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Using multiple tickets for one journey should be banned, with passengers forced to exit the train at the split point

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Farnborough

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Moderator note: Split from

SWR cracking down on Vauxhall - Waterloo doughnuts/short fares - Also GTR

Get ready for a spate of posts! South Western Railway has launched a major enforcement operation targeting 'short faring'; specifically passengers traveling from further out who purchase cheap barcode tickets for the short Vauxhall-to-Waterloo leg simply to clear the barriers at Waterloo. SWR...
www.railforums.co.uk www.railforums.co.uk
Adam Williams said:
As much as the industry might like to pretend otherwise, there's this thing called "split ticketing" that exists.
Click to expand...
In this thread, people have (rightly) raised the idea of the immorality of fare-dodging, particularly "doughnuting".

But split ticketing is, IMHO, up there too...

The official system keeps adding OSIs to make journeys requiring changes to neighbouring stations count as single journeys... split ticketing makes journeys that don't even need a change into multiple journeys!

IMVHO, if you are planning a journey from A to Z you should hold a ticket from A to Z - should you buy a ticket from A to B, and B to C, and C to D etc, eventually to Z, you should be required to not only leave the train, but physically leave the station at each inter-change (ie a ticket from B to C should require you to enter at B, and leave at C).

It's gaming the system, not playing to the spirit!
 
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Tester

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Farnborough said:
In this thread, people have (rightly) raised the idea of the immorality of fare-dodging, particularly "doughnuting".

But split ticketing is, IMHO, up there too...

The official system keeps adding OSIs to make journeys requiring changes to neighbouring stations count as single journeys... split ticketing makes journeys that don't even need a change into multiple journeys!

IMVHO, if you are planning a journey from A to Z you should hold a ticket from A to Z - should you buy a ticket from A to B, and B to C, and C to D etc, eventually to Z, you should be required to not only leave the train, but physically leave the station at each inter-change (ie a ticket from B to C should require you to enter at B, and leave at C).

It's gaming the system, not playing to the spirit!
Click to expand...
Are you advocating reducing the A to Z fare to the split fare, or reducing the amount of travel done by rail?
 
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Farnborough said:
In this thread, people have (rightly) raised the idea of the immorality of fare-dodging, particularly "doughnuting".

But split ticketing is, IMHO, up there too...

The official system keeps adding OSIs to make journeys requiring changes to neighbouring stations count as single journeys... split ticketing makes journeys that don't even need a change into multiple journeys!

IMVHO, if you are planning a journey from A to Z you should hold a ticket from A to Z - should you buy a ticket from A to B, and B to C, and C to D etc, eventually to Z, you should be required to not only leave the train, but physically leave the station at each inter-change (ie a ticket from B to C should require you to enter at B, and leave at C).

It's gaming the system, not playing to the spirit!
Click to expand...
If it was gaming the system, the railway wouldn't have embraced it... Indeed some TOC-endorsed apps were/are giving basic splits, which shows they don't really care about it.
 
AlterEgo

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Farnborough said:
In this thread, people have (rightly) raised the idea of the immorality of fare-dodging, particularly "doughnuting".

But split ticketing is, IMHO, up there too...

The official system keeps adding OSIs to make journeys requiring changes to neighbouring stations count as single journeys... split ticketing makes journeys that don't even need a change into multiple journeys!

IMVHO, if you are planning a journey from A to Z you should hold a ticket from A to Z - should you buy a ticket from A to B, and B to C, and C to D etc, eventually to Z, you should be required to not only leave the train, but physically leave the station at each inter-change (ie a ticket from B to C should require you to enter at B, and leave at C).

It's gaming the system, not playing to the spirit!
Click to expand...
TOCs proactively offer split ticketing on their own sites and apps in many cases.

Taking advantage of the system to buy valid tickets - often with the express encouragement of the train company - is not anything like doughnutting or short faring, both of which are a form of fraud.
 
Fawkes Cat

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Farnborough said:
In this thread, people have (rightly) raised the idea of the immorality of fare-dodging, particularly "doughnuting".

But split ticketing is, IMHO, up there too...

The official system keeps adding OSIs to make journeys requiring changes to neighbouring stations count as single journeys... split ticketing makes journeys that don't even need a change into multiple journeys!

IMVHO, if you are planning a journey from A to Z you should hold a ticket from A to Z - should you buy a ticket from A to B, and B to C, and C to D etc, eventually to Z, you should be required to not only leave the train, but physically leave the station at each inter-change (ie a ticket from B to C should require you to enter at B, and leave at C).

It's gaming the system, not playing to the spirit!
Click to expand...
signed said:
If it was gaming the system, the railway wouldn't have embraced it... Indeed some TOC-endorsed apps were/are giving basic splits, which shows they don't really care about it.
Click to expand...
While I wouldn't endorse @Farnborough 's view, it is possible to argue that the railway has embraced it not because they approve of it but because the amount of fares being lost to other vendors made accepting it irresistible - selling split fares became a commercial imperative.
 
AlterEgo

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Fawkes Cat said:
While I wouldn't endorse @Farnborough 's view, it is possible to argue that the railway has embraced it not because they approve of it but because the amount of fares being lost to other vendors made accepting it irresistible - selling split fares became a commercial imperative.
Click to expand...
They don't even offer the cheapest splits, so it isn't that.

In many cases selling splits benefits the company's bottom line. Split ticketing is entirely endorsed by the industry and is expressly permitted. In some cases it is the only option for making a journey, too.

People making a moral judgment on a legal, expressly permitted way of paying a cheaper fare just don't understand the fares system. It is no different to buying a railcard or an overdistance ticket which allows break of journey.
 
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Kilopylae

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Farnborough said:
IMVHO, if you are planning a journey from A to Z you should hold a ticket from A to Z
Click to expand...
Can I ask why? Sheer neatness?

There are lots of situations we can imagine where someone ends up with split tickets not to save money but because it's the most natural thing to do. For example, if you buy an Advance from, say, Leeds to Exeter, expecting to go to the main Leeds station. But on the day, you're in the Headingley area, so you buy a short Headingley to Leeds walk-up ticket to meet your big train out of Leeds. You might end up doing the same thing at the other end - your train pulls in on platform 4 at Exeter and you see a train calling at St Thomas in platform 3. You abandon a previous plan to walk the 20 minutes and buy a quick e-Ticket on your phone. That would be three tickets for one journey in circumstances that no-one could accuse of gaming the system.

If we then alter the scenario very slightly to imagine that cheap Advances are available from Leeds main station to Exeter but not from Headingley... you might choose to buy the same combination of tickets even planning in advance. Can you elaborate further on what makes this seedy or wrong to you?
 
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Farnborough

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Kilopylae said:
There are lots of situations we can imagine where someone ends up with split tickets not to save money but because it's the most natural thing to do. For example, if you buy an Advance from, say, Leeds to Exeter, expecting to go to the main Leeds station. But on the day, you're in the Headingley area, so you buy a short Headingley to Leeds walk-up ticket to meet your big train out of Leeds. You might end up doing the same thing at the other end - your train pulls in on platform 4 at Exeter and you see a train calling at St Thomas in platform 3. You abandon a previous plan to walk the 20 minutes and buy a quick e-Ticket on your phone.
Click to expand...
That is three separate journeys... and you've certainly ended your original one when you get off in Exeter. But this in no way compares to someone buying, as a single "split ticketing" purchase
  1. Headingley to Leeds
  2. Leeds to Exeter
  3. Exeter to St Thomas
And certainly does not compare to (a TL/XC option this morning):
  1. Reading to Banbury, stay on the train...
  2. Banbury to Stafford, stay on the train...
  3. Stafford to Manchester Piccadilly
 
