Future of Ticket Office Consultations launched

[Bletchleyite]

Many people have wanted central government control of the railways for a very long time. Enjoy the consequences of that and don't say you weren't warned.

What anyone with any sense wants is BR, or something very similar to it, back. BR was basically a QuANGO*, something that got a bad name in the 80s but is a very sensible structure for something like this. It was incredibly efficient.

That is, taking out private profit, but the railways being run by people who know how to run railways, with the Government setting the funding package and general direction but largely leaving them to get on with it. Think of a bigger version of LNER or Northern before they started meddling, for example. Or indeed a classic 1995 franchise, but for the whole English and UK IC network (TfW and ScotRail being separate now).

Nobody with any sense wants the DfT to be micromanaging things, which is what they're doing now. Network Rail is perhaps a reasonable example, give or take the fact it doesn't run trains, though it isn't perfect (what is?).

That's not to say that our neo-BR wouldn't have closed booking offices and destaffed - the original one did so we can assume it probably would have done. Similarly that's not to say it'd not have closed lines - the original one did. But what it would have done is had a more sensible, standardised, national approach to such things - such as when rural booking offices closed Paytrain was introduced as a clear, simple and technology-appropriate (at the time) approach to how on-board payment could be introduced.

* Quasi-autonomous non-governmental organisation. In essence an arms length, not for profit Government owned company in any meaningful sense. Usually structured as a company limited by guarantee.

 

[driverd]

It's to me tragic this has been so badly botched. A well designed national scheme to change how tickets are bought would be beneficial - that requires a new system to be designed including what is sold, not just how it's sold. This is a bin fire.

Absolutely. I was never massively against these plans until the  actual plan was announced.

From my perspective, ticket offices with glass screens and awful (pointless) intercoms to speak to the staff member are dated out of relevance. This whole setup is very 1980s, it's unfriendly to customers and should have been done away with years ago.

The idea of moving staff into the concourse with ticket slings (as per guards), able to assist with TVMs and, when less busy, provide general station assistance, seems to me like a good idea that moves the industry in the right direction.

What we have got is the opposite. Less staff, less of the day. I suspect we will see an uptick in "commision by the fine" agency revenue staff and changes to the industry that make it so customer unfriendly, sizeable chunks of the market will be sufficiently put off as not to bother.

If this is modernisation, where is the future to look forward to?

 

[Bletchleyite]

Absolutely. I was never massively against these plans until the  actual plan was announced.

Part of the issue was there being no plan per-se, that is it's not nationally consistent.

 

[yorksrob]

What anyone with any sense wants is BR, or something very similar to it, back. BR was basically a QuANGO*, something that got a bad name in the 80s but is a very sensible structure for something like this. It was incredibly efficient.

That is, taking out private profit, but the railways being run by people who know how to run railways, with the Government setting the funding package and general direction but largely leaving them to get on with it. Think of a bigger version of LNER or Northern before they started meddling, for example. Or indeed a classic 1995 franchise, but for the whole English and UK IC network (TfW and ScotRail being separate now).

Nobody with any sense wants the DfT to be micromanaging things, which is what they're doing now. Network Rail is perhaps a reasonable example, give or take the fact it doesn't run trains, though it isn't perfect (what is?).

That's not to say that our neo-BR wouldn't have closed booking offices and destaffed - the original one did so we can assume it probably would have done. Similarly that's not to say it'd not have closed lines - the original one did. But what it would have done is had a more sensible, standardised, national approach to such things - such as when rural booking offices closed Paytrain was introduced as a clear, simple and technology-appropriate (at the time) approach to how on-board payment could be introduced.

* Quasi-autonomous non-governmental organisation. In essence an arms length, not for profit Government owned company in any meaningful sense. Usually structured as a company limited by guarantee.

Exactly. No one has ever called for direct day to day control of the passenger service by Government. That is the worst of all worlds.

 

[Lewisham2221]

You couldn't get a more British bodge than this, and that includes the reaction to it too. Much of the public are in complete denial of the politics surrounding it.

Many people have wanted central government control of the railways for a very long time. Enjoy the consequences of that and don't say you weren't warned.

Indeed, I've seen a number of social media posts in regards ticket office closures going along the lines of "this is why the railway needs to be nationalised". Seemingly unaware that the currently "nationalised" TOCs are going along with this, and that it is undoubtedly government behind the plans.

