Rail fare prices - the basis of increases (merged ongoing discussion)

[whole diary]

[Btline]

Or perhaps because of non existent ticket checks and lack of barriers, people are only being "caught" on the way back, so only buy a single!

[paul7575]

First class fares always go up - I dread to think what I'll pay Monday

Its only my (ahem) student rail card that keeps it viable since my travel patterns are too sporadic to use a season.

Do you always manage to find First Advance fares available then? 

Paul

[paul7575]

That was the comment I had from management. Seems the new structure was resulting in too much loss of income. Which is not surprising given that it gave lots of opportunity to travel cheaper than an anytime return on HSS^▸ (High Speed Services). 

The 15% rise on FGW^▸ (First Great Western) 'supersaver' [1] fares seems to have been reported by newspapers all over the country. I use one of these webcrawler sites that finds news articles with rail as subject, and it is quite obvious every local rag works from the same agency releases.  It seems big bad FGW is basically the only story that allows them to post 'passengers face 15% rise' headlines - whatever the geographical separation happens to be...

[1]  why are organisations like Passenger Focus referring to FGW 'supersavers' - don't they know fares simplification occured?
 
Paul

[Mookiemoo]

First class fares always go up - I dread to think what I'll pay Monday

Its only my (ahem) student rail card that keeps it viable since my travel patterns are too sporadic to use a season.

Do you always manage to find First Advance fares available then? 

Paul

havent we been there before - only ever found one TM^‡(resolve) who wont sell me  a walk on

[Chris from Nailsea]

From The Scotsman:

Rail travellers in UK pay 20% more than the rest of Europe

Cuts in rail fares do not go far enough and British passengers are still paying 20 per cent more than the European average, transport campaigners have warned.

The Campaign for Better Transport said a reduction in some fares introduced today would be "too little, too late". Ministers have been urged to review the way rail fares are regulated and cut ticket prices to the EU^» (European Union - about) average ^ by around one-fifth.

Some commuters will benefit from cheaper tickets from today, when many regulated rail fares drop marginally in price.

Most rail prices are regulated by the government, with increases to most fares capped at 1 per cent above inflation. The change in the price of regulated fares from 2 January is based on July's Retail Price Index (RPI^▸ (Revenue Protection Inspector (or Retail Price Index, depending on the context))), which was ^1.4 per cent. As fares are pegged to rise 1 per cent above inflation, it will mean a one-off reduction in regulated fares of 0.4 per cent.

Cat Hobbs, of the Campaign for Better Transport, said: "Regulated fares will fall by 4p for every ^10 paid. This is too little, too late for passengers who are already paying hundreds of pounds more because of the government's policy of increasing fares. UK train fares are already 20 per cent higher than the European average, so the government needs to make serious cuts to make taking the train affordable."

Transport Secretary Lord Adonis said: "The majority of rail journeys in this country are made on regulated fares and most of those rail fares will fall from Saturday. Passengers will welcome these reductions ^ regulated fares include the weekly, monthly and annual season tickets used by commuters as well as many day singles and returns and long-distance off-peak fares. This is good news for many passengers; for the first time in a generation, they will see the cost of their tickets fall. I hope that this will encourage more people to travel by train, which is also good news for the economy and the environment."

But there were fears that some rail companies would still raise fare prices.

Some ScotRail fares will rise by 3 per cent, while passengers on Virgin Trains will face an increase of 2.8 per cent.

Rail passenger watchdog Passenger Focus has also criticised First Great Western for increasing fares only three months after reducing them. The company cut some of its single fares by half in September to attract more customers, but now it has put some back up by 15 per cent.

Car parking charges for commuters will also go up. Passengers on the East Coast Main Line from Edinburgh to London will see car park charges rise by 4.3 per cent at most stations.

While train fares will fall in the short term, passengers will pay a greater proportion of the cost of their journeys as the subsidy for rail will remain static.

The contribution of passenger revenue is expected to increase from ^6.7 billion to ^9bn per annum by 2013/14.

Meanwhile, rail subsidy levels will remain at around ^3bn throughout.