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35B

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Farnborough said:
That is three separate journeys... and you've certainly ended your original one when you get off in Exeter. But this in no way compares to someone buying, as a single "split ticketing" purchase
  1. Headingley to Leeds
  2. Leeds to Exeter
  3. Exeter to St Thomas
And certainly does not compare to (a TL/XC option this morning):
  1. Reading to Banbury, stay on the train...
  2. Banbury to Stafford, stay on the train...
  3. Stafford to Manchester Piccadilly
Click to expand...
Our definitions differ, fundamentally - and only one of us is backed up by the conditions of the contract when a ticket is purchased. The journey in this scenario is Headingly to St Thomas; the ticketing is a separate matter, as is whether it's a through train. Or are you seriously suggesting that when I travelled from Vauxhall to Orpington, changing at Waterloo/Waterloo East, it was really two separate journeys?

In just the same way, I am planning a weekend in Seville. My journey will be Home-station (car), station - airport (train), airport-airport (flight), airport-hotel (cab). For rail purposes, only the station - airport part will count, but whether I use one ticket or several will be irrelevant to the nature of of the journey while I remain on UK mainline operators (as distinct from London Underground, say).

There may be debates to be had about whether split ticketing should be allowed, or how it should be limited, but they are fundamentally separate from the basic question of definition under which it is settled law that split ticketing is allowed, and that the journey is not the same as the ticket.
 
AlterEgo

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Farnborough said:
That is three separate journeys... and you've certainly ended your original one when you get off in Exeter. But this in no way compares to someone buying, as a single "split ticketing" purchase
  1. Headingley to Leeds
  2. Leeds to Exeter
  3. Exeter to St Thomas
And certainly does not compare to (a TL/XC option this morning):
  1. Reading to Banbury, stay on the train...
  2. Banbury to Stafford, stay on the train...
  3. Stafford to Manchester Piccadilly
Click to expand...
Of course those are different scenarios but what they all have in common is the are legal, expressly permitted, and encouraged by the industry. Struggling to see your issue with it to be honest.
 
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35B said:
Our definitions differ, fundamentally - and only one of us is backed up by the conditions of the contract when a ticket is purchased. The journey in this scenario is Headingly to St Thomas; the ticketing is a separate matter, as is whether it's a through train. Or are you seriously suggesting that when I travelled from Vauxhall to Orpington, changing at Waterloo/Waterloo East, it was really two separate journeys?
Click to expand...
If you have a single through ticket from Vauxhall to Orpington, that is unambiguously a single journey, even with a change. This is emphasized by the fact that Water/Waterloo East is an OSI

If you have a single through ticket from Headingley to St Thomas, that is unambiguously a single journey - and you will benefit from protections if you miss connections.

However, if you have three tickets, it is less clear - especially given your example where you added the first and last legs (although, at least you are getting off at the end of each ticket) - you do not have an end-to-end contact; you have three separate contracts (along with the three separate tickets)... so (for example) if you have a delay on the first leg and you miss your connection to your Advance Ticket, do you get the same protections?

Anyway, I seem to be in a minority (of one?), so let's let it go...
 
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AlterEgo

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Farnborough said:
However, if you have three tickets, it is less clear
Click to expand...
Wrong.

Farnborough said:
especially given your example where you added the first and last legs (although, at least you are getting off at the end of each ticket) - you do not have an end-to-end contact
Click to expand...
Wrong.

Farnborough said:
you have three separate contracts (along with the three separate tickets)
Click to expand...
Wrong.

Farnborough said:
... so (for example) if you have a delay on the first leg and you miss your connection to your Advance Ticket, do you get the same protections?
Click to expand...
Yes.

Have you read the National Rail Conditions of Travel?
 
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Farnborough said:
However, if you have three tickets, it is less clear - especially given your example where you added the first and last legs (although, at least you are getting off at the end of each ticket) - you do not have an end-to-end contact; you have three separate contracts (along with the three separate tickets)... so (for example) if you have a delay on the first leg and you miss your connection to your Advance Ticket, do you get the same protections?
Click to expand...
The UK is basically alone in actually recognizing split-ticketing as a single journey, but as @AlterEgo says, there is nothing right here, a A-B-C-D split ticketing is equivalent to a A-D ticket for all intents and purposes.
 
