With the upcoming advent of more detailed info printed on tickets, I believe it is now time to do away with these short and often-misleading names being shown to the customer as what you might call a primary source of information - online and at TVMs. If they know the name (or whatever a revised version might be), then that's OK, but there should be no need to present the name until the product is selected by process of elimination. There are some flows where this is not entirely possible, but generally the passenger wants a ticket covering them on a journey from A-B, and "ticket" does not equate in their mind to a "Super Off-Peak Day Single" or something!
For example, at a TVM, you often get presented with a long list or large grid of these ticket names immediately after selecting your destination. Instead, it would be much easier for the customer to be presented with a screen which offers them a choice of: "Single" / "Return", then, for either leg of the journey, an option to touch the date on a calendar which they need (as well as "Today" / "Tomorrow", as is usually provided nowadays on TVMs, after a set time of day) and be given the option to select the earliest & latest departure times possibly needed. Further features could include a function perhaps clearly called "Break my journey en-route", where the passenger can say how long they wish to spend at any given "via" point (with an identical date/time selection system), and also the fare shown in a universal place on screen, which can change dynamically with selected options. But why oh why do they need to even be shown or told about the three-to-five word summary name at the first or second "screen" in the sequence, which is very often only fully understood by TOC staff trained in ticketing/revenue?
Unfortunately, this information is usually just summarised at the time of payment, requiring long-winded backtracking through the system if it's wrong. And often the restrictions are then partially displayed twice, or off the edge of the screen, or in tiny text. Unless this inability for a customer to go through a more logical sequence of date/time options and be given a ticket with any correct restriction is remedied, which it could be, I don't blame passengers making unfamiliar journeys for not wanting to use the machines. The same does go for online booking, but people are usually not in quite as much of a hurry about that, and at least they are fairly happy that they are able to scroll through things on a reasonably familiar device.
From personal experience, many passengers in my local area know the difference between a "single" and "return", and have an idea that there is something along the lines of a "normal ticket" and a "Travelcard". Usually, they'll be aware that off-peak fares are cheaper, but not if they're valid, especially in which directions or the times when they may arrive (that can be really confusing for people!). (As for Railcard vs off-peak restrictions, don't get me started on the comments I've heard on that one, but that's irrelevant here.)
My overall point is that three-to-five words cannot cover the enormous ambiguities in our fares system. Usually, all you need is to be able to gather the info from the customer, and print a ticket which covers them at the times they've selected. Asking them to pick and choose fares from a list is daunting and can just result in random guessing.
