Standard to first class excess fare process

[premier01]

I posted the following thread in August:

http://www.railforums.co.uk/showthread.php?t=25973&highlight=Excess

In summary this confirmed that the correct excess fare to charge when excssing a Standard to First Excess for one way only is the difference between the equivalent Standard and First Class Single fares-please see extract from the FRPP:-



Originally Posted by FRPP

The Excess Fare to charge when there was “no opportunity to buy” before boarding the train

Transfer to First Class accommodation

National Rail Conditions of Carriage, Condition 39, allows a customer holding a ticket for travel in Standard accommodation to travel in First Class, on payment of an Excess fare. General principles for Excess fares are:

Return tickets - change of class in one direction

One of the following options, according to the ticket type held:

· Anytime/ Anytime Day Return = difference between the equivalent Standard and First Class Single fares;

· Off-Peak/Off-Peak Day, Super Off-Peak/Super Off-Peak Day = difference between the fare paid and the Standard Return plus the difference between the Standard Single and the First Class Single fare for the same route. If cheaper, the First Class Single fare.

· Advance = difference to First Class Return plus £10 administration fee.

The example that I referred to was the excess that should have been charged was to upgrade on the outward journey only from Preston to Leeds:

Example

Preston to Leeds-any permitted route Anytime Return: £31.70-this is the ticket that was purchased.

Upgrade to First Class on outward journey only:-

Excess charged- £13.60 incorrect

Correct process:-

'Standard Anytime Return – simply pay the difference between the Standard and First Class Anytime Single fare'

Therefore correct excess should have been:-

Anytime Single Preston to Leeds-Any Permitted Route-Standard- £21.20
Anytime Single Preston to Leeds-Any Permitted Route-First- £29.50

The difference between these fares is £29.50 - £21.20 = £8.30


I subsequently received a refund from Virgin Trains and £15 travel vouchers-since then I have had no cause to try this until Wednesday 14th April when I was travelling on a Standard Anytime Return ticket from Preston to Leeds and having experienced busy trains on the outward journey thought to try to upgrade the return journey-having had 2 previous expereinces where this was refused and received £25 compensation I went to the ticket office at 11:00 to sort this out in advance complete with signed copy of the FRPP from retail manager at Manchester.

Request not accepted again-after 20 mins I said I would come back later in the day on the agreement that the process would be checked and communicated so that I could purchase the upgrade-when I returned at about 17:30 they dodn't know anything about this and so through the process again-request not accepted even after showing the FRPP extract-requested to speak to manager-after another 20 mins they managed to issue an excess ticket for Preston to Leeds Anytime 1DS for £8.30-the correct price-but they said they were not happy that it was correct and would research this.

I advised that they should and provide me with an update-nothing received-the issue seemed to be with the system-please can someone advise the exact steps needed to issue this excess-which is valid and fair-on the system so I don't have to go through this for again at Leeds or other stations.

 

[janb]

Interesting. I think its a case of people assuming a computer must be right, combined with people struggling without a paper fares/retail manual.

Virgin still use Tribute AFAIK, and I presume it has some form of automating an excess fare which is incorrectly calculating in this case? Someone else may be able to say what to do on the specifics of that system.

Certainly with FTPE Fujitsu STAR, whilst the 'automated' (for want of a better word) idiots guide step by step process to doing an excess fare works very well in 99% of cases it does in my experience calculate the First Class in one direction excess incorrectly. In which case you would need to know how to construct an excess fare in manual fares, and obviously the rules as per The Manual (that it was FDS-SDS, FOS-SOS).

 

[premier01]

Interesting. I think its a case of people assuming a computer must be right, combined with people struggling without a paper fares/retail manual.

Virgin still use Tribute AFAIK, and I presume it has some form of automating an excess fare which is incorrectly calculating in this case? Someone else may be able to say what to do on the specifics of that system.

Certainly with FTPE Fujitsu STAR, whilst the 'automated' (for want of a better word) idiots guide step by step process to doing an excess fare works very well in 99% of cases it does in my experience calculate the First Class in one direction excess incorrectly. In which case you would need to know how to construct an excess fare in manual fares, and obviously the rules as per The Manual (that it was FDS-SDS, FOS-SOS).

Ok thanks-in the case of the Leeds Ticket Office I have been advised that they use the Fujitsu system-which you say calculates the excess incorrectly-so what steps need to be followed-what buttons need to be selected etc-as this seems like the only way to get the advisor to issue the correctly priced tickets

 

[janb]

Ok thanks-in the case of the Leeds Ticket Office I have been advised that they use the Fujitsu system-which you say calculates the excess incorrectly-so what steps need to be followed-what buttons need to be selected etc-as this seems like the only way to get the advisor to issue the correctly priced tickets

From the Anywhere to Anywhere screen,
"Other Tickets"
"Manual Fares"
"Excess Fare"
Complete the fields as appropriate, original ticket number, original date, then other bits are slightly open to interpretation, you could go Preston to Leeds, excess ticket as FOR and excess return journey only, enter excess £8.30 which would give a months return validity. Thats probably the way I'd go about it, but I guess others might go simply Leeds to Preston, excess ticket FDS, excess whole journey, enter excess £8.30, which I guess would only give one day validity.

 

[premier01]

From the Anywhere to Anywhere screen,
"Other Tickets"
"Manual Fares"
"Excess Fare"
Complete the fields as appropriate, original ticket number, original date, then other bits are slightly open to interpretation, you could go Preston to Leeds, excess ticket as FOR and excess return journey only, enter excess £8.30 which would give a months return validity. Thats probably the way I'd go about it, but I guess others might go simply Leeds to Preston, excess ticket FDS, excess whole journey, enter excess £8.30, which I guess would only give one day validity.

That's useful-any ideas on Virgin Trains system-the same process or different-they manage ticket office at Preston where I would usually buy tickets