10% off Advances - FGW website

[whole diary]

[Fourbee]

Customers who book through firstgreatwestern.co.uk will save 10% on First Great Western's Advance tickets from 11 August 2013 to 02 May 2014 for travel dates between 08 September 2013 to 03 May 2014. These discounted Advance tickets can only be booked through our website.

Further details here:
http://www.firstgreatwestern.co.uk/Train-times-and-tickets/Ticket-types/Leisure-tickets

[ChrisB]

Not the 'offer' that it appears to be!
http://www.standard.co.uk/news/transport/anger-as-rail-firm-first-great-western-plans-11-rise-in-advance-fares-8785785.html

First Great Western is to increase the price of many advance tickets by 11.11 per cent from next month, the Evening Standard can reveal today.
 
The ^advanced purchase^ tickets are often the cheapest way to travel and must be purchased up to 12 weeks in advance and can only be used for a particular train and date.

But they are not covered by the regulations which limit commuter fare rises, allowing train companies to charge what they like.

The rise comes on top of average fare increases of 4.4 per cent in January this year and they will go up again by a similar amount next January.

Critics condemned the increase as ^little more than daylight robbery^ and raised concerns that other trains companies across the UK^▸ (United Kingdom) would also increase the price of advance tickets.

A FGW^▸ (First Great Western) spokesman said the fares already offer ^significant discounts of more than 60 per cent on standard walk-up fares^  and that won^t change. A FGW document said the increase would come into force from Sunday 8 September.

The September 2013 Fares Briefing overview of key FGW fares changes states: ^Advance fares (open, excluding sleeper fares) increases by 11.11 per cent (subject to rounding to nearest 10p).^

The increases will only apply to those tickets purchased at FGW^s 276 tickets offices from Paddington to Cornwall and not to those purchased online ^  sparking accusations it was ^yet another^ move to close ticket offices to save money.

Manuel Cortes, leader of the TSSA^» (Transport Salaried Staffs' Association - about) transport union, said: ^This is little more than daylight robbery ^ it is blatant profiteering at the passengers^ expense.

^Private rail franchises are a licence to print money and First Group is exploiting that licence to the very limit.^

Mr Cortes addedd: ^This is yet another move to close ticket offices by driving passengers online when trying to find the cheaper fares. They are penalising all passengers who buy advanced tickets at a station and this is particularly unfair on the middle-aged and elderly who prefer to use their local booking office.^

He is writing to Tim O^Toole, First Group chief executive, demanding to know if the rises will also apply at the company^s four other franchises; First Capital Connect, TransPennine Express, First Hull Direct an ScotRail.

The FGW spokesman said: ^Advance Purchase tickets are variably-priced fares which change depending how busy a particular train is. There is no single set price for an AP ticket.

^These fares already offer significant discounts of more than 60 per cent on standard walk-up fares and this will not change in September.

^Like many other operators, we are currently running a promotion that gives customers an additional 10 per cent discount on these fares when booking from our own website.^

So, advances are going up by 11.11% (odd figure!), but until May 3 2014, only by 1.11% if bought online.

Sneaky, unless they are extremely good at all forms of communication. Pain the arse that the discount isn't available via the app though.

[Fourbee]

The increase is actually 0% when buying via the FGW^▸ (First Great Western) website, not 1.11% because the 10% discount entirely cancels out the 11.11% increase.

These increases/discounts are already in the system.

e.g. I took a sample journey from London Paddington to Plymouth on Wednesday 6 November, on the 11.06.

Price quoted by FGW = ^18.50 (i.e. the same fare as now, so called WDS Advance from BR^▸ (British Rail(ways)) Fares)
http://www.brfares.com/#fares?orig=PAD^» (Paddington (London) - next trains)&dest=PLY^» (Plymouth - next trains)&rlc=
Price quoted by Southern = ^20.60 (so actually not rounded to the nearest 10p, but rounded up)

Interestingly Southern also shows the entire fare range on the first mixing deck button (so ^15 being the new lowest standard advance fare), but FGW only shows the lowest price available for that particular search.

[ChrisB]

Indeed - hence where the 11.11% figure comes from....

But originally flagged as an offer to 'save' 10% wasn't it? in other words, a 10% discount OFF 18.50 - i.e. ^16.65 in this instance?

Rather than an offer to delay a price rise?

[Fourbee]

Absolutely, there has only been around 2/3rds of August from which to benefit from the true "spirit" of the promotion (even then for travel from 8 September).

Companies will continue to use these slights of hand - how long has it taken the OFT to take action against low quality imported furniture retailers?!

