Better that it fails visibly than silently sells tickets for the child at public rate, surely?
We've just had an "upgrade"
This arises due to TOCs misusing the reservation system to implement controls which should be in the fares data (or e.g. RCS) instead within the reservation system. The XC service doesn't have the mandatory reservations flag set, so just sell it to the pax without reservations if your JP thinks it's valid? Or put the reservations through separately afterwards as two SDSs/SDRs if they really need booked seats.... Would've taken a lot less time than writing up this 12 page essay.
It sure seems to rain a lot here in Warwickshire for somewhere "abroad" where jobs have been moved to!
rather ignores how Joe Public wish to carry out their ticket buying transactions, and that a very high proportion of tickets sold online are sold by third party retailers (and one in particular).
Yes, the controlling document here is the Retail Brief that does not show restrictions in Advance for LNER with Kids for a Quid. The website does but that is an advertisement (legally an Invitation to Treat) so is not part of the contract. When you retail you have to give weight to the authority of the information source you use. When in doubt you can use the power of "discretion". The other option which is found in the ATOC Retail Manual 2006 is to put your hands up and cry, "I don't know". As the comment above says, the fares system is a bit of a mess to put it mildly. I've been in and out of Booking Offices / Travel Centres / Travel Shops for thirty-seven years all over ScotRail. Whilst on the Board of Directors (First ScotRail) I made recommendations for change but nothing ever transpired - politics. It is still getting worse and will continue in this fashion for the forseeable future.
Under the Consumer Rights Act, any information provided by the trader (i.e. the train company) which influences the consumer's purchasing decision is a binding term of the contract. So if the purchaser of a Kids for a Quid fare viewed the LNER website, any information there may well have influenced their purchasing decision and thus have become contractual.
It is a a bit long winded. However, the object of the exercise was to prove the fragmentation of the various information dissemination methods used within the Service. The fact that different departments did "their own thing" gave rise to errors or led to out of date information being the norm. On train staff had one set of rules, the station staff another and what was shown on websites where the Passenger made their decisions, based on what they were told, was different yet again. This gives rise to a breach of the Consumer Protection Regulations that could lead to rather expensive claims. Hence, I felt the need to warn the Executive Group and fellow staff otherwise much needed funding could be lost that would benefit the Service in providing for the Passenger, rather than going to Solicitors etc. Centralisation of information is needed to ensure uniformity. Each department then feeds from that source so everyone has the same set of rules. Simplicity is the key to success.Better that it fails visibly than silently sells tickets for the child at public rate, surely?
What do you expect FAM with 4 adults to do?
We've just had an "upgrade"
This arises due to TOCs misusing the reservation system to implement controls which should be in the fares data (or e.g. RCS) instead within the reservation system. The XC service doesn't have the mandatory reservations flag set, so just sell it to the pax without reservations if your JP thinks it's valid? Or put the reservations through separately afterwards as two SDSs/SDRs if they really need booked seats.... Would've taken a lot less time than writing up this 12 page essay.
The root cause here is that the KWA fare has no route code or restriction associated with it, which is entirely Scotrail's fault. If they don't want it to be valid on CrossCountry, that's up to them to fix- otherwise, the passengers are perfectly entitled to travel in accordance with the itinerary produced by the accredited TIS for the fares selected. Words on Sharepoint are meaningless.
Fix the data, make these promotional fares E-Ticketable, and let the customers buy the tickets online to avoid all of these headaches. If they can buy it, it's valid for the journey they're trying to make.
It sure seems to rain a lot here in Warwickshire for somewhere "abroad" where jobs have been moved to!
being the
I do agree that the current fares are a fragmented mess, and there should be simplification (we don't need 5 different variations of "Kid for £1/£2 when travelling with an adult" ticket types from every TOC who wants to "have a go").
The problem is that the T&Cs catch 99% of people out as they do not read them or understand them even if they do. Sometimes people do not have the funds to buy a new ticket and are stuck overnight. Also, those who do not understand the fares system overpay e.g. RailCards, special offers, etc. The TOCs (Train Operating Companies) and the government promote these methods TPRs (Third Party Retailers) and TVMs (Ticket Vending Machines) as they are raking it in, justifying closing Booking Offices with staff who do their best to protect the interests of the Passenger. Last week I had one poor lad who came up the West Coast with split tickets for the 16:39 Haymarket to Inverness with LNER advance for that portion of the journey. 60 minutes delay. The next train he can use that ticket on was the next day. Earlier today I had quite a few having to buy new tickets as they could not delay their journey. TOC Specific and Split Tickets need to be abolished with a simplified system or the rules have to be changed so that you can use any service due to a delay or cancellation. The current system is simply not fit for purpose - back to "a combination of tickets, bought at the same time, from the same location is legally a through ticket" or better still price by the mile or part thereof with the subsidy paying for tickets to be affordable again. We have been pricing people off the Railways for decades now. Is it fair for someone to be paying £50 for a ticket when the person next to them has paid £300 for the exact same journey? No, of course it isn't. The cheap tickets advertised are to entice the many, but only a few benefit. Marketing Managers / Directors get nice fat salaries and bonuses along with the rest of the elite with a service that costs three times as much as it really should to run, but utilise these low fares to justify their existence and people actually believe it is better. They utilise this brainwashing methodology to fool all of the people all of the time and it works, for the most part. Very few understand what is really going on. The fares system is no longer fair.
You'll appreciate the approaching general election then, so that you can vote for someone opposed to a capitalist system. And no, I haven't read all of your post (again) because it's a rant that achieves nothing.
I've not read the whole thing but airing your dirty laundry in public is ripe for a potential disciplinary for bringing the company into disrepute.
That’s not correct. He would be entitled to rerouting and is legally protected in any case from being stranded. Don’t tell me you stranded him overnight.
I wrote it as a training example on how you determine what has appropriate authority when retailing.
No, I arranged for him to be put on the next Scotrail. It is the fact that passengers think of themselves as stranded when they have to wait four hours for the next LUMO, for example.
Freedom of Information applies - I made a check with the RMT before posting - I can disseminate this information as a private person.
So do I have your permission to ignore ScotRails retail rules?
Given that ScotRail don't follow their eTicket rules themselves with that TVM, I see it as fair game :P
Don’t
Here is a post from one of the Conductors - Roger is pretty good, however some have "given up" as they say:
Good on Roger for taking a pragmatic approach; if only everyone was like that!
In many places in England if an RPI had come across that they’d have taken that £160 plus a casual £250/£500 in penalty fares, or maybe even a report for prosecution off that railcard!
Well, in Scotland there isn't an option to issue a Penalty Fare or report them for prosecution, so there are not many alternatives.
They could have demanded the full fare, or difference to full fare, as applicable for the individual circumstance.
And if they'd refused to pay? Very different in Scotland as mentioned.
If anyone is suggesting it's not possible to enforce debts in Scotland (is that the suggestion?), this isn't the case. Private prosecutions are much harder (and rightfully so), but not impossible and other options are available such as using the civil courts.
