Bus Fare Cap will be £2 from January

My opinion is that £2 is too cheap. £3 should be retained.

Clearly there is insufficient budget to fund this reduction until the quite winter months and early Spring.

Will this be a problem next summer in tourist areas where buses are already loaded to capacity. I am thinking especially south coast, south west and other coastal towns. Mousehole!? Where is the extra funding, drivers, buses coming from?

It will be interesting to see what happens outside England.

The article I read said that funding would be provided to devolved governments to take similar action.
But I don't know if they would have to spend the money on this or could choose to do something else with it.
Assuming the funding provided is sufficient anyway.

mangad said:

In Greater Manchester the Metrolink is seen as a rail service. It's integrated into National Rail ticketing system, it uses a zonal fare structure. Why would it be treated to bus fares? Indeed by the same argument you could say why aren't tube fares subject to a cap.

Besides which, it's hardly expensive. Single zone fare singles are £1.40. 2 zone singles £2.80. It's still a lot cheaper than National Rail singles for equivalent journeys.

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I don't see how Metrolink is very different to the Wimbledon to Croydon tram line which accepts the £1.75 Hopper Fare.

It is just another example of how the UK doesn't understand or appreciate fare integration compared to other countries.

JKP said:

My opinion is that £2 is too cheap. £3 is more logical.

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Depends on journey length. Aside from in urban areas a flat cap arguably doesn't make sense. You don't really gain much by people doing Oxford to Bedford for 2 quid, a tenner would still be dirt cheap for a journey of that length and is far cheaper than rail.

To be fair given that the English scheme is limited to registered local bus services there is at least some sanity check. The Scottish scheme including long distance coach but not rail (encouraging duplication rather than co-operation in very rural areas) is the definition of utter insanity.

johncrossley said:

The fact that he kept trams as a premium fare as Mayor, not integrated into the £2 Hopper fare, showed he didn't care.

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johncrossley said:

I don't see how Metrolink is very different to the Wimbledon to Croydon tram line which accepts the £1.75 Hopper Fare.

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In Manchester the trams are effectively the equivalent to the London Underground, being radial routes out from the centre, not a couple little tram lines in just one part of the City like London has.

I would not disagree with offering a discount for bus-tram through journeys, but the Manchester Trams are far from similar to the Croydon Trams, which might as well be part of the Superloop.

johncrossley said:

Other countries have banned cash altogether and before that cash was only accepted at a huge premium to deter cash usage. I am talking 20+ years ago, long before contactless bank cards and mobile apps were invented. London banned cash 12 years ago.

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Yes but the whole idea of the fare cap is to help the poorest with the cost of living crisis.

It isn't for some ideological means to move to cashless or to encourage bus patronage.

johncrossley said:

I don't see how Metrolink is very different to the Wimbledon to Croydon tram line which accepts the £1.75 Hopper Fare.

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It is important to understand the history of the two systems to get to that. Tramlink primarily replaced buses (though built partly on rail alignments), Metrolink was a drop in replacement for rail.

johncrossley said:

It is just another example of how the UK doesn't understand or appreciate fare integration compared to other countries.

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London does not have fare integration. Bus (and tram) is totally separate to rail and Tube unless you hit a cap, which as the caps are quite high most people won't on a daily basis.

KHCT said:

Widely trailed so not a shock, but certainly welcome. Clearly the increase to £3 was a Starmer/Reeves mistake.

However, my first two responses were why wait 5 months and why only for a year.

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Very much begging the question there to say that the increase to £3 was "clearly a mistake" – it was a different priority, and maybe one that was chosen in the light of seeing the financial cost of value for money of the £2 cap. Who is to say that Burnham is right and Starmer/Reeves were wrong?

As to why wait 5 months ... because these things need time to be planned for. We saw the chaos it caused when the original scheme was launched at short notice, far better to give yourself time to plan and get all the admin sorted out.

Why only for a year is a better question – by then, we will have had the £2 and then £3 fares cap in place for 4 years. The financial implications for the country, the industry and the people should be known by now, and if not then why bloody not ... putting this in for just 1 year smacks of populism over substance.

YorkRailFan said:

I wonder how many operators will opt out of this because of reimbursement rates. Preston Bus has already opted out of the £3 fare cap.

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It will be interesting to see how it is costed, and whether it puts operators in any better a position than they have been with the previous caps. If the rate is such that it puts marginal services in jeopardy and so leads to some routes being reduced or withdrawn then that would definitely be a bad thing!