[Fourbee]

...or Motor Insurers' frequent claims of 20% off.

20% off what? How do we know the initial premium has not been adjusted upwards to take account of this.

[bobm]

or Tesco and strawberries....

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-birmingham-23755528

[trainer]

"FGW^▸ (First Great Western) giveth and FGW taketh away."

Words for the death of transparency in pricing.

[LiskeardRich]

I may have read this differently

The increases will only apply to those tickets purchased at FGW^▸ (First Great Western)^s 276 tickets offices from Paddington to Cornwall and not to those purchased online

If they are only going up at stations does this mean online advances will be lower than ticket offices and then you get a further 10% off on top for buying online.
Or is the 10% online discount to counteract the increase?

[ChrisB]

the latter.

So they go up across the board, but are then discounted back down to current prices on their website only until May 2014

[thetrout]

Interestingly Southern also shows the entire fare range on the first mixing deck button (so ^15 being the new lowest standard advance fare), but FGW^▸ (First Great Western) only shows the lowest price available for that particular search.

There was a ruling from the ASA which upheld a complaint AIUI^▸ (as I understand it). The complainant suggested the full range of fares was misleading which FGW in fairness accepted could be taken as the case.

http://www.asa.org.uk/Rulings/Adjudications/2013/5/First-Greater-Western-Ltd/SHP_ADJ_215420.aspx

What is interesting here is why FGW have to comply and other TOCs^▸ (Train Operating Company) do not. Am I on the right track (No pun intended) in suggesting it's because that is a different  operator and therefore companies Booking System?

[ChrisB]

That ruling is a nuisance.

I often DO want to see all fare levels as I might check further (if I'm sble to be flexible on travel times/dates) to find a train with that lower fare. If I don't know it exists, I might not realise & look for it.

This may be why some operators now have lowest fare finder that can stretch across weeks/month.....in which case, FGW^▸ (First Great Western) need to offer it

[LiskeardRich]

That ruling is a nuisance.

I often DO want to see all fare levels as I might check further (if I'm sble to be flexible on travel times/dates) to find a train with that lower fare. If I don't know it exists, I might not realise & look for it.

This may be why some operators now have lowest fare finder that can stretch across weeks/month.....in which case, FGW^▸ (First Great Western) need to offer it

I haven't seen any TOC^▸ (Train Operating Company) example but I'm assuming this is the same as EasyJet who if you select your flexible show you either week or month view with cheapest price for each day. This I find great if I know I need or want to go somewhere but am not bound by exact dates.

[Fourbee]

There was a ruling from the ASA which upheld a complaint AIUI^▸ (as I understand it). The complainant suggested the full range of fares was misleading which FGW^▸ (First Great Western) in fairness accepted could be taken as the case.

http://www.asa.org.uk/Rulings/Adjudications/2013/5/First-Greater-Western-Ltd/SHP_ADJ_215420.aspx

What is interesting here is why FGW have to comply and other TOCs^▸ (Train Operating Company) do not. Am I on the right track (No pun intended) in suggesting it's because that is a different  operator and therefore companies Booking System?

AFAIK^▸ (as far as I know), there are 2 major booking backends, ATOS/WebTIS and Trainline. The main difference is just the branding applied to the front (e.g. FGW, Southern, Redspottedhanky etc. in the case of WebTIS). In the case of the ASA ruling FGW will have made a change request to ATOS to limit the fares shown as applicable to the search made. The inconsistency being Southern have not been made subject to that ruling, so have not requested the change presumably. A lot of the pages on the FGW site, for example, share similar relative URL's to the others with just the domain name changed.

That ruling is a nuisance.

I often DO want to see all fare levels as I might check further (if I'm sble to be flexible on travel times/dates) to find a train with that lower fare. If I don't know it exists, I might not realise & look for it.

This may be why some operators now have lowest fare finder that can stretch across weeks/month.....in which case, FGW need to offer it

I bet XC^▸ (Cross Country Trains (franchise)) would not be interested to introduce this, given that a lot of their advance quotas are now set to 0 !

I haven't seen any TOC example but I'm assuming this is the same as EasyJet who if you select your flexible show you either week or month view with cheapest price for each day. This I find great if I know I need or want to go somewhere but am not bound by exact dates.

Here is Virgin Trains' example. I only discovered it recently on this page under "best fare finder" on the right hand side.
http://www.virgintrains.co.uk/tickets-offers/

[ChrisB]

Juat checked...was incorrect. Those only show lowest fares available on each day too....