RJ
Established Member
So I was in Liverpool again fairly recently. Wishing to return towards home, I chose to buy a Super Off Peak ticket from Liverpool to Lichfield and spend the time travelling finding a cheap way to complete the journey, starting with the 16:22 TPE service as far as Manchester. Without wishing to go into too much detail, this is the gist of the story.
It was 16:00 and I went to the ticket office, asking for a Super Off Peak Return to Shenstone. Long story short, they were adamant the ticket wasn't valid at that time and so at 16:06, I gave up trying and went to the TVM.
The ticket wasn't being offered for sale from the TVM.
I then went into the Travel Centre and had the same problem. Staff trying to be helpful by bringing up the journey planner and telling me it wasn't valid at that time, when the most helpful thing they could possibly have done was sell me the ticket that I asked for.
At around 16:17, it was intimated that even if I was right in saying that I was allowed to start my journey before 16:30, the 16:04 London Midland service towards Birmingham was the last service I could have used with that ticket. At this point, I had to state that I was planning to catch the 16:22 to Manchester. This then kicked off a further dispute as I was being told rather firmly that the only permitted routes were the shortest route or by direct train. I said there was also the routes permitted by the NRG as I didn't want to take either of those routes, but was told maps had no relevance.
16:22 came and went, so the Super Off Peak ticket was no longer an option, which I was unhappy about. An offer was made for me to be shown the National Routeing Guide instructions in an attempt to prove to me that the only permitted routes were the shortest or by direct train. I said by all means yes, with the predictable consequence that this backfired on them as they realised before bringing it out I was right and the maps did need to be consulted after all. A hard copy of the National Routeing Guide was produced, in pristine condition, the cover adorned with a slow shutter speed image of an Intercity Mk4 whizzing by in the sunset.
In this edition of the National Routeing Guide, Shenstone had 4 routeing points - Brum, Rugeley and two others which I can't remember. So did Lichfield Trent Valley. I was confused for a moment then asked how old this paper edition of the NRG was. It transpired that it was published in 1997, when Lichfield Trent Valley in itself wasn't actually a routeing point. I opened up my laptop and showed them the yellow pages of the current version, which clearly showed Lichfield Trent Valley as a routeing point. I then showed maps NL+MA which permitted my chosen route via Manchester.
It finally dawned that I wasn't just some airhead insisting on buying a Super Off Peak ticket for travel by any train - but someone with a railway background who knew what they were doing. I was finally shown some respect and they were somewhat apologetic about the whole incident. By now, it was 16:50. They tried to help me by looking for split tickets to try and save me some money - I said thanks but it wasn't necessary - the ticket I wanted was around £10. I ended up buying the Off Peak Return instead for almost double the price.
Now, I figured out precisely what the core problem was here. It is something which has been plaguing the systems for years. If a ticket is barred between 16:30 and 19:30 and the journey planner deems it necessary to change trains between those times, it will decide the ticket is invalid, regardless of the time the journey commenced. The relevant restriction LH accounts for this in the restriction text, but the planning systems fail to. This was a problem from when I was in the ticket office from 2010-2011. We used our common sense and sold tickets for travel when they were valid, rather than relying religiously on an automated planner which is knowingly prone to error. However, TVMs are programmed not to sell tickets they understand to be barred at that time, taking data from the same journey planning systems.
I'm not going to suggest that millions of journeys have been affected by this technical error over the years, causing thousands of people to pay for a more restrictive ticket than the one they are entitled to purchase. I'm sure it is something that is well known about but nothing nearly effective enough has been done about it to date.
What upsets me is that there are human beings paid good money to sit in a ticket office, who don't seem to have the ability to interpret restriction text - they just rely solely on what the computer tells them. Most customers would walk away having bought a ticket more expensive than what the TOCs intended them to buy. Because of this, I was faced with the option of waiting 3 hours for the OPR to become valid again, or be delayed by 60 minutes and pay for a ticket almost twice the price, but with the promise that I would be refunded by London Midland's Customer Relations. I'm not inspired by their current published response times, but it's not their fault - whoever worded the restriction on that ticket did their best. The technical error in the systems is beyond their control, as is the lack of common sense exhibited by some retailing staff who should really know better.
I eventually ended up in Sheffield that evening and had some issues with a ticket office clerk who was adamant that National Transport Tokens are not accepted under any circumstances as payment and that I should take them back to where I got them from, with her colleagues stepping in to say that she was right. Not a single one of them bothered to double check properly, despite me giving them ample opportunity to do so. If this is what they're telling all holders of NTTs, which are more commonly the elderly and the disabled, I'm disgusted.
What I want to know is;
a.) Is the railway industry doing anything to rectify this technical error which has existed for years? The bug also affects National Rail Enquires.
b.) Do ATOC still send out paper copies of the NRG? It's all very well staff giving out advice which is 16 years out of date but somebody should be making more effort to keep retailers better informed of the progress that has been made.
c.) I'm not the first person to realise that there are incompetencies with respect to payment methods being accepted in various locations the UK. Given other people must also have complained, what is being done about this?
It was 16:00 and I went to the ticket office, asking for a Super Off Peak Return to Shenstone. Long story short, they were adamant the ticket wasn't valid at that time and so at 16:06, I gave up trying and went to the TVM.
The ticket wasn't being offered for sale from the TVM.
I then went into the Travel Centre and had the same problem. Staff trying to be helpful by bringing up the journey planner and telling me it wasn't valid at that time, when the most helpful thing they could possibly have done was sell me the ticket that I asked for.
At around 16:17, it was intimated that even if I was right in saying that I was allowed to start my journey before 16:30, the 16:04 London Midland service towards Birmingham was the last service I could have used with that ticket. At this point, I had to state that I was planning to catch the 16:22 to Manchester. This then kicked off a further dispute as I was being told rather firmly that the only permitted routes were the shortest route or by direct train. I said there was also the routes permitted by the NRG as I didn't want to take either of those routes, but was told maps had no relevance.
16:22 came and went, so the Super Off Peak ticket was no longer an option, which I was unhappy about. An offer was made for me to be shown the National Routeing Guide instructions in an attempt to prove to me that the only permitted routes were the shortest or by direct train. I said by all means yes, with the predictable consequence that this backfired on them as they realised before bringing it out I was right and the maps did need to be consulted after all. A hard copy of the National Routeing Guide was produced, in pristine condition, the cover adorned with a slow shutter speed image of an Intercity Mk4 whizzing by in the sunset.
In this edition of the National Routeing Guide, Shenstone had 4 routeing points - Brum, Rugeley and two others which I can't remember. So did Lichfield Trent Valley. I was confused for a moment then asked how old this paper edition of the NRG was. It transpired that it was published in 1997, when Lichfield Trent Valley in itself wasn't actually a routeing point. I opened up my laptop and showed them the yellow pages of the current version, which clearly showed Lichfield Trent Valley as a routeing point. I then showed maps NL+MA which permitted my chosen route via Manchester.
It finally dawned that I wasn't just some airhead insisting on buying a Super Off Peak ticket for travel by any train - but someone with a railway background who knew what they were doing. I was finally shown some respect and they were somewhat apologetic about the whole incident. By now, it was 16:50. They tried to help me by looking for split tickets to try and save me some money - I said thanks but it wasn't necessary - the ticket I wanted was around £10. I ended up buying the Off Peak Return instead for almost double the price.
Now, I figured out precisely what the core problem was here. It is something which has been plaguing the systems for years. If a ticket is barred between 16:30 and 19:30 and the journey planner deems it necessary to change trains between those times, it will decide the ticket is invalid, regardless of the time the journey commenced. The relevant restriction LH accounts for this in the restriction text, but the planning systems fail to. This was a problem from when I was in the ticket office from 2010-2011. We used our common sense and sold tickets for travel when they were valid, rather than relying religiously on an automated planner which is knowingly prone to error. However, TVMs are programmed not to sell tickets they understand to be barred at that time, taking data from the same journey planning systems.
I'm not going to suggest that millions of journeys have been affected by this technical error over the years, causing thousands of people to pay for a more restrictive ticket than the one they are entitled to purchase. I'm sure it is something that is well known about but nothing nearly effective enough has been done about it to date.
What upsets me is that there are human beings paid good money to sit in a ticket office, who don't seem to have the ability to interpret restriction text - they just rely solely on what the computer tells them. Most customers would walk away having bought a ticket more expensive than what the TOCs intended them to buy. Because of this, I was faced with the option of waiting 3 hours for the OPR to become valid again, or be delayed by 60 minutes and pay for a ticket almost twice the price, but with the promise that I would be refunded by London Midland's Customer Relations. I'm not inspired by their current published response times, but it's not their fault - whoever worded the restriction on that ticket did their best. The technical error in the systems is beyond their control, as is the lack of common sense exhibited by some retailing staff who should really know better.
I eventually ended up in Sheffield that evening and had some issues with a ticket office clerk who was adamant that National Transport Tokens are not accepted under any circumstances as payment and that I should take them back to where I got them from, with her colleagues stepping in to say that she was right. Not a single one of them bothered to double check properly, despite me giving them ample opportunity to do so. If this is what they're telling all holders of NTTs, which are more commonly the elderly and the disabled, I'm disgusted.
What I want to know is;
a.) Is the railway industry doing anything to rectify this technical error which has existed for years? The bug also affects National Rail Enquires.
b.) Do ATOC still send out paper copies of the NRG? It's all very well staff giving out advice which is 16 years out of date but somebody should be making more effort to keep retailers better informed of the progress that has been made.
c.) I'm not the first person to realise that there are incompetencies with respect to payment methods being accepted in various locations the UK. Given other people must also have complained, what is being done about this?
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