Ticket machine ripoffs

[whole diary]

[TaplowGreen]

Pretty shocking news, wonder how this was allowed to happen?

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/uknews/road-and-rail-transport/11175688/Rail-ticket-rip-off-passengers-routinely-denied-cheapest-fares.html

[JayMac]

I've seen some recent evidence of this occurring in FGW^▸ (First Great Western)-land.

People quite obviously travelling Off Peak (ie. on a Saturday or Sunday) but purchasing an Anytime ticket. Although the method of purchase is not specified in the evidence I've seen, it can only be, in my opinion, from a TVM^▸ (Ticket Vending Machine). No guard or ticket office staff member is going to sell Anytime Day on a Saturday or Sunday when the correct fare is the Off Peak Day.

In this case I don't believe this to be, 'minor technical errors' or 'inconsistencies', but something that is symptomatic of the complex nature of the fares system. It is a failing on the part of the rail industry to accurately communicate ticket validities through TVMs.

[Richard Fairhurst]

It's unfortunately all too common in FGW^▸ (First Great Western)-land. Buy a ticket at the Hereford TVM^▸ (Ticket Vending Machine) for evening travel to (say) Moreton-in-Marsh, and you'll be sold a CDS^▸ (Off Peak Day Single [ticket type] (formerly 'Cheap Day')) for ^17.90; no signal that there's a cheaper ticket that gets you there for ^3.60. Or buy a ticket at the Charlbury TVM for an evening trip to Banbury, and you'll be offered an ^8.90 CDR^▸ (Off Peak Day Return [ticket type] (formerly 'Cheap Day')) but not the ^3 Oxford Evening Out. In both cases you have to not only know that the cheap tickets exist, but also know to buy them from the station/on-train staff.

[grahame]

From the article ...

Rail passengers are routinely being denied the cheapest fares when they buy tickets at stations, The Telegraph can disclose.

I was looking for a "soundbite" from the article to quote, taking about ticket machines, but rather found it hopping from one topic to another in a way which frustrated me.

(Manned) Ticket offices are required to sell you the cheapest journey that's available that meets your requirement from your start point to your end point.  So they will not offer you splits, nor cheaper tickets to more distant stations.  I believe they will offer you season tickets, rangers and rovers where appropriate.  

(Automated) Ticket machines (TVMs^▸ (Ticket Vending Machine)) have no requirement placed on them to offer a full range of tickets.

The human being behind the counter usually has a very wide knowledge, and can ask questions and (in effect) jump to huge numbers of alternative submenus very quickly, and he's usually aware of what's available even if it doesn't initially come up for him.  TVMs, alas, lack this applied intelligence in anything more than a rudimentary form and on top of that there must be a certain amount of offering the most popular fares on early screens ... and if it's a Virgin TVM you've walked up to, you're probably looking for a Virgin trains ticket.

It must be very tempting to push the "any time" button - "I just want a ticket" -  rather than exploring terms and conditions behind off peak return, off peak day return (which may differ) and superoffpeak returns - if the machine even knows - at it's not always obvious that by jumping to the next screen less flexible, but better priced tickets may be on offer.    And if I want to catch that 19:00 to Melksham, changing at Chippenham, who do I as a stranger to the area know whether or not a "via Swindon" ticket is OK for me?   And am I going to stand at the machine for 5 to 10 minutes while I research this, with the bloke and blokes behind me getting impatient because they're going to miss their train?

Until interaction with a machine becomes as natural and advanced as interaction with a human being, or until the fare system is simplified out of all recognition of the current system, TVMs will continue to sell higher priced tickets than the cheapest that would be valid for the journey(s) being made.  And the folks who put the menus and screens and logic together will be tempted to optimise them for quick sales even if it might be more expensive sometimes, rather than slowing down the logic to try to ensure that it's always the cheapest valid ticket that's sold.

OK - so I'm not at all surprised at what the Daily Telegraph has found.   I don't think it's all down to the train companies being naughty; some of it, I suspect, is.  Much of it is down to the system they have to operate under and, barring huge leaps forward in the technology that will remain the case unless or until the fares system is truly simplified.

[grahame]

Following up on my own post here ... I've just taken an example of pricing a journey from Melksham to Paddington and back for a peak day's work. Out on the 07:20 from Melksham, changing to the "Capitals Ltd" non-stop to Paddington from Swindon, at 07:58 and arriving into London at 08:54.Return on the 17:45 from Paddington, stopping at Reading only on the way to Swindon at 18:44, where you connect into the 18:52 that gets you to Melksham at 19:18.

A standard return is ^157.00, and a weekly season is ^250.50 (an incredibly low differential).  However, if you know what to ask for I think it can be done for ^102.80 (for one day), ^181.40 (for 2 days) and then the season ticket becomes the best option. A machine will NOT sell you the tickets necessary for the latter; a member of staff will, if you know what to ask for.

[noddingdonkey]

Totally agree it's a mess. Just to note though that a guard can and indeed should sell an anytime ticket at the weekend to those who could have bought a ticket before boarding the train but neglected to do so.

[JayMac]

Totally agree it's a mess. Just to note though that a guard can and indeed should sell an anytime ticket at the weekend to those who could have bought a ticket before boarding the train but neglected to do so.

That's the legally enforceable option indeed. But with TVMs^▸ (Ticket Vending Machine) as complex as they are, there should be, and quite often is, discretion shown.

What does a group of three adults do when they rock up at Westbury outside ticket office hours wanting to buy a GroupSave fare to Melksham? By the letter of the law, they should each buy a ticket that allows them to complete part of their journey, then excess this to the correct fare at the earliest opportunity. Thing is though, if they do that and buy 3x Singles to Trowbridge from Westbury's TVM, they will pay more than the fare they actually require. They won't be getting the difference back from the conductor, and it'll no doubt take a long time for FGW^▸ (First Great Western) to refund them should they complain.
 

