Great Western Coffee Shop

I have seen a leaflet on the train stating that from March of this year that part time season tickets were available in cornwall, which allow travel on three of the weekdays and the weekend. Has anyone got any more information about these tickets? I couldn't find anything on the FGW website.

Mod's feel free to move this topic if it is more relevant in Fare's Fare.

http://www.plymouth.gov.uk/fgwticketoffers.pdf

Yes, they're available on all Cornwall and Devon flows, you have to choose which days you want to travel and those days are printed on the ticket, they are available for monthly or longer only.

Not quite, Vacman.  Only to Truro, Plymouth, Exeter St Davids, Central plus Digby & Sowton.   This is so they can be regulated through ticket gates (except, of course, in the case of Digby). 

There are also new Carnets too (in addition to the ones we already organise on the Tamar Valley Line and Mid Devon - Exeter).  Same flows - 10 Standard Day Returns for the price of nine, to be used within a month.

I'm helping organise a lot more publicity for these over the next few weeks.

Does Exeter Central have barriers now?

it does indeed at both entrances, very annoying if you get off the bus at the station and want to buy a devon ranger.... you have to go the long way to the station, why cant they just program the ranger ticket into the damn machines????

on the plus side watching someone jump the barrier and fall flat on their face.... priceless

I imagine it's rather like watching someone get a van stuck in a ditch!  :P ;) ;D

guards are already finding people abusing the carnets, totally useless idea, wide open to abuse as they don't even have to be dated!

Using mainly gateline stations is the way of tackling this.

no comment  ::) ;D :-[

I have seen someone climb up a fence, not quite make it over said fence and fall back onto platform giving themselves some cuts and bruises...

...Station has no ticket checks on entry/exit - so I'm not really sure why he was trying to leave that way.

between the hours of 7 and 7 maybe, it's just added yet more opportunity for people to fiddle for the sake of saving very little money for the customer, these tickets dont even have date boxes on them just an expiry date! the part time season is a good idea and quite simple as the valid days are printed on the ticket, but not enough thought has gone into the hotch potch carnet!

Between 7 and 7 should cover pretty much everyone who buys them, I would have thought.   If on-train staff cancel tickets too, that should mop up anyone else.  We'll see.  Still very early days. 



 

got stuck in a queue when the person being served asked for one of these carnet jobs,  22 bits of tickets later....  STUPID IDEA

Yep! I can see plenty of complaints from staff going in about these rediculous contraptions! I cant see why anyone would buy them, if your travelling Exmouth to Exeter for example, they are only available for anytime tickets, and save you a whopping 50p per day (but will save you ^100's a year when you keep re-using the same ticket like whats already happening!)

Now, let's not have any overreaction here.  These tickets have just been introduced and (apart from Digby & Sowton) deliberately targeted at gated stations.

With the reduction in season ticket rates in Cornwall in 2006 after the change to the Devon & Cornwall Railcard, the Carnets are going to be better value in Devon (where season ticket discounts over the daily fare are very small) than they are in Cornwall.

The move for Carnets has come from a number of members of the Customer Panel and they are right, there should be a mechanism to encourage people who travel regularly but not every day to take the train.  This is supported by the Carnets we have run in the Tamar Valley since 2004 which have helped increase journey numbers by 50% in an area with a small population.

It's easy to rubbish or be cynical about new ideas.  Let's see how they go - and, Vacman, if you have any evidence of abuse, feed it back up the line.  The mechanism of these promotions was devised centrally.

Many TOCs wouldn't attempt something like this and it is to FGW's credit that they have.
 

 

Thanks for that useful background information, Richard.  :)

Yes but why dont they make the customer fill in the date before travel.  Thats what usually happens but having it this way makes it wide open to abuse.

Sometime the guard has to deal with customer service issues.  Some trains will be too busy to get through.  Sometimes the barriers are open anyway.  I just think it is a crazy idea.

Why not have a validator on the platform like in France which the customer can validate the ticket before travel.

Cos if a person wants to get lots of use they're not gonna use a validator?

... and, to be equally fair, thanks for that useful background information, super tm.  :)

I'm now going to step back slightly, and encourage both 'sides' in this debate to discuss the matter further: it seems to me that there are some 'rough edges' to be knocked out, around this particular scheme?

Chris.  :-\

I'm sorry but the people who have dreamt up these ideas obviously have no experience and haven't thought through how they work at the sharp end. The issuing (as I previously posted) takes an age, inconveniencing far more passengers than it benefits. It totally relies on technology, gateline (which is far from perfect) and humans (ditto) to police, and in the end does exactly what we, the paying public, don't want,.. even more fares to muddy the great fare debate..
I think nearly everyone says that it's to complicated and should be simplified, this, and other schemes like it does not help  STOP NOW

i know it would cost too much to do, but they should scrap tickets and extent oyster, have 2 fairs peak and off peak, and replace advance fairs with loyalty discounts that way regular travelers see the benefits, you cant buy the wrong ticket by mistake, you can change your journey if needed..... but im sure the cost of barriers/ gateline staff at all stations would make it impossible

On the subject of The Tamar Valley Carnets, has anything been done to rectify the current ill thought out version where one half is given on train and the other at the gateline?? Will the summer books be back to one ticket??? Currently, you give half on the train and the other half at Plymouth gateline and vice versa on the return trip. Works fine, apart from the large number of people who alight/join at Devonport/Keyham etc don't have to give a portion to a gateline so get twice as many journies from their book.....

Answer - yes, something has been done.  The new tickets will still have the three portions but one will be marked clearly "Travel ticket" and the other "Gateline pass".  You will always have to hand over a travel ticket portion to make a journey.  Unused gateline passes will be worthless.

The coupons will have a horizontal, rather than vertical perforation, with the travel ticket portion being top right.

Sales have been much the same as last year, so I don't think there have been too many instances of people getting extra journeys but there have clearly been some and this move will put an end to that.  The new books will go on sale on Thiursday week, 23rd.

any chance you can do this with the Tarka ones aswell Richard?

*Amen*

anyone who wants to do a case study..... read this


http://mancunian1001.wordpress.com/2010/03/03/^they-cut-the-fares-they-cut-the-fuss-^/

I live in Penryn, received a leaflet about these in the post along with the normal Lidl, Asda, etc flyers
the following pricing are quoted in the leaflet,

D & C Carnet
Falmouth Town- Truro ^41.00
Penryn- Truro ^32.00

Part time Season Ticket
Falmouth Town - Truro ^36.50 (normal season ticket ^53.00)
Penryn- Truro ^28.80 (normal season ticket ^42.30)
Taken the following extracts from the leaflet posted in my door

Yes, the Tarka ones will also be changed.  Out later this week.




Edited to fix quote. bignosemac