Preston Bus have a standard single fare of £3.50, but an all-day ticket for £5 and other better value options like £7.50 for an all-day ticket for a group of up to 5 people, or £17 for unlimited travel for a week. So for a lot of passengers, they're paying a lot less than £3 per single journey anyway.

It would be good to see some data on the average spend per person on fares on local and longer-distance buses. The difference between £2, £3 or an uncapped £3.50 on an urban network like Preston Bus might be that people pay a little bit more/less but often, whereas on a longer distance route from Preston to somewhere like Burnley, Liverpool, Skipton or Blackpool the difference between a capped and uncapped fare would be a lot more but most people will be travelling less frequently. Would an extra £1 a day for someone who travels every day be more or less of a deterrent than an extra £5 for someone who travels once a week? Instinctively, I feel like a £2 cap for long journeys is unnecessarily generous, but maybe the hassle of deciding what counts as a long journey, and then dealing with differential reimbursement rates and possible unhappiness from passengers if their journey is just over the threshold means that it's worth taking the financial hit on income.

BuhSnarf said:

For those going all week they will already be paying less on a weekly ticket.

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Some might not, after this coming cut in single fares.

I have an annual Arriva North-East pass. A year ago it cost £1155. I renewed it for this year for £1520. That is a 31.6% increase in a year, ten times the 3% rise in the CPI over the same period and over three time the RAC’s estimate that the average costs of motoring have risen by about 8% over the same period.

This works out at £4.17/day. At £3 single that probably works out slightly cheaper than paying per journey for my typical journeys and avoids wondering whether a particular journey is worth the fare. At £2 per journey I may end up having spent more on the pass than I would paying single fares.

Increasing period passes by 30% while cutting single fares by about the same seems likely to lead to a shift from buying passes to paying single fares, which may make income less predictable, reduce journeys made and increase boarding times.

Charging more for driver issued tickets is commonplace in many countries. The UK is an anomaly in that respect.

KHCT said:

why wait 5 months

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It takes several months for reimbursement rates to be agreed with participant operators.

johncrossley said:

Other countries have banned cash altogether and before that cash was only accepted at a huge premium to deter cash usage. I am talking 20+ years ago, long before contactless bank cards and mobile apps were invented. London banned cash 12 years ago.

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Levels of deprivation vary nationally, and are often much higher outside of London, particularly in the North of England. London has a smartcard (Oyster) valid across all of Greater London (and even outside on TFL Buses) whereas many areas do not have such a thing. Creating a smartcard is more complicated and expensive than allowing people to use cash to purchase a fare capped ticket.

Also, keeping full fare tickets alongside capped tickets only adds confusion for drivers and passengers.

johncrossley said:

There's no reason why it can't do both.

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Am I missing something? Banning cash payments affects low income households disproportionately.

johncrossley said:

I don't see how Metrolink is very different to the Wimbledon to Croydon tram line which accepts the £1.75 Hopper Fare.

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johncrossley said:

It is just another example of how the UK doesn't understand or appreciate fare integration compared to other countries.

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Or an example of how transport funding works differently in London to other parts of the UK?

How much would it cost to reduce Metrolink fares to parity with bus fares? Where does the Mayor get that money from?
(Rhetorical questions though I'd be interested if anyone does have answers).

Bletchleyite said:

It is important to understand the history of the two systems to get to that. Tramlink primarily replaced buses (though built partly on rail alignments), Metrolink was a drop in replacement for rail.

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That's why I used the example of the Croydon to Wimbledon line, which was operated by BR before conversion to tram.

Bletchleyite said:

London does not have fare integration. Bus (and tram) is totally separate to rail and Tube unless you hit a cap, which as the caps are quite high most people won't on a daily basis.

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Of course, that is true. London gets a lot of publicity for its low £1.75 bus fare but in reality London is one of the most expensive transport systems in the world.

Bletchleyite said:

If you subsidise one mode of transport to be cheaper than others you don't have an integrated network, you have a set of separate modes. It does make it cheaper to add bus to rail, to be fair, but it also means bus competes with rail by being cheaper rather than sitting closely alongside it as a partner.

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For the vast, vast majority of train journeys, time differential is far more of a consideration than cost.

stevieinselby said:

As to why wait 5 months ... because these things need time to be planned for. We saw the chaos it caused when the original scheme was launched at short notice, far better to give yourself time to plan and get all the admin sorted out.

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Also, as was mentioned, the funding might also be being phased to avoid the main summer season.

stevieinselby said:

Why only for a year is a better question – by then, we will have had the £2 and then £3 fares cap in place for 4 years. The financial implications for the country, the industry and the people should be known by now, and if not then why bloody not ... putting this in for just 1 year smacks of populism over substance.

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This is the problem. We need a consistent, multi-year settlement so businesses can plan

johncrossley said:

There's no reason why it can't do both. Charging more for driver issued tickets is commonplace in many countries. The UK is an anomaly in that respect.

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I agree, cash is slow. When I used to have to pay by cash (before cards were really accepted on buses - and took even longer for school buses to accept them) I would have the cash ready in exact quantity to hand over immediately.

Sometimes I spend more time waiting as people pay than actually moving, and we have contactless tap on with hopper and daily caps.

London don't do on bus sales for good reason.

YorkRailFan said:

Levels of deprivation vary nationally, and are often much higher outside of London, particularly in the North of England. London has a smartcard (Oyster) valid across all of Greater London (and even outside on TFL Buses) whereas many areas do not have such a thing. Creating a smartcard is more complicated and expensive than allowing people to use cash to purchase a fare capped ticket.

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Lots of places outside the UK have been cashless for decades. Tickets were bought off bus from local shops and the like. Nowadays it would be easier just to point people to prepaid contactless cards that can be topped up in cash whenever desired.

johncrossley said:

Charging more for driver issued tickets is commonplace in many countries. The UK is an anomaly in that respect.

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Yes - you keep saying this...

However, you don't seem to be able to comment on the fact that by charging more for cash fares, you are penalising the very people that the fare cap are supposed to be helping.

Well, except that you now suggest having a load of off bus sales outlets and stored value cards....

Stop using the fare cap as a means of pursuing your own ideological dreams of fare collection.

stevieinselby said:

Instinctively, I feel like a £2 cap for long journeys is unnecessarily generous, but maybe the hassle of deciding what counts as a long journey, and then dealing with differential reimbursement rates and possible unhappiness from passengers if their journey is just over the threshold means that it's worth taking the financial hit on income.

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On this point, I think an earlier generation of civil servants would have been tasked with drawing up some kind of "ready reckoner" of distances and caps, turning the scheme into an administrative catastrophe ("Please note services 24, 25, X3, and 127 are classed as Category B routes and are capped at £3/ passengers for circular route 17 should state destination for Category A fares".

Bletchleyite said:

If you subsidise one mode of transport to be cheaper than others you don't have an integrated network, you have a set of separate modes. It does make it cheaper to add bus to rail, to be fair, but it also means bus competes with rail by being cheaper rather than sitting closely alongside it as a partner.

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Whilst I do kind of agree, the problem about extending it to other modes right now is that other modes, in particular rail, have far more complex and often expensive fare structures. So these are going to be tricky to stitch into bus fares quickly.

Keeping low cost bus travel is hopefully just the first stage of many in improving public transport & better integrating systems, especially if more areas are allowed more local control and follow a similar model to Greater Manchester. I know here in Cheshire that is potentially the way it is going which would be great, as in many parts services are disjointed, don't connect easily with each other let alone with rail, & evenings and Sunday services are non-existent in many places. I definitely saw an uptick in use of the services I use in my area after the initial fare cap was set, and this has helped keep many rural services going when they would likely have been further cut back or canned altogether. So if used as part of a wider improvement programme, then it should be welcomed.

£2 (and £3) is too cheap for the longer-distance services. If this is going to become a permanent thing, it's just going to encourage the operators to discontinue longer routes and swap them to being multiple shorter services which is of benefit to nobody except shareholder pockets. The flip side is that £3 to go 2 miles is way more than it should be - so I do agree there should be a cap, but it should be (scheduled) time or mileage based, not just a flat rate.

If you live in the sticks, it should be cheap to get to your nearest town. It shouldn't be the same prices for city dwellers to get on a bus for 2 hours to go visit the seaside.

Gareth1990 said:

Which is why the fare cap needs to be made compulsory, there’s really no excuse not to now

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I believe that the only way this could be done through existing legislation would be through the Concessionary Fares legislation, which has a complex and lengthy lead time, and you can be sure of much opposition to reimbursement rates by bus companies. If Govt. want the reduction quickly (to show they are helping the 'cost of living crisis') the only way is a voluntary scheme.

Snow1964 said:

Basic economics though, if reimbursement is insufficient value, (or difficult to receive) then might be, that not operating service is more profitable (or less of a loss).

The flat rate fare cap is clumsy relative to costs of operating the service, and potential distance it could be used for.