[ChrisB]

Other than the Telegraph's first example of not showing Off-Peak tickets and a requirement to grey-out fares that are superceded with the same route restrictions (or none) when lower fares are available (ie at weekends, when an anytime has at least an off-peak equivalent, and maybe a super-off-peak), I rather see no difference in buying anything else.

A pair of levis, for example, can vary in cost (the same type/colour etc) depending on where you buy them, as does anything else really. If that's too obtuse, what about airfares? You have to shop around....I don't understand why the fuss that you must always be presented with the lowest fare from any point of sale.

Petrol - it's different all over town....any transport example. Rail ticketsreally are the only item sold commercially that raises this 'problem'. Bus tickets...only available from each company etc etc....

[ellendune]

Other than the Telegraph's first example of not showing Off-Peak tickets and a requirement to grey-out fares that are superceded with the same route restrictions (or none) when lower fares are available (ie at weekends, when an anytime has at least an off-peak equivalent, and maybe a super-off-peak), I rather see no difference in buying anything else.

A pair of levis, for example, can vary in cost (the same type/colour etc) depending on where you buy them, as does anything else really. If that's too obtuse, what about airfares? You have to shop around....I don't understand why the fuss that you must always be presented with the lowest fare from any point of sale.

Petrol - it's different all over town....any transport example. Rail ticketsreally are the only item sold commercially that raises this 'problem'. Bus tickets...only available from each company etc etc....

You buy a pair of levies and you can find out what size they are - you can read it on the label, you can look at the quality of the material. You aren't asked to buy them unseen in an unmarked box are you?

Is it really so much to ask that a TVM^▸ (Ticket Vending Machine) gives you some information about the validity of a ticket. After all buying a ticket is entering into a contract to travel. Yet somehow you when you buy it from a TVM you are supposed to know the terms of the contract without being able to read them. 

[ChrisB]

There is an info button beside each fare, but I agree that the info contained within is really bare bones, and should be improved.

But all my points above stand

[JayMac]

But all my points above stand

Except the one where you compare the purchase of jeans with that of rail tickets. Such analogies are deeply flawed.

[grahame]

Other than the Telegraph's first example of not showing Off-Peak tickets and a requirement to grey-out fares that are superceded with the same route restrictions (or none) when lower fares are available (ie at weekends, when an anytime has at least an off-peak equivalent, and maybe a super-off-peak), I rather see no difference in buying anything else.

ChrisB has something of a point - though I think it's a matter of degree.

We're all used to going into shops such as our local supermarket and seeing tempting up-market goods at eye level, and having to look down to the base of the gondola or up to the top shelf for a generic alternative at lower cost.  It's something we accept as a part of modern shopping - something that the stores do to increase their sales of higher profit products.  If we feel a particular store does it too much, there isn't typically a shortage of stores - for example even in our little town we have Aldi, Lidl, Sainsburys, Waitrose, Asda, Co-op Food (x2) and Tesco Express, as well as a number of corner shops.  If we don't like the practices of one, we can quite easily transfer our business to another, and there is no shortage of supplies or choices.

Train wise, it's a bit different. We have just a single station. We have a single train operating company providing passenger services there, so there is really no choice.  There is also something of a shortage of supplies - the service used to be truelly appalling, and with a great deal of effort and co-operation it has been brought up to be rather better, but it remains sparse, with gaps which our research tells us people would like filled, and with insufficient supply of seats and cycle acccommodation at the busiest of times.  Too add to that, if you want to transfer to the competitor's product, you have to buy some of the local monopoly's product to get there, and the pricing structure is hard for the layman (and sometimes the staff) to understand - a lack of clear labelling.

If Waitrose didn't put their generic "basics" product on the lower shelf, but rather put it on some remote and unexpected aisle, or kept it around the back so you had to ask an assistant for it every time, I suspect they would loose business.  And I suspect that they would come in for criticism, like the railways do for making the fares hard to buy.  And if Waitrose refused you said product because it was a busy day, or because it was before 09:30, you would soon get fed up. But the railway is a local monopoly, with a horrifically complex pricing scheme that makes "2 for ^3" or "buy 1, get 1 free" look trivial.

Provide us with two or three stations, each with frequent services and operated by truely independent and competing organisations - like our supermarkets operate.  Then it will be fare to make comparisons between the business practises; my guess is that some of the things we see on rail tickets and fares at present would be rather quickly shaken out as they would loose the company using / providing them an awful lot of custom.

[TaplowGreen]

No matter how much guff is spouted the very simple point is that there is something fundamentally wrong about the idea of a ticket office & two machines parked next to each other in the same station selling exactly the same product at wildly different prices without offering the same level playing field to all customers or attempting to offer the cheapest option -it is profiteering against the public interest pure and simple, and the TOCs^▸ (Train Operating Company) should stop it immediately.

Comparisons with supermarkets and pairs of Jeans hold no water whatsoever - Ellen's point is particularly relevant here.....in these situations you can make a totally informed choice that the product being chosen is the right one for you, taking into account all options.

The obvious solution is for the ridiculously complex fare structure to be totally taken apart & simplified.

[ChrisB]

As I said, that point I do agree with. TVMs^▸ (Ticket Vending Machine) ought to offer all fares available from the ticket office

[ellendune]

I think I have said before.  I once bought a ticket from Koln to Bonn from a TVM^▸ (Ticket Vending Machine) at Koln hbf.  The machine (which allowed me to switch into using English) asked me where I wanted to go then asked me to choose which train from a list before selling me the correct ticket.  I believe there is nothing fundamentally wrong with TVM's as a concept can we just have some software that helps people buy the right ticket.