 

[GRALISTAIR]

You couldn't get a more British bodge than this, and that includes the reaction to it too. Much of the public are in complete denial of the politics surrounding it.

Many people have wanted central government control of the railways for a very long time. Enjoy the consequences of that and don't say you weren't warned.

Absolutely!

 

[davews]

I have just completed an SWR survey 'about my latest journey'. Besides being an opportunity to state my views after train chaos on the Reading line on Wednesday after a PHBT one question was what improvements I would like to see at my station. 'Increase ticket office opening hours' said I.

(and a little puzzled that in the questionnaire super off peak tickets were an option, not the evening return I had actually bought. And I had to choose my destination as Reading platforms 4A and 4B.)

 

[bramling]

Many people have wanted central government control of the railways for a very long time. Enjoy the consequences of that and don't say you weren't warned.

Has anyone actually wanted “central government control”, though?

We’ve been seeing an increasing element of that for some years now, with the privatised TOCs losing more and more autonomy. Covid then put this on steroids. It’s all rather ironic that a supposedly Conservative government has presided over all this.

BR certainly wasn’t like this. Whilst we all know the politicians were never too far away, it was at least an arms-length organisation that was allowed to get on with delivering the service as it saw fit. The other difference in those days was the politicians were arguably a better breed than the utter dross we have today (on all sides of the house). The current lot seem to be pretty clueless about anything, make little if effort to clue themselves up on their brief, are utterly pig-arrogant, and seem to feel they have some kind of God-given right to be in the position they’re in.

 

[12LDA28C]

Even if we believe that the quoted 88% figure of people who buy their tickets online is accurate, that equates to 12% of people still preferring (or only able to) buy their tickets in person at the ticket office. Surely if they were able to do so, they would have already adapted to buying online instead.

So, can we assume that those 12% of customers will now either not buy a ticket, or travel by alternative means? What kind of business would deliberately alienate 12% of its customer base? Not one that is allegedly keen to increase revenue I would suggest.

Seriously, don't take everyone for a mug and attempt to pass off cost-cutting and de-staffing as 'modernisation' and 'better service for customers'.

== Doublepost prevention - post automatically merged: 14 Jul 2023 ==

Those aren't tickets. That's like printing an e-ticket.

The international airline industry finished moving to e-tickets 15 years ago

Any chance of the railways industry catching up?

As has been mentioned repeatedly when people make the invalid comparison between rail and air travel, airports don't generally have a steady stream of passengers who have decided to fly on the spur of the moment and rock up at the airport ten minutes before a flight, expecting to buy a ticket and board immediately. That's the selling point of the railway.

 

[JW4]

Even if we believe that the quoted 88% figure of people who buy their tickets online is accurate, that equates to 12% of people still preferring (or only able to) buy their tickets in person at the ticket office. Surely if they were able to do so, they would have already adapted to buying online instead.

So, can we assume that those 12% of customers will now either not buy a ticket, or travel by alternative means? What kind of business would deliberately alienate 12% of its customer base? Not one that is allegedly keen to increase revenue I would suggest.

Seriously, don't take everyone for a mug and attempt to pass off cost-cutting and de-staffing as 'modernisation' and 'better service for customers'.

== Doublepost prevention - post automatically merged: 14 Jul 2023 ==



As has been mentioned repeatedly when people make the invalid comparison between rail and air travel, airports don't generally have a steady stream of passengers who have decided to fly on the spur of the moment and rock up at the airport ten minutes before a flight, expecting to buy a ticket and board immediately. That's the selling point of the railway.

Having the ability to ‘Turn up and go‘ is integral and it’s being put at severe risk

 

[tomuk]

Having the ability to ‘Turn up and go‘ is integral and it’s being put at severe risk

How is turn up and go being put at risk? You can buy your ticket on your app wherever you are, contacless is being expanded, ticket machines aren't being removed and there is still the possibility to buy from the guard.

 

[Krokodil]

You couldn't get a more British bodge than this, and that includes the reaction to it too. Much of the public are in complete denial of the politics surrounding it.

Can you blame the public for being misinformed when the government have been at pains to pretend that this is the doing of the operators?

Just like in the beginning of the dispute Shapps was pretending that it had nothing to do with him.