Tetchytyke

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Farnborough said:
It's gaming the system, not playing to the spirit!
Click to expand...
Taking this logic to its absurd conclusion, buying anything other than a full-fare Anytime ticket is "gaming the system." Buying split tickets is no different to buying an off-peak ticket or buying a railcard.
Farnborough said:
Yeahbut... if I walk up to a counter, and ask for a return to the next station, and also a return from the penultimate to the terminus (or any other similar combination) the clerk is likely to raise more than an eyebrow.
Click to expand...
It's been a very very long time since you needed to talk to a clerk to buy a ticket.

Even in the days of the QuickFare machines in the 80s, people would buy the cheapest ticket to get through a barrier.

There's nothing new about any of this.
 
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Farnborough said:
If you have a single through ticket from Vauxhall to Orpington, that is unambiguously a single journey, even with a change. This is emphasized by the fact that Water/Waterloo East is an OSI

If you have a single through ticket from Headingley to St Thomas, that is unambiguously a single journey - and you will benefit from protections if you miss connections.

However, if you have three tickets, it is less clear - especially given your example where you added the first and last legs (although, at least you are getting off at the end of each ticket) - you do not have an end-to-end contact; you have three separate contracts (along with the three separate tickets)... so (for example) if you have a delay on the first leg and you miss your connection to your Advance Ticket, do you get the same protections?

Anyway, I seem to be in a minority (of one?), so let's let it go...
Click to expand...
You are incorrect and need to familiarise yourself with the National Rail Conditions of Travel, specifically condition 14.2

NRCoT
Unless Condition 14.1 applies, you may use a combination of two or more Tickets to make a journey provided that the train services you use Call at the station(s) where you change from one Ticket to another.
Click to expand...
 
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Farnborough

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Hadders said:
You are incorrect and need to familiarise yourself with the National Rail Conditions of Travel, specifically condition 14.2

NRCoT
Click to expand...
Indeed... but this sub-thread is not about split ticketing... it's about adding additional stages at the front and athe end

A-B (change) B-C (change) and C-D on three tickets is not provided that the train services you use Call at the station. They are three separate journeys forming a bigger one.

And furthermore,
4.1 Where it is possible to do so, you must purchase or hold a valid Ticket for your full intended journey before boarding a train to travel on any service provided by the Train Companies.
Click to expand...
If you only have ticket(s) for A-B and B-C, and only buy C-D once you've arrived at C, then you cannot possibly consider A-B-C-D as a single journey.

But enough... I withdraw......
 
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Farnborough said:
If you only have ticket(s) for A-B and B-C, and only buy C-D once you've arrived at C, then you cannot possibly consider A-B-C-D as a single journey.
Click to expand...
What if C-D was Oyster, contactless or any other form of pay as you go? C-D could also be a season ticket.
 
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Farnborough said:
Indeed... but this sub-thread is not about split ticketing... it's about adding additional stages at the front and athe end
Click to expand...
You diverted the discussion by mentioning separate contracts and fewer rights.

Forum members correctly challenged you on that.

Farnborough said:
A-B (change) B-C (change) and C-D on three tickets is not provided that the train services you use Call at the station. They are three separate journeys forming a bigger one.
Click to expand...
You may use two or more tickets to make one journey (it is not three separate journeys). Condition 14 of the NRCoT is absolutely clear on that.

Discussion on whether you shouldn’t be allowed to use a combination of tickets to make a journey or whether fewer rights apply to people using combinations is welcome but this should take place in a separate thread in the appropriate section of the forum.
 
Tetchytyke

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Farnborough said:
If you only have ticket(s) for A-B and B-C, and only buy C-D once you've arrived at C, then you cannot possibly consider A-B-C-D as a single journey.
Click to expand...
The clause you refer to is there to prevent short-faring, i.e. buying a ticket for one stop then claiming you were intending to buy additional tickets on board.

