Bad training or ripping the customer off?

[Pumbaa]

Thought this would be of interest to some here!

On sunday at Liverpool Central, the need arose to travel out to the suburbs. Now at Liverpool Central for those who don't know it, the ticket office is a hybrid shop. Whether or not they are ticket clerks who also sell books and sweets, or standard shop monkeys who sell tickets on the side I don't know, but after Sunday I firmly suspect the latter.

Standing in the queue, the clerk nearest to the queue end was selling Anytime Day Returns - on a sunday. The two people in front of me were both sold anytime day returns, and then when I pointed out it was sunday, and thus off-peak, he changed the ticket type.

What was then more interesting was my better half used a different clerk, and got charged the anytime day return fare too! I also took note as I was walking down the aisle, at least one other transaction in process was for an anytime day return.

So with this, and tickets as proof of purchase, where's my first port of call within Merseyrail management? I was quite frankly astonished that staff could be this badly trained, but the bitter cynical side of me says that perhaps this is not bad training at all - just trying to fob off passengers.

 

[janb]

I would think (and hope) its just bad training rather than anything malicious.

 

[yorkie]

Can you give examples of the flows involved?

I would have asked if they were aware of what they were doing and if their managers were aware of what was going on. It could be that a manager has (incorrectly) given them wrong instructions.

Whatever the reason it is a breach of the rules that must be adhered to when issuing tickets, and you can report the matter to ATOC, Passenger Focus, etc. But try Merseyrail first.

 

[Pumbaa]

Passengers in front of me were sold an anytime day return to Preston; they stated clearly that they were travelling and returning today.

I was sold a Freshfield CDR after pointing out it was off-peak. The other person I was travelling with was sold the anytime version to Freshfield.

 

[Multiple Unit]

Some Destinations on Merseyrail do not have Off pEak Returns nmaley sort jouneys as no off peak singlkes either only Anytime MR works different than other TOCs as does VT on the WCML offpeak there is affter 09.30 but not before 06.30 as Mersyrail O-Peak is Before 06.30 + Affter 09.30 and then all day.

 

[Pumbaa]

True - but they're very few. Moorfields - Central is the only one I can think of.

 

[tony_mac]

Quite a lot of the short journeys from Liverpool appear to have no CDRs, e.g. Moreton, Rock Ferry, New Brighton, Bootle, Aigburth and possibly a bit further out.
There are also some longer ones, like Gobowen and Flint.

 

[yorkie]

There's something wrong here, Liverpool to Preston certainly has an Off Peak Day available, along with the ticket the OP was sold. They're definitely in breach of the Ticketing & Settlement Agreement.

I'd contact Merseyrail, Passenger Focus and ATOC about this issue.

 

[tony_mac]

yes, sorry, I didn't mean to imply they didn't - just that a number of the passengers may have correctly been sold an SDR.
It is something that obviously needs addressing

 

[EM2]

I'm more concerned with the phrase 'standard shop monkeys'.
OK, there seems to be some mistakes made here but there's no need to be derogatory about people.

 

[mickey]

I'm more concerned with the phrase 'standard shop monkeys'.
OK, there seems to be some mistakes made here but there's no need to be derogatory about people.

Indeed. M2Go staff are the same ones who used to sell only tickets, just now with added retail jobs. I must admit I laughed when I saw the idea proposed but actually it works very well and I doubt it'll be too long before it's copied elsewhere.

Anyway, as someone else has mentioned Merseyrail ditched off-peak return fares for local journeys a couple of years ago, adding over a third to the price of some tickets overnight. No fuss was made at the time, something I very much regret, as it now means an off-peak journey to Chester now costs only 30p more than one to Liverpool, despite it being four times the journey length. At the same time the company promised 'no above inflation fare rises for 5 years' or something like that, since when I've struggled to believe they can ever be truly sincere about anything.

 

[northwichcat]

True - but they're very few. Moorfields - Central is the only one I can think of.

