Return rail tickets to be scrapped

[whole diary]

[Ralph Ayres]

I wish he'd expanded on that "Operators are often unable to significantly reduce prices on quieter services" as in my view it's untrue, or misleading at best. They may choose not to because it would just reduce income without increasing usage, a service at crack of dawn to nowhere special perhaps, where no-one extra would travel even if it were free. They may also not want (or maybe not be allowed by rules set by the DfT^» (Department for Transport - about)?) to reduce prices as the time of departure approaches, as such a lastminute.com approach would make pricing even harder to understand and less popular than ever, and drive a hole through any book-early-for-best-prices promise.

The only time I've been aware of operators not being able to reduce prices they control is when they've been forbidden to by the DfT, either during the post-pandemic arrangements or any other time the operator has been directly passing all takings back to the government, or occasionally if it would affect another operator's contractually guaranteed income or the apparent value of a franchise up for renewal. At other times the whole point of Advance (train-specific) tickets is to vary them to reflect and even out demand, and so far as I know operators can price them however they want.

[RichardB]

My concern is over day returns. For many local journeys the only fares available are singles and day returns with the former often only a few pence cheaper than the latter. If returns are abolished this could mean that local journeys almost double in price unless the single fare is significantly reduced.

If there is only one type of flexible return, then the single will be half the price of that return. That has been stated clearly.

My concern is where a CDR^▸ (Off Peak Day Return [ticket type] (formerly 'Cheap Day')) exists *alongside* a longer-dated flexible return. It has also been stated that there will only be one type of off-peak single, and it won't be the off-peak day single.

But Mark Harper said "This is not about increasing fares".   Unless there is a big cut in Single fares (who pays and are they prepared to do so?), removing the Cheap Day Return and its equivalents are, of course, going to lead to lots of vociferous losers.   Also, who would want to have to buy two Single tickets, one out and one back just for a short(ish) day trip?   Long distance, I can see it but short and shortish, not until contactless is available for these journeys.  That's probably not as far off as may be thought but it won't be next year or the year after (or for a further while still), that's for sure.

[grahame]

The answer about GWR^▸ (Great Western Railway)'s changes a few years back, as I recall, is that returns were unchanged and singles anytime dropped to 50% of return anytime, and singles off peak dropped to around 60% of the equivalent return.  But if someone could confirm that, it would be appreciated

New topic

The switch to singles on day return will be a delight to night shift works.   At present (example MKM^» (Melksham (Station code) - next trains) to SWI^» (Swindon - next trains), up on the last train and back on the first costs £8.20 + £9.40 = £17.60, versus day returns of £11.20 (anytime) or £8.30 (off peak). With singles half of the return, the total return trip will be that £11.20, or even £9.75.

[1st fan]

If Advances fluctuate but Off-Peak and Anytime continue to be fixed, then not a lot changes except, presumably, the degree and rapidity with which the Advance prices fluctuate. I'm not sure that's how airline prices work though; don't they all fluctuate? In any case, that doesn't help people feel confident they've got the best VFM; if they've paid a fixed price, they're likely to feel others have got the same ticket cheaper. If they've bought an Advance, they might feel they could have got it cheaper by buying a week earlier or an hour later. This doesn't matter to everyone (probably not even to most people) but it's uncertainty not confidence.

From what little I understand of airline fares you have have different fare buckets with a set number of tickets available in each. So the cheapest most restrictive economy fare (non changeable, hand luggage only etc.) are in one bucket. The more/most expensive (changeable fares with hold luggage etc.) go into another bucket. Once the particular bucket is sold out, so is that fare price. The closer you get to departure the less chance of the cheaper fare buckets having tickets available. Therefore people who try and book days or hours before the flight often end up paying more.

Not sure the same could be done with rail fares.

[Bmblbzzz]

That actually makes sense. I thought there were elements of time and demand as well, so that the price in each bucket would vary according to those factors. But if it's just buckets, it's simpler, should correspond more to customer demand and, in a way, fairer.

In terms of transferring those buckets to railways, flexibility is one that's obviously already implemented. It's foreseeable that you could pay extra to be sure of getting a seat and extra again to get the seat of your choice (perhaps table seats would cost more than others, for instance). A charge for luggage is possible but would be hard to enforce and unpopular. I suppose on longer journeys there could be more classes, not just first and standard, but there would be no scope for this on shorter routes. And this all goes against the professed aims of making fares simpler.