I used to regularly travel from London to Bradford and would usually buy my ticket from Leeds to Bradford from the guard on the intercity leg (understanding that if they were unable to sell the ticket, I would need to buy one at Leeds). Of course it is still one journey. And that's before we consider Contactless/Oyster/other PAYG systems where you won't buy a ticket in advance.
 
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Haywain

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Farnborough said:
If you only have ticket(s) for A-B and B-C, and only buy C-D once you've arrived at C, then you cannot possibly consider A-B-C-D as a single journey.
Click to expand...
You're not allowed to extend the journey by legitimately buying and using a ticket? An offence is only committed if the ticket from C to D is purchased after departing from C.
 
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There’s no rule breaking here. You can’t police morality beyond what’s in the letter of the rules. It’s unworkable. It’s a non-starter.
 
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Who's really "gaming the system"? Is it the passengers who are using multiple tickets for one journey, or is it the TOCs who are exploiting naive passengers by setting unjustifiably high prices for through-tickets?

I'd be 100% in favour of banning split tickets, as long as the method for a ban is to reduce the cost of all through-tickets to the cheapest split-ticket equivalent.
 
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BG2024 said:
Who's really "gaming the system"? Is it the passengers who are using multiple tickets for one journey, or is it the TOCs who are exploiting naive passengers by setting unjustifiably high prices for through-tickets?

I'd be 100% in favour of banning split tickets, as long as the method for a ban is to reduce the cost of all through-tickets to the cheapest split-ticket equivalent.
Click to expand...
I'd rather simply make split ticketing an irrelevance, aside from the old relative niche case of through journeys from the edge of a season ticket's validity. But that will generate losers as well as winners, given that splitting relies in part on using the lowest cost advance fares to generate the savings.
 
The exile

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35B said:
I'd rather simply make split ticketing an irrelevance, aside from the old relative niche case of through journeys from the edge of a season ticket's validity. But that will generate losers as well as winners, given that splitting relies in part on using the lowest cost advance fares to generate the savings.
Click to expand...
It is basically demand-dependent advance ticketing that has created the need /window for split fares as demand peaks and troughs are not consistent across the network.
 
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BG2024

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35B said:
I'd rather simply make split ticketing an irrelevance, aside from the old relative niche case of through journeys from the edge of a season ticket's validity. But that will generate losers as well as winners, given that splitting relies in part on using the lowest cost advance fares to generate the savings.
Click to expand...
There are many splits I use regularly that don't use advance fares at all.

For example (all anytime singles):
Broad Green - Hebden Bridge: £38.50

Broad Green-Todmorden: £25.80
Todmorden-Hebden Bridge: £3.50

How does adding one stop to the journey add £12.70, when that stop is sold separately for £3.50? It's bordering on criminal how many people get ripped off by buying grossly overpriced through-tickets.
 
Polarbear

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Another point-how exactly would (could) such a measure be enforced? Realistically, it can’t as things stand.
 
Fawkes Cat

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Polarbear said:
Another point-how exactly would (could) such a measure be enforced? Realistically, it can’t as things stand.
Click to expand...
What's the Irish experience? My understanding is that their Ts&Cs (and a rather different set of laws) forbid split ticketing: is this successfully enforced?
 
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I don't think it should be banned. There are certain situations were split ticketing helps, not every long distance fare has an Off Peak Day Return for example.
 
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The higher price for a full journey ticket is sometimes because it's valid by more than one (possibly longer but quicker) route to give passengers useful flexibility or for historic reasons and can't be priced at less than any part of any valid route as that would open up loopholes. Splitting tickets to save money quite logically restricts their use to the cheaper route and banning them would not be to passengers' benefit, nor would taking away the flexibility by only ever selling tickets by a single specific route or barring break of journey on every ticket. At least now automated ways to find the splits are emerging the whole thing is getting more transparent than it was when you just had to know.
 
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There are some journeys where the fastest possible journey is not a valid route with a ticket from the origin to the destination. In those cases a split would be necessary to achieve the fastest journey.
 
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