[devon_metro]

As nice as it would be to have cheaper fares we need to reach a compromise. If they go down the railways will be swamped what with petrol now at 108.9!

I'd like to see an end to relentless twice yearly hikes in fares. Can't we just cap them as quite frankly for some fares to get more expensive would be taking the biscuit.

[Btline]

Yes, there should be only one rise per year. No more than 1% in real terms.

But D/M is right. It's ok saying we need cheaper fares, but the capacity just isn't there on many commuter routes. Of course, having evening peak restrictions does not help to encourage off peak travellers to fills the empty off peak seats *cough* LM^▸ (London Midland - recent franchise)!

It would have been nice to see cheaper walk on tickets on Off Peak VHF services, but no - we got the same old sky high fares, and lots of ridiculously cheap advance ones no-one can commit to.

[ChrisB]

There's a worrying item in the Notes to Editors in that DfT^» (Department for Transport - about) release....

"Previously, train operators have been allowed to increase individual regulated fares by as much as 5% above the average cap on regulated fares so long as the average increase across their 'basket' of fares was no more than RPI^▸ (Revenue Protection Inspector (or Retail Price Index, depending on the context))+1%. Andrew Adonis announced in, February 2009, his intention to remove this flexibility for 2010.   (My emphasis)

I thought he'd done this for all future rises, not just this one.....very disappointing. I'm sure they'd have said "remove this flexibility from 2010 if this was indeed the case. I'll make enquiries....

[unfarepayingpassenger]

atoc insists that most passengers travel on discounted or off peak tickets. Now the DFT^▸ (Department for Transport)/Lord Adonis is saying that most travel on regulated tickets. (There may be a slight overlap).
It was commented upon in the 2007 or 2008 rises that the peak/off-peak periods had changed, so someone had to buy a peak ticket (open return at the time) rather than an off peak (might have been a cheap day return).
These times rarely seem to be available or easy to find. It's really helpful when the sign in the train window says 'please make sure your ticket is valid for this train'
Before Thames Trains unfortunatley became part of the fgw (greater) franchise they would allow travel from London with an off peak travelcard between 4pm and 7:15pm where as fgw wouldn't. I'm not sure if that restriction disappeared when they were absorbed. (fgw used to put a train at 7:15 which you couldn't get on with an off peak ticket).
Am I not looking in the right place?
I know it can be seen from the online booking sites, but if travel plans change and you weren't looking at every possibility, do you know exactly when the evening off peak starts?

[IndustryInsider]

There's a worrying item in the Notes to Editors in that DfT^» (Department for Transport - about) release....

"Previously, train operators have been allowed to increase individual regulated fares by as much as 5% above the average cap on regulated fares so long as the average increase across their 'basket' of fares was no more than RPI^▸ (Revenue Protection Inspector (or Retail Price Index, depending on the context))+1%. Andrew Adonis announced in, February 2009, his intention to remove this flexibility for 2010.   (My emphasis)

I thought he'd done this for all future rises, not just this one.....very disappointing. I'm sure they'd have said "remove this flexibility from 2010 if this was indeed the case. I'll make enquiries....

Good spot, ChrisB - let us know what you find out.

[eightf48544]

IMO^▸ (in my opinion) off peak rstrictions on return journies in the evening are counterproductive and just make the whole rail experience unessesarily unpleasant.

We used to have them on the Central Divsion. Pink they were, they were a pain to sell, you had to ask when are coming back, explain that couln't be used between 16:30 and 18:30 or 4:30 and 6:30 pm in those days.

Then when they tried to return between those times there were endless arguments about the ticket clerk didn't tell me etc.

Further I'm not sure if they even worked, most people going to town on leisure would probably either try and get a train before 4:30 or be staying on to after 6:30. 

Nowadays with all this technology do the TVMs^▸ (Ticket Vending Machine) flash red when issuing an offpeak return Saying not valid for return between X and Y. if not it seems to me that it's a bit of con selling an invalid ticket for the journey the passenger wants to make.

I'm afraind that it's thinking about finding a fare getting the right ticket and right train, without feeling you're being ripped off, in danger of getting the wrong train and being surcharged that puts me off making more train journies.

