Should retailers get more share from tickets they sell?

[yorkie]

Rail enquires can easily take 15-20 minutes, for instance find the cheapest fares, routing, engineering works, strikes, customer assistance etc etc...

It doesn't take that long for a query for one journey; as with using a website, the staff would enter an origin and destination into the journey planner, and the list of itineraries and fares would appear almost instantly. Yes it may take a bit of time to establish which itinerary and fare the customer requires, but not that long.

What proportion of the ticket do you think retailers should get, and would this vary by sales channel (e.g. ticket office, ticket machine, telesales, website)?

 

[deltic]

We can move tp the Dutch system where you pay more for tickets brought from ticket offices or you close all ticket offices

 

[Red Rover]

We can move tp the Dutch system where you pay more for tickets brought from ticket offices or you close all ticket offices

This already happens in a different manner, northern tickets are cheaper online than via TOCs.

== Doublepost prevention - post automatically merged: 1 Jun 2024 ==

I am shocked the commission is as much as it is - I'd have guessed sub-5%.

It is my firm belief that ticket offices should be provided whether they generate enough revenue for the company to cover their operating costs or not. This is precisely why we have regulation to keep ticket offices open and selling tickets impartially whether they make money or not.

In reality, whilst the OP may perceive it is worth his time to sell high value 'Northern only' tickets, or 'Any Permitted' tickets where all or nearly all of the revenue goes to Northern under ORCATS, nearly all of the people buying those tickets would buy them whether the ticket office was there or not - probably from a Northern TVM or guard.

People who take a long time to buy an advance because they wouldn't trust themselves to buy the right tickets unless they'd been to the station and spoken to their (hopefully friendly, at least outwardly, even if inwardly seething and resentful) ticket office staff are a big part of the reason why people think ticket offices are still required. And the £3 commission they pay is a rare example of revenue generated for Northern that otherwise would have gone to Trainline if you're lucky, or more likely would have been lost to the rail industry completely.

Not on specified routes for TOC’s no, take merseyrail for example? Their staff doing mainline work for 10%, even larger tickets and the proportion of time taken seems unfair compared to the money received.

 

[Krokodil]

I'm still trying to understand why it matters. The money ends up with the government come what may.

 

[Donny Dave]

It not swings and roundabouts though is it? Staff at say Basingstoke must do loads of advance purchase for other operators and getting a mere 10% for the aggravation seems a tad small.

== Doublepost prevention - post automatically merged: 1 Jun 2024 ==

10% is a (very) generous amount already, when you consider that commission has been banned from several other industries already. Besides, increasing the rate of commission will push up the price of tickets, as the TOCs will need to find the extra money from somewhere.

 

[skyhigh]

This already happens in a different manner, northern tickets are cheaper online than via TOCs.

This is a misleading statement.

Northern 'Advance Purchase on Day' tickets are only available online (from any TOC/3rd party website or app) or from a TVM (operated by any TOC). This change came about as part of the proposed ticket office closure scheme, which never went through. Advances ahead of the day of travel and walk ups are exactly the same price via all sales channels. It is nothing to do with making people who opt to use it pay for provision of the ticket office.

Of course some retailers (e.g. Trainsplit) may be able to offer cheaper itineraries but you won't find those on TOC websites.

 

[Red Rover]

This is a misleading statement.

Northern 'Advance Purchase on Day' tickets are only available online (from any TOC/3rd party website or app) or from a TVM (operated by any TOC). This change came about as part of the proposed ticket office closure scheme, which never went through. Advances ahead of the day of travel and walk ups are exactly the same price via all sales channels. It is nothing to do with making people who opt to use it pay for provision of the ticket office.

Of course some retailers (e.g. Trainsplit) may be able to offer cheaper itineraries but you won't find those on TOC websites.

I should have phrased it better, sorry.

 

[stevieinselby]

Yes, a small number of ticket sales can lead to a member of staff spending a long time working on them – but they are only a very small minority of transactions at ticket offices. In most cases, it will take less than 30 seconds, meaning that the time the ticket clerk has spent issuing the ticket is more than covered by the commission, that will offset the handful of cases where they are dealing with a more protracted enquiry.
Not that it matters either way – at many stations there is a member of staff available to sell tickets but they don't spend their whole time doing that, so it's irrelevant if they spend more or less time on some tickets than others, the TOC still has to cover their salary and the running costs of the office regardless.
What about all the enquiries to station staff (including information desks) that don't even result in a sale ... the TOC gets nothing at all from that!

The reason for having commission at all is for ticket sales that are done outside of a TOC or NR setting – third party agents need to get something back to make it worth their while selling the ticket. For any sales made by TOCs, it's just money going round and round, and what they lose on some sales they will gain on others.