A lot of destinations between Merseyside and Knutsford e.g. Liverpool-Knutsford don't have off-peak day returns available but have standard day returns available. That caused one ticket clerk I was buying a ticket off to think his machine was broken.

 

[Pumbaa]

I'm more concerned with the phrase 'standard shop monkeys'.
OK, there seems to be some mistakes made here but there's no need to be derogatory about people.

Exaggeration for emphasis - I was just highlighting the two different possible backgrounds that the staff selling the tickets might have had.

Letter fired off to Merseyrail about an hour ago.

 

[Greenback]

This is very strange - a possible explanation may be that there is confusion over which of the local destinations have Off Peak Day Returns. Of many of the shorter journeys have only Anytime Day Returns, the clerks could have got into the habit of always selling Anytimes for local journeys. Any regular travellers would (hopefully) notice this like Pumbaa did, and question the clerk. The Mersey rail ticketing strategy may have led to thsi situation especially where a very busy ticket office/shop is concerned.

I hope that now Merseyrail have heard of this they will take steps to ensure that the clerks have the training and support they need, to do the jopb correctly. Sadly, many TOC's do not realise how complicated the front line sales position can be.

 

[A60K]

I would like to see the tickets renamed:
* Ordinary Single/Return if there's only one price of ticket available for a journey

* Peak Single/Return for what is now Anytime; with
* Off-Peak Single/Return staying the same name

which would mean no confusion like Off-Peak tickets being valid after 04.15, as now.

 

[First class]

If you could provide the time that you made the transaction, I would be happy to look into this further.

However, as it was Sunday, there would have been no trains to Preston from Liverpool Central via Ormskirk, and customers are usually advised you have to go to Liverpool Lime Street for the service. They also could have being paying by warrant or using a Staff Travel Card which would bar the "off peak" tickets.

Very few CDR fares exist within the Merseyrail network. Generally, unless the Anytime fare is more than £3.20, there is no Off Peak ticket.

However, it is absolute rubbish that staff have deliberately misled passengers.

 

[yorkie]

I would like to see the tickets renamed:
* Ordinary Single/Return if there's only one price of ticket available for a journey

* Peak Single/Return for what is now Anytime; with
* Off-Peak Single/Return staying the same name

which would mean no confusion like Off-Peak tickets being valid after 04.15, as now.

That would cause more confusion

"Ordinary return please"
"There's not an ordinary return to this destination, it's Anytime or Off Peak"
"Oh, what's the difference then?"
"Ordinary can be used any time"
"Just like an anytime?"
"Err, yes"

And what would you do with Peterborough to York? The SOR is £112, the SVR is £54.50 (valid after 4am), the SSR is £51.80 (Valid after 9:30am)? Do you honestly think that EC would abolish the £112 ticket?

What would you do about the fact that an outward portion of an off peak day ticket can be used in the evening 'peak' from London to Stevenage, but a return portion cannot, however the return portion of an off peak ticket can be used on the same train to Peterborough yet an outward portion cannot? Would you simplify it by barring either ticket, thus causing a huge fare rise? I can't see the TOCs simplifying by making the tickets less restrictive!!!
--- old post above --- --- new post below ---

However, it is absolute rubbish that staff have deliberately misled passengers.

So you are confirming it was negligence? That's OK then

 

[mickey]

* Peak Single/Return for what is now Anytime

But what if you want to return off peak?

 

[dave4jackie]

If you could provide the time that you made the transaction, I would be happy to look into this further.

However, as it was Sunday, there would have been no trains to Preston from Liverpool Central via Ormskirk, and customers are usually advised you have to go to Liverpool Lime Street for the service. They also could have being paying by warrant or using a Staff Travel Card which would bar the "off peak" tickets.

Very few CDR fares exist within the Merseyrail network. Generally, unless the Anytime fare is more than £3.20, there is no Off Peak ticket.

However, it is absolute rubbish that staff have deliberately misled passengers.

that makes no difference thay can still have a cdr