 

[Lewisham2221]

So, can we assume that those 12% of customers will now either not buy a ticket, or travel by alternative means? What kind of business would deliberately alienate 12% of its customer base? Not one that is allegedly keen to increase revenue I would suggest.

No, we can't, because that would be a ridiculous assumption. Just because somebody chooses a particular method when given a  choice does not mean that they will not adapt to a different method if that choice is taken away.  Some may stop travelling by rail, but by no means all.

My local branch of Morrisons has self scan and manned checkouts. Sometimes I use self scan, sometimes a manned checkout. Therefore I would appear in both percentages. In the even that they completely removed all manned checkouts, I would be unlikely to stop using the store altogether.

== Doublepost prevention - post automatically merged: 14 Jul 2023 ==

As has been mentioned repeatedly when people make the invalid comparison between rail and air travel, airports don't generally have a steady stream of passengers who have decided to fly on the spur of the moment and rock up at the airport ten minutes before a flight, expecting to buy a ticket and board immediately. That's the selling point of the railway.

It might be the selling point of the railway, (I'd argue it is one of the selling points, rather than  the selling point, but that is a different argument) but how many people turn up completely "blind" at the station, without checking times/fares online first? And even if they did, the existence of TVMs means that a lack of ticket office does not equal lack of ability to turn up and go.

Yes, there are flaws in the plans. Yes, there are changes that need to be made before booking offices are closed. But some of the arguments being made against the closures are so ridiculous that they are completely unhelpful to the cause.

 

[12LDA28C]

How is turn up and go being put at risk? You can buy your ticket on your app wherever you are, contacless is being expanded, ticket machines aren't being removed and there is still the possibility to buy from the guard.

Not everyone wants to or is able to 'buy on an app' or use contactless. Ticket machines are frequently faulty and out of use and many trains do not have guards. Many people like face to face contact. The fact of the matter is that it's an insidious proposal to de-staff stations, dishonestly passed off to the public and media as 'modernisation' and whichever side of the fence you sit on, that's got to be a bad thing.

== Doublepost prevention - post automatically merged: 14 Jul 2023 ==

It might be the selling point of the railway, (I'd argue it is one of the selling points, rather than  the selling point, but that is a different argument) but how many people turn up completely "blind" at the station, without checking times/fares online first? And even if they did, the existence of TVMs means that a lack of ticket office does not equal lack of ability to turn up and go.

Yes, there are flaws in the plans. Yes, there are changes that need to be made before booking offices are closed. But some of the arguments being made against the closures are so ridiculous that they are completely unhelpful to the cause.

If TVMs were easier to use, programmed with all the information needed to sell every ticket available and were 100% reliable then there might be a rather feeble argument for closing ticket offices but until those conditions are met, offices should remain open.

 

[trainJam]

At WMT stations, I have become efficient at using the older TVMs that accept cash*. The touchscreen input device is reliable and does exactly what you expect. No slow animations, no dragging. I remember trying to buy a ticket faster than the office could issue one when I was younger only to be let down by the slow coin slot . The Graphical User Interface (GUI) has been the same for years, with only one change (when I went on ScotRail I recognised the old blue GUI with the alphabetical order keyboard).

Good features that I remember being added to this style of TVM include:
- Tickets from other stations (originally this was very limited but has been expanded) enabling splits
- Travelcard menu button : London Zones 1-6, Daytripper, Network One Day.
- QWERTY keyboard
- Assistance button (haven't tried it so don't know about it)

Improvements to TVMs:
- Rangers and rovers should be added to the TVM. Currently I am unable to buy a WMDR or Daytripper Add-on or Plus from the TVM. PlusBus is only available to a very small number of destinations in the West Midlands (e.g. Redditch) - I don't see why it is not available for all PlusBus destinations, as the TVM has proven it is possible.
- Many users will be familiar with the current GUI so do not radically change it or we will need to re-learn how to use it significantly
- In terms of information, TVMs should be able to give the full meaning of a restriction code without the need for the user to check this separately on a mobile computer.
- If a journey planner feature is added, it should not be compulsory to use (as it would make the process for buying local day tickets longer).

Whilst the current WMT TVM is good in some aspects, it lacks in other ways.
Therefore I cannot support the closure of ticket offices whilst current TVMs are inadequate and sell too small a range of fares.

I don't know what you would do if the TVM failed to print all tickets (has happened to me), or how you would handle free refunds in disruption or excