ATOC guide to tickets

[OwlMan]

ATOC has issued a new "National Rail Guide to Tickets" and a guide to smarter future ticketing "Your Ticket To Travel"

 

[yorkie]

There are some interesting claims there such as "Almost a million cheap Advance
tickets are now sold every week" but not all Advance tickets are cheap. I've seen several cases where passengers are offered Advance tickets for a similar cost to a flexible, 'walk-up' ticket. If all the Advance tickets sold are counted as "cheap" then that's misleading.

And there are now only 4 ticket types? 4 categories I can understand, but 4 types? that's highly misleading.

They want people to be able to "make your rail ticket choice with confidence" but how long would it take for these people to be able to have "confidence" in knowing what trains their tickets are valid on?

An ex-guard (now driver) on here told me that he couldn't excess people on Off Peak Day tickets, because the excess he'd be selling them (for about 50p) would be to an Off Peak Return. That daftness undermines 'confidence' and makes the railway look like a laughing stock.

Still, they won't stop pretending everything's wonderful in such leaflets. Perhaps one day someone will produce this leaflet in court and it would be interesting to see if a court can rule that the claims are binding. I'd love to see that happen!

 

[maniacmartin]

The first link PDF is a nice summary, although obviously it doesn't go into the depth that our guide does.

Also interesting is the second link has now made public the new ticket designs. Some things are nice, such as Child replaced with Under 16. This will remove some "confusion".

 

[kieron]

It may be worth mentioning that the links to the original files are:

NR Guide to Tickets
Your ticket to trave

In the first guide, I'm a bit disappointed that they only mention prosecution in the section about Penalty Fares. Would it not be useful to mention that other TOCs can also prosecute?

And I'm curious about the idea that ticket machines show travel information. I can see it being hard to balance the wish to give someone the information needed to buy a ticket against the wish to give people tickets quickly.

 

[Deerfold]

Is it just me, or is the new text on tickets going to be tiny? I suspect a lot of people will have trouble reading it.

I wonder how many reservations they'll be able to fit on one coupon on advances?

 

[TheEdge]

Without having seen a new ticket in the flesh I'm not smitten with them. From a passenger view I like them, from a guard view, I don't.

Obviously with everything being written out in full English the restrictions are a lot clearer to understand which is good for the travelling public. But the flip side of that is rather than a glance at a ticket I can see the class, age and railcard in just a few figures I now have a full sentence in fairly small text. For example '1ST Y-P' is quicker and easier than 'First class with 16-25 railcard'. What will the long version of 'STD CHFAM' be now? I would assume something along the lines 'Under 16 year old standard class with Family and Friends railcard'. Don't like.

Also I don't like the fact the ticket number, something fairly important for staff has been shunted down into tiny text in the corner.

 

[AlexS]

Valid points I think, but at the end of the day ticketing being a complicated mess is a major passenger bugbear so if you can make it far easier for the passenger on one coupon instead of the number that you get spilling out of machines now, then I'm all for it.

Once you get used to it I'm sure you'll be able to skim read them fairly effectively anyway.

 

[TheEdge]

Also they look they could be easier to forge. It looks like they are just in standard railway text, or possibly even just Gill Sans rather than the pretty distinctive text on current tickets.

 

[Qwerty133]

Considering the number of problems with EMT barrier staff its a shame they dont state if break of journey is permitted on the ticket.
I prefer the old ones theres something about the new ones that make them look cheap and tacky and I can see the ink fading quite quickly with the text being smaller.

 

[LexyBoy]

For example '1ST Y-P' is quicker and easier than 'First class with 16-25 railcard'. What will the long version of 'STD CHFAM' be now? I would assume something along the lines 'Under 16 year old standard class with Family and Friends railcard'. Don't like.

The new design is marked with symbols at the top (the diamond and circle you can see in the examples), which correspond to railcard/child, so this should actually make it easy to see (though you'll still need to look to check the type of railcard).

Also I don't like the fact the ticket number, something fairly important for staff has been shunted down into tiny text in the corner.

Surely you only need it occasionally (for changes to tickets etc), so it makes sense that it would be less prominent?

Also they look they could be easier to forge. It looks like they are just in standard railway text, or possibly even just Gill Sans rather than the pretty distinctive text on current tickets.

They do look different, but this might just be because they have been mocked up on a computer. I believe the printers are limited in what they can print so the font will probably be the same as existing tickets.

 

[hairyhandedfool]

....Surely you only need it occasionally (for changes to tickets etc), so it makes sense that it would be less prominent?....

And refunds, and if they use it for season tickets then you can include replacements on that aswell (and given how badly tickets are left to fade before people do anything about it....).

....They do look different, but this might just be because they have been mocked up on a computer. I believe the printers are limited in what they can print so the font will probably be the same as existing tickets.

I can't say I like the look of them, but I suppose it was going to happen someday. Presumably the non-reservable trains on Advances tickets are also going to be shown on the tickets now? Or will the wording on the tickets be slightly different for them?

 

[LexyBoy]

Yes, I suppose Seasons might be an issue as the edges seem to fade more than the centre. No reason Seasons couldn't have the ticket number more prominent though. It's not something that needs to be prominent from a ticket checking POV was my point.

The new designs do look a bit off to me too, but that's probably down to familiarity with the old design. There seems to be a lot of blank space. The new designs do share a lot with designs I've seen from non-industry bods though (the kind usually accompanied with a ranty article about how complicated tickets are).

Will be interesting to see how they work out anyway. No idea about the Advance connections - I note that they will "usually" not require more than one ticket, so obviously accommodation has been made for those 7-change journeys

 

[Paul Kelly]

Surely you only need it occasionally (for changes to tickets etc), so it makes sense that it would be less prominent?

I pity the staff with poor eyesight though! It's not needed often but when it is, it's bound to slow things down at least a wee bit. Don't see why it has to be sooo tiny!

Also, I think they've missed a trick by not putting the RSID (Retail Service ID) of the train in next to each reserved service. The train in the example (1043 London Euston to Birmingham New Street) is a Virgin service so will very likely have the RSID (in this case VT5140) displayed on the side panels. I think it could reduce confusion and encourage these very handy unique train IDs to be more widely used.

 

[yorkie]

Considering the number of problems with EMT barrier staff its a shame they dont state if break of journey is permitted on the ticket.
I prefer the old ones theres something about the new ones that make them look cheap and tacky and I can see the ink fading quite quickly with the text being smaller.

The National Rail Conditions of Carriage clearly state that break of journey is permitted unless it is "made clear" in "notices and publications" that it isn't. Now with Advance tickets, I agree that is made clear that you can't, but with other tickets, I would be inclined to ask them to show me a notice or publication that makes it clear that the particular ticket in question forbids break of journey, because if they cannot demonstrate that, then it is valid for BOJ.

 

[Qwerty133]

The National Rail Conditions of Carriage clearly state that break of journey is permitted unless it is "made clear" in "notices and publications" that it isn't. Now with Advance tickets, I agree that is made clear that you can't, but with other tickets, I would be inclined to ask them to show me a notice or publication that makes it clear that the particular ticket in question forbids break of journey, because if they cannot demonstrate that, then it is valid for BOJ.

I've been told a season ticket between narborough and whatstandwell isn't valid at leicester on more than 1 occasion!!!!

 

[LexyBoy]

The new wording "Valid for one journey from A to Z" could lead to confusion - it could easily be interpreted as valid only for a single trip which must be from A to Z, whereas the ticket would be valid for travel from A to D and later D to Z, or from C to Y, etc...

Strangely the Advance format just has "From:" and "To:"

 

[Temple Meads]

From an aesthetic point of view I don't like them, the old style looked a lot more balanced, this just looks like plain text at first glance. Also not convinced they are more user friendly, not for those of us with a little more knowledge than the average passenger anyway!

 

[jon0844]

They seem to have no proper order, and a lot of wasted space. Whether more 'white space' makes something easier to read is open to debate regularly in print journalism.

 

[Eagle]

These are still only preliminary designs, remember. They're ages away from appearing in the real world (with the exception of the new-logoed ticket stock, which is already being rolled out) and I suspect a lot of alterations will have been made by then

 

[yorkie]

I've been told a season ticket between narborough and whatstandwell isn't valid at leicester on more than 1 occasion!!!!

What was the outcome of your complaint? If it's not satisfactory, refer it to Passenger Focus. I am happy to proof read...

 

[sheff1]

I've been told a season ticket between narborough and whatstandwell isn't valid at leicester on more than 1 occasion!!!!

Well, of course, EMT have their own rules - the NRCoC do not apply to them.

Ticket sales requirements do not apply to EMT either and stations such as Sheffield are at liberty to refuse sale of any ticket on whatever grounds they think of that day !

 

[aleph_0]

If they are going to put verbose text, it would be useful if they used the bottom orange strip to give all the data concisely. E.g.: "STD BAT-WAT CDR F4 Y-P"

Should be useful for ticket inspectors, and knowledgable passengers.

 

[Paul Kelly]

If they are going to put verbose text, it would be useful if they used the bottom orange strip to give all the data concisely. E.g.: "STD BAT-WAT CDR F4 Y-P"

That's such a good idea!

 

[TheEdge]

If they are going to put verbose text, it would be useful if they used the bottom orange strip to give all the data concisely. E.g.: "STD BAT-WAT CDR F4 Y-P"

Should be useful for ticket inspectors, and knowledgable passengers.

Inform the DfT of this immediately.

 

[maniacmartin]

Has anyone else noticed that the new stock has a different mag-stripe?

All of my old tickets have shiny plastic-film like magstripes, whereas my new stock magstripes feel like black ink on cardboard.

 

[Birdbrain]

I dont see how these new tickets will work for the +connections part of an advance ticket. It would not be helpful (to us) to add in suggested connecting trains.

 

[yorkie]

I dont see how these new tickets will work for the +connections part of an advance ticket. It would not be helpful (to us) to add in suggested connecting trains.

Surely only booked trains will appear on reservation coupons.

 

[Eagle]

I dont see how these new tickets will work for the +connections part of an advance ticket. It would not be helpful (to us) to add in suggested connecting trains.

Presumably would only list trains on which you actually have a reservation (and perhaps a line that says "and then by any train to Whereverington").

 

[MikeWh]

Presumably would only list trains on which you actually have a reservation (and perhaps a line that says "and then by any train to Whereverington").

any train? ... or any unreservable train?

 

[Birdbrain]

You would hope only booked trains would appear but they would have to be careful how they word the connections part.