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It is clumsy, but anything else would be mired in complication and argument, which the Govt. simply does not want.

Bletchleyite said:

They could provide the funding.

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Far be it to suggest that it's more to do with votes than actual improvements...

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At as average £175k pa per extra bus put on the road (7am to 7pm Monday to Saturday , even more money if early morn, late evening and Sunday operation is taken into account), it would be a huge sum of money to make a nationwide difference / step change, and this still would not make a direct contribution to relieving the 'cost of living crisis'. Assuming the bus companies could resource that kind of increase in both buses and drivers. Yes, there may be some argument that some people could then use a bus instead of a car, but nowadays so many people commute long distances and diffuse journeys and/or times that buses are never going to universally cater for satisfactorily.

Cuts in fares for existing users has an immediate impact on those users, who are mostly from the demographic that it will help the most. (it will also help the (often) wealthier classes sending their offspring to out of area / grammar schools / faith schools etc.)

pokemonsuper9 said:

London don't do on bus sales for good reason.

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London is different economically from the rest of England. Not every Local or Combined Authority is going to have the money to introduce some sort of smartcard scheme to replace cash

johncrossley said:

Lots of places outside the UK have been cashless for decades. Tickets were bought off bus from local shops and the like. Nowadays it would be easier just to point people to prepaid contactless cards that can be topped up in cash whenever desired.

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Places outside the UK are different economically from say The Tees Valley region. Singapore can afford to go cashless, not everywhere in the UK can.

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dosxuk said:

£2 (and £3) is too cheap for the longer-distance services. If this is going to become a permanent thing, it's just going to encourage the operators to discontinue longer routes and swap them to being multiple shorter services which is of benefit to nobody except shareholder pockets. The flip side is that £3 to go 2 miles is way more than it should be - so I do agree there should be a cap, but it should be (scheduled) time or mileage based, not just a flat rate.

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It's a fair point but the cost and complexity of introducing a capped fare based on mileage might not be worth it? Perhaps just having a flat rate is simpler and any costs associated with it is less than the cost of introducing a mileage fare cap?

dosxuk said:

If you live in the sticks, it should be cheap to get to your nearest town. It shouldn't be the same prices for city dwellers to get on a bus for 2 hours to go visit the seaside.

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So how do you differentiate between a "city dweller" in Lincoln who wants a trip out to the seaside at Mablethorpe, and someone who lives out in the sticks at Mablethorpe and wants to get to the nearest town of any size in Lincoln?

YorkRailFan said:

Places outside the UK are different economically from say The Tees Valley region. Singapore can afford to go cashless, not everywhere in the UK can

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This point needs repeating and underlining often.

RT4038 said:

Cuts in fares for existing users has an immediate impact on those users, who are mostly from the demographic that it will help the most. (it will also help the (often) wealthier classes sending their offspring to out of area / grammar schools / faith schools etc.)

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The wealthier classes will have the money to save money by investing in annual school year season tickets so won't benefit (they aren't the target group) but will feel hard done by as the season tickets become less good value retrospectively.

YorkRailFan said:

Places outside the UK are different economically from say The Tees Valley region. Singapore can afford to go cashless, not everywhere in the UK can.

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Don't you think there were poor people in London when cash fares were increased in London prior to cash fares being scrapped? At the moment, poor people outside London are suffering with long dwell times. Introducing a nationwide flat fare should make boarding times quicker not slower.

There are still poor people in London today.

pr1 said:

Believe me: those of us on very little money appreciate the cap.

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But someone has to pay for it.

It is also macroeconomically poor (discourages people from needing to better themselves, learning, night school, studying, skills courses, setting up own business etc), in blunt terms allows people to be stay on little money, and not improve their pay by ambition and growth. Not helping to grow the economy is bad overall long term.

A short term fare cap is more of a political stunt, than a serious way to growth the economy and make people less poor. Appeases those who don't see the whole picture, but just think of themselves.

If reimbursement is insufficient either we will see operators not participating or marginal services being cut.

If local authorities are not properly funded then more subsidised services will be lost.

Undercutting daily caps and season tickets will increase boarding times as more people interact with the driver

Bantamzen said:

Whilst I do kind of agree, the problem about extending it to other modes right now is that other modes, in particular rail, have far more complex and often expensive fare structures. So these are going to be tricky to stitch into bus fares quickly.

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I agree that is true for rail and big tram systems but smaller tram systems like Nottingham have pretty simple fare structures especially for singles.