Should railways outside the UK offer cheaper return fares?

[johncrossley]

feel free to create a thread if you'd like to discuss this further.

Should railways outside the UK routinely offer discounted return fares, funded by raising the price of single fares? For the most part, there is very little difference between singles and returns in the UK, meaning that going there and back is cheaper than it would be if there were only single fares. I realise there are some discounted return fares outside the UK, for example the weekend return in Belgium, but in general there is usually no discount over two singles.

 

[Bletchleyite]

No, because single fare pricing is vastly fairer than overpricing the singles. A possible exception, like our Day Returns, is area-based day tickets which can be good value for local travel and do exist in lots of Europe.

 

[yorkie]

Should railways outside the UK routinely offer discounted return fares, funded by raising the price of single fares? For the most part, there is very little difference between singles and returns in the UK, meaning that going there and back is cheaper than it would be if there were only single fares. I realise there are some discounted return fares outside the UK, for example the weekend return in Belgium, but in general there is usually no discount over two singles.

In a lot of countries, point-to-point fares aren't charged according to how much the market can bear, like in Britain; instead fares tend to be priced to be 'fair'; what you appear to be proposing is that railways abroad move towards a more market-based pricing regime.

To some extent, this is already happening, but not by the introduction of cheaper return fares per se, but in two quite separate ways:

Firstly, yield management techniques are commonplace on High Speed services even in countries which previously had purely 'distance based' pricing models. Secondly, for traditional regional/urban services, many countries have a range of products which allow multiple journeys to be made very cheaply, such as area-based tickets, which can pay for themselves with just one return journey.

For example when I travelled from the Czech border (near Cheb) into Germany, I found that it was cheaper to buy a Bayern area ticket for 3 of us (total 45 euros) than just one single ticket each; we then decided to do another journey, which we'd otherwise not have done.

A big problem with comparing Britain to other European countries (apart from: which one do you choose!) is that you are comparing a country that is obsessed with charging the maximum possible amount that people are prepared to pay, and is keen to price demand off the railways, with countries that - generally speaking - offer very reasonable fares, which are priced in order to be affordable to the average person.

 

[Bletchleyite]

A big problem with comparing Britain to other European countries (apart from: which one do you choose!) is that you are comparing a country that is obsessed with charging the maximum possible amount that people are prepared to pay, and is keen to price demand off the railways, with countries that - generally speaking - offer very reasonable fares, which are priced in order to be affordable to the average person.

I guess this all comes down to (again) "we should subsidise the railway more to make fares more reasonable" and less the structure itself.

I do agree with that, but sadly the present Government doesn't.

 

[johncrossley]

Not many people think that their walk on fares are good value even if they are vastly cheaper than those in the UK. So (unless you have free travel like Luxembourg) there is always scope for making return fares cheaper by increasing single fares more than return fares.

 

[yorkie]

Not many people think that their walk on fares are good value even if they are vastly cheaper than those in the UK.

Maybe they do, maybe they don't; it's largely irrelevant.

So (unless you have free travel like Luxembourg) there is always scope for making return fares cheaper by increasing single fares more than return fares.

Or introducing cheap area-based products, which many countries have done; Germany being an excellent example.

These fares are designed to encourage rail travel, unlike in the UK where pricing is designed to dissuade people from discretionary travel, so as to avoid the powers that be having to pay to provide additional capacity.

 

[johncrossley]

Or introducing cheap area-based products, which many countries have done; Germany being an excellent example.

But you can do this in addition to changing walk on fares. In the case of Germany, they obviously now have the very cheap 49 EUR monthly ticket for regional trains, but this ticket doesn't cover the fastest trains, which most people pay single fares for. They may be discounted using a Bahncard or by the German equivalent of Advance fares, but they don't do returns.

 

[zero]

The German state-wide day tickets are something like 25 euros for 1 person, but typically can only be used after around 9am. There must be plenty of single journeys on regional trains which are more than €12.50 - so effectively they are similar to off-peak day returns (and also allow further travel that day).

Though I don't have any examples to hand, there are probably some single journeys which cost more than the day ticket if you want to start early in the morning.

Day tickets on the European mainland tend to be around 1.5x to 3x the price of a single, which is broadly in line with UK return and day ticket pricing, apart from the cases where returns are 10p extra.

I recall that some of the cross-border fares in Luxembourg are only available as returns and I had to buy a return even though I only wanted to go in one direction (and oddly, on that train, I found a used single ticket issued at the booking office which cost more than my return ticket).


Yes, the IC trains on the European mainland, where they have exclusive tickets, have single-leg pricing. But few people would use them for short journeys unless they have some sort of pass/season, whereas some short journeys in the UK are only possible with LNER/Avanti.

 

[dutchflyer]

In many cases this is now simply made impossible by the use of all these new style chipcards etc.
Most countries with state-run railways have also burocratic state-set fares based on distance, similar to postage stamps etc. Just look f.e. at the long lists of those who are entitled to some form of discount: may even be mothers with prams or blood-donors.
What always appears me for the Britsih standard is the near complete lack of fare-integration with other transport-outside of London. Yes, I know about BusPlus etc.

 

[Bletchleyite]

To be fair Nederlandse Spoorwegen was typically poorly integrated as well, with a totally separate fare system to the Strippenkaarten used by buses and trams. The OV-Chipkaart has mostly sorted that, though.

 

[miklcct]

What always appears me for the Britsih standard is the near complete lack of fare-integration with other transport-outside of London. Yes, I know about BusPlus etc.

It also doesn't exist in Hong Kong despite nearly 90% of public transport modal share as well. Rail and bus are mostly competitors of the other.

 

[rvdborgt]

To be fair Nederlandse Spoorwegen was typically poorly integrated as well, with a totally separate fare system to the Strippenkaarten used by buses and trams. The OV-Chipkaart has mostly sorted that, though.

Well... NS fares are still not integrated with anything else. And the little integration there was (strippenkaarten could be used within a number of cities) was dissolved. All the chipcard has done is that you don't need separate physical tickets anymore, but the separate fares continue to exist.

 

[Trainbike46]

Should railways outside the UK routinely offer discounted return fares, funded by raising the price of single fares? For the most part, there is very little difference between singles and returns in the UK, meaning that going there and back is cheaper than it would be if there were only single fares. I realise there are some discounted return fares outside the UK, for example the weekend return in Belgium, but in general there is usually no discount over two singles.

The big question you're not answering is why would they do this? you're proposing a change to multiple (quite different) fare systems, but so far haven't made a case as to why your proposals would improve those fare systems.

The Netherlands went from having a discount for (day) return tickets to charging returns at the cost of two singles, in part so simplify the introduction of the OV-chipkaart, but it was also a benefit to people doing an outbound one day and a return another day, as well as people not travelling in a traditional out and return fashion. I can't think of any country that has moved in the direction you want them to move, which is to make singles more expensive and provide discounts for buying a return.

== Doublepost prevention - post automatically merged: 15 May 2023 ==

Well... NS fares are still not integrated with anything else. And the little integration there was (strippenkaarten could be used within a number of cities) was dissolved. All the chipcard has done is that you don't need separate physical tickets anymore, but the separate fares continue to exist.

The fares may not be "integrated" from certain perspectives, but the fact is that, for a user, it feels as though they are because you simply tap on and off with your OV-chipkaart. you just need one card for public transport, and it just works everywhere, which is a major advantage

There is still some level of integration, as in some cities (notably Utrecht) a bus and tram season ticket is also valid on the NS trains within the region

 

[DanielB]

To be fair Nederlandse Spoorwegen was typically poorly integrated as well, with a totally separate fare system to the Strippenkaarten used by buses and trams. The OV-Chipkaart has mostly sorted that, though.

However, lots of commuters used to have benefit back then from a zonal supplement one could buy with a subscription for a fixed route.
This supplement allowed for travel in one, two or three zones by bus, tram and metro on both ends of your train route and was exceptional value for money.

 

[johncrossley]

The big question you're not answering is why would they do this? you're proposing a change to multiple (quite different) fare systems, but so far haven't made a case as to why your proposals would improve those fare systems.

The Netherlands went from having a discount for (day) return tickets to charging returns at the cost of two singles, in part so simplify the introduction of the OV-chipkaart, but it was also a benefit to people doing an outbound one day and a return another day, as well as people not travelling in a traditional out and return fashion. I can't think of any country that has moved in the direction you want them to move, which is to make singles more expensive and provide discounts for buying a return.

To be clear, I am in favour of single leg pricing. This discussion has arisen because of the rollout of single leg pricing on LNER and if you see the linked thread, you can see that I was directed to start a new thread when I mentioned the situation abroad. The prevailing view on the LNER thread that it is preferable to penalise travellers who get singles because it is more important to keep returns at the lowest level possible.

== Doublepost prevention - post automatically merged: 15 May 2023 ==

In many cases this is now simply made impossible by the use of all these new style chipcards etc.

They could still implement cheaper return fares using overnight processing. Various smartcards in the UK (Southern KeyGo, SWR Tap2Go etc.) calculate the best fare(s) for the journeys you made the previous day and deduct single or return fares from your bank account as appropriate. NS Flex bills you at a later date so they could do the same thing. To be clear, I wouldn't recommend it, but it could be done.