Recent content by NARobertson

This policy of ripping off some genuine customers will probably come to occupy space in the consumer complaints columns of national papers. The railways will have some discretion about refunds due to emergencies (heart attacks for instance) but they probably won't use it much. Cases that are...

Apparently, according to the Cross-Country website, a refund will be considered on the day in exceptional circumstances of which only one example is given, that of a medical emergency. But even in such a case the customer is in the position of a supplicant. This situation basically arises...

In a way this case exemplifies falling standards in the UK today, particularly substitution of people with fewer or no qualifications. I am going to the dentist tomorrow. I would be very displeased if the person seeing me was not a dentist. The dental profession has in fact maintained standards...

There is an interesting story in the Times today. It concerns a case involving a tramp who is said to owe Govia Thameslink £30000 in unpaid fares.However, the judge has adjourned the case until December while he investigates a defence claim that the man Thameslink used in this private...

There are interesting points in this report. One is a description of the Swiss penalty fare system. It has a graduated system of fines; about 80 SFr for a first offence, SFr 110 for a second and SFr 140 for third. The report notes that the Swiss have a simpler fares system than the UK (although...

I noticed in this report that the LNER has the highest number of prosecutions relative to the number of passengers. I wondered if this is related to their very limited range of fares. Certainly, this is contrary to the expectation that it is a complex range of tickets that tends to increase...

A big problem is that there is a lot of inconsistency between railway companies. I was on 1st class on two GWR trains last week. On both a passenger with a standard class ticket upgraded to 1st class for £50 or so. On another occasion a group of four who were unwilling to upgrade were put off...

I read about this case in the Times today. I bet the RPO had some personal interest in reporting such a case even if it was just getting a better appraisal. Going back to the 1889 Act the ticketing situation was probably much simpler then and if you had a ticket it was likely to be valid. I...

The 70 minute either way limit is a bit arbitrary. But not as arbitrary as having one set of ticket types between some destinations and another set for other destinations. It is also the case that another company now operates between Kings Cross and Edinburgh with the current ticket system...

Most people will suspect this change to the fare system is just a ploy to increase prices. But it could be just another nail in the railway's coffin. Along with the breakdowns due to high winds, overheated points, signals failures etc, the trains that do not run because of lack of staff...

A point that occurred to me when I looked at the statistics for tickets sold by GWR. For all the stations I looked at more tickets were sold at ticket offices than at TVMs. It follows that if all ticket offices close, TVM usage might double at least in the short term. This might produce a...

I have sent a response to the Transport Forum on this subject. When it came to submitting this message I found the anti-robot censor to be unduly obstructive. So it asked for every square where there was a bicycle or a bus. But the images were fuzzy and small. I persisted and sent the message...

Despite word of these proposals I cannot find anywhere on the Internet any document detailing this scheme.

It is not for you or anybody else to prohibit other people from using cash. While I mainly use cards since the pandemic, recently I was in a restaurant when their electronic system crashed and the only way I could pay was cash.

Today I bought two tickets at the ticket office at Bristol Parkway, one for £148. I am sceptical about ticket office staff being redeployed to work elsewhere in stations. There are already substantially more staff outside ticket offices in this country than in many European countries, Germany...