can be easily wiped away, as its ink based and doesn't really make much of an indent in the card.


Same with the stamps they use on the Heathrow Express.

My impression is that staff are all issued with the stampers, but many don't bother to use them, or if they do won't necessarily set the correct details for each train they're working.

Re the ink wiping off, there are quick-drying ink ribbons available for the glossy thermal tickets, but for some reason (cost maybe?) FGW don't seem to use them. But even having said that, I don't think it's possible to wipe off the impression completely: if the ribbon's a bit dry then the impression tends to be clearer and won't rub off, and if it's a new ribbon then you'll leave a large and obvious purple smear!

Correct re: All staff are issued with them.

The ink is a pain in the backside, especially when changing the numbers etc, ink gets everywhere - I know a few staff who don't bother getting the ink refilled and they just grip hard to make the indent.  The XC ones appear to use the better ink which doesn't smudge so much.

I know of another TOC issuing staff with sharpie pens because the ink was not drying. Also heard of some punters putting a recently inked ticket into a top pocket of a White shirt.

What is so wrong with a good old ticket clipper?!??! Miles better than a scruffy scribble from a biro.

I believe it's because they were renowned for cutting through the magnetic strip, thus making them useless on a gateline.

how much heat does it take to activate the ink within the ticket? could there be a small enough heat stamp?

Someone who works St Ives branch has one of them - cut's various shapes.

The plastic window in my rail card wallet is so inked up that the card is not visible any more.

The problem with a hole punch is that it doesn't mean anything, same with a biro! Apparently there will be a crack down on it soon as the ziffa stamper is part of the member of staff's working equipment!

So whats the difference between writing a number (such as the day) as opposed to a ziffa?
Ones cheap, the others expensive. They both do the same job.
The ziffa may imprint the headcode (thats if its got that particular letter on its cogs, it doesn't have every letter on them).

But does Zifa-ing a ticket actually mean anything?

On tickets that are valid for a single day, journeys can still be broken, so fare evaders could use the ticket again for a slightly shorter journey.

Same with tickets valid for longer periods.  Am I correct in saying that a whole journey doesn't need to be completed in a single day, in which case a date/headcode is pointless.

The only benefit I can see to punching/scribbling/Zifa-ing tickets is that it prevents them being returned for a refund.

Well obviously it means something because, assuming it's set correctly, it identifies the date, train and guard ;)

The principal reason as far as I'm aware is that the date/headcode combination can be used by customer relations to verify claims regarding delays, thus making fraudulent applications for refund much less easy. The control number printed at right-angles to the main impression also identifies the member of staff who gripped it. Zifa is also quicker and more consistently legible than writing the date with a pen, not that staff with biros generally bother to do that.

When BR introduced stampers towards the end (big, blue, plastic, unwieldy, cheap and nasty things made by Dormy for the most part) they used a three-letter route code following the date, which identified the section of route on which the ticket had been inspected. Ticket examiners' handbooks from the early 1990s have long lists of these codes in the back. Again though, that assumes that the guard had the print wheels set correctly and it must have been a royal PITA, especially on long-distance XC services, for the staff to have to look up the right code and reset their kit every few stops.

It wont identify the train on some trains as the letter cog doesn't have every letter on it.
e.g. AFAIK it has A/C/E/G/L/M/O/S/T/X as letters. I know some trains that dont use any of those letters as main headcodes.
The number only identifies the ziffa number and not the individual guard (unless logged that way) and isnt unique to ziffa only to the order made.

Fair point re reporting numbers, but using an X in place of the letter assuming the correct one isn't on the wheel still gives a good indication of what train it was used on. From the context of "I used this ticket on the xxxx train from Nempnett Thrubwell to Portishead on dd-mm-yyyy" it should be pretty easy to deduce the train which 2X34 instead of, say, 2R34, refers to.

And not just because there are very few trains between Nempnett Thrubwell and Portishead ;)

(http://forum.thescubasite.com/happy/happy0158.gif) (http://www.thescubasite.com)

I've had it before where a passenger claims the return portion of a ticket was stamped in error on the outward journey of an SVR, the ZIFA stamp however told a different story and had been used two days previously on the same service (and surprisingly the passenger did not have any overnight bags). Easier to do that when you have a regular route and get to know the headcodes, we're mainly Mike and Oscar, one shift a day has a Victor, we get an Echo on Saturdays and will be getting a Sierra a day come December!

The ziffa number is logged by Crew Admin staff to the staff member locally so can be traced within FGW.

Makes good sense! Would seem a bit pointless to issue all that kit with control numbers but not actually log them.