[1st fan]

That actually makes sense. I thought there were elements of time and demand as well, so that the price in each bucket would vary according to those factors. But if it's just buckets, it's simpler, should correspond more to customer demand and, in a way, fairer.

In terms of transferring those buckets to railways, flexibility is one that's obviously already implemented. It's foreseeable that you could pay extra to be sure of getting a seat and extra again to get the seat of your choice (perhaps table seats would cost more than others, for instance). A charge for luggage is possible but would be hard to enforce and unpopular. I suppose on longer journeys there could be more classes, not just first and standard, but there would be no scope for this on shorter routes. And this all goes against the professed aims of making fares simpler.

The problem with trains is that there’s a lot more people who want to turn up and go on trains than on planes. These people are normally buying tickets that don’t tie them to a particular train service. The fare bucket model only really works if you’re selling tickets for a specific train because you are capacity limited on a particular service. Realistically you’re not going to be making a 5 car IET^▸ (Intercity Express Train) into a 9 or 10 just because you can sell a few more tickets at an inflated price.

You could say that the customershave to specify the service they want to travel on when buying any tickets and apply dynamic pricing then. The issue is that you then seriously penalise the people who are intending to travel on one service but get delayed and then their ticket isn’t valid for the next train. Say I intend to get the 19:50 for example, get stuck with a client and have bought a ticket for that service. Do I have to buy a second ticket for the later service? Or I intend to travel on the 19:50 and rock up at 19:35 to buy a ticket am I going to be paying more to do so?

[Bmblbzzz]

That seems to be the general trend. I don't like it, but that's one passenger's view, not the railway's.

[1st fan]

That seems to be the general trend. I don't like it, but that's one passenger's view, not the railway's.

Hardly a vote winner which usually sways politicians.

[broadgage]

Interesting to read the suggestion that "perhaps table seats could cost more"
I have long argued that all, or at least the great majority of seats should be at tables on long distance trains.

A number of respected members took a different view and suggested that bus style, sorry airline seats were better. And yet now we see a suggestion that perhaps a premium price could be charged for sitting at a table, this being a facility that used to be taken for granted on long distance trains.
I can remember when HSTs^▸ (High Speed Train) had 16 tables/64 seats at those tables in a  second class coach. Each "improvement" reduced the number of tables.

Now we have the new shorter trains, with minimal tables, or as FGW^▸ (First Great Western) put it "comparable to the previous trains"

[Bmblbzzz]

What will happen in situations where the single is already less than half the return? Eg someone elsewhere is talking of going to York from London next month, coming back same day. An off-peak return is £112 but advance singles are £29 each leg. They don't mention an off-peak single and I haven't been able to find one looking on NRE^‡(resolve), but presumably it must exist.

[eXPassenger]

We all know how complex the current ticketing 'system' is and the anomalous examples quoted here show the complexity just on returns vs singles.  It will be interesting to see how the trials develop and how the balance will be struck between losers and gainers.  Realistically I doubt there will be any firm answers in the lifetime of the current government and it will be left to GBR^▸ (Great British Railways) in 2025 to pick up the poisoned chalice.

[Ralph Ayres]

Comparing an Advance single valid only for a specific train with a "walk up" more flexible off-peak return is very much comparing apples and oranges. However messily the whole thing is eventually delivered, I'm pretty confident that there will be a single available in each direction equivalent to that off-peak return. The project is intended partly to deal with the current lack of that flexible single ticket, as an alternative to being tied to a specific train booked in advance.

[grahame]

Report published via https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/lner-single-leg-pricing-trial-evaluation-revenue-analysis

Details

This report is an independent evaluation of the single leg pricing (SLP) trial. The trial was introduced in January 2020 on 3 London and North Eastern Railway (LNER^» (London North Eastern Railway - about)) journeys between:
London and Leeds
London and Newcastle
London and Edinburgh

The Department for Transport (DfT^» (Department for Transport - about)) commissioned the evaluation to provide a summative assessment of the impact of the SLP trials on revenue and customer satisfaction. Due to the COVID-19 pandemic, onboard passenger surveys were not possible during the evaluation, which is why the focus of the report is on revenue impacts.

The SLP trial did not appear to have a significant impact on revenue. But this may be a result of the pandemic, which affected all passenger journeys and revenue across the network during the trial.

SLP on LNER journeys will be evaluated further to examine revenue and customer satisfaction impacts. This will also provide post-pandemic evidence to inform future fares and ticketing reform.