[super tm]

There's a worrying item in the Notes to Editors in that DfT^» (Department for Transport - about) release....

"Previously, train operators have been allowed to increase individual regulated fares by as much as 5% above the average cap on regulated fares so long as the average increase across their 'basket' of fares was no more than RPI^▸ (Revenue Protection Inspector (or Retail Price Index, depending on the context))+1%. Andrew Adonis announced in, February 2009, his intention to remove this flexibility for 2010.   (My emphasis)

I thought he'd done this for all future rises, not just this one.....very disappointing. I'm sure they'd have said "remove this flexibility from 2010 if this was indeed the case. I'll make enquiries....

Can be read two ways.  I believe it means for 2010 and thereafter. You think it means 2010 only.  Either of us could be right but 99% sure I am 

[super tm]

Before Thames Trains unfortunatley became part of the fgw (greater) franchise they would allow travel from London with an off peak travelcard between 4pm and 7:15pm where as fgw wouldn't. I'm not sure if that restriction disappeared when they were absorbed. (fgw used to put a train at 7:15 which you couldn't get on with an off peak ticket).

It is still valid on nearly all the ex Thames services.  There are a couple of Fast trains to oxford where they no longer are but all the stoppers still good.

Basically if the train stops before Reading CDR^▸ (Off Peak Day Return [ticket type] (formerly 'Cheap Day')) are valid. If first stop Reading then they are not.  A good one is the 1706 which is OK because it is first stop Twyford.

[ChrisB]

Can be read two ways.  I believe it means for 2010 and thereafter. You think it means 2010 only.  Either of us could be right but 99% sure I am 

I hope you're right! It's certainly what I and two TOCs^▸ (Train Operating Company) I deal with closely understood.

[JayMac]

From the Swindon Advertiser:

RAIL fares in Swindon could rise by up to 10 per cent, Transport Secretary Philip Hammond hinted this week despite the town having the highest single fare in Europe.  Mr Hammond, challenged by the Advertiser to squash speculation of huge fare hikes on the horizon, said: ^I don^t want to rule anything out.^  The minister insisted the coalition Government was committed to ^fair fares^ and said no decision would be taken until after the national spending review concluded in the autumn.  But he added it would be wrong not to consider whether the current pricing structure should be changed against a backdrop of public spending ^constraints^.

The cost of a standard-class Anytime Single on a First Great Western (FGW^▸ (First Great Western)) train for the 77-mile journey from Swindon to Paddington is ^54.50, which rises to ^89.50 in first class. At more than 70p a mile, this is the most expensive fare in the EU^» (European Union - about).

Mr Hammond has already indicated that the existing annual fare rise formula ^ whereby regulated rail fares including season tickets go up each January by one per cent above RPI^▸ (Revenue Protection Inspector (or Retail Price Index, depending on the context)) inflation ^ may have to be reformed. Yesterday, during Commons question time, shadow transport minister Willie Bain expressed fears that the fare formula could be replaced with an RPI plus five per cent arrangement ^ meaning a likely rise of up to 10 per cent.  Mr Hammond replied: ^The coalition agreement commits us to a policy of fair fares and we are committed to ensuring that fares are fair for rail users, and no decisions have been made as yet about future fare increases.^

Offered the chance to rule out 10 per cent rises in Swindon, the minister told the Advertiser afterwards: ^If we rule out fare increases we are essentially shrinking the pot of money that would be available for investment in the railways and it is very clear that there are some investment that passengers urgently need, including additional rolling stock capacity. Until I^ve seen what my spending assessment from the Treasury is, I don^t want to rule anything out.^

Gerry Doherty, leader of the TSSA^» (Transport Salaried Staffs' Association - about) rail union, said: ^The Transport Secretary will be betraying millions of passengers if he scraps the present fares formula and allows a 10 per cent increase in fares in January^

Mr Hammond refused to offer any hope for supporters of the redoubling of the Swindon to Kemble railway line, saying that scheme would also be ^reviewed^ following the spending review.

Similar stories have also appeared in the past few days in Exeter's Express & Echo and Plymouth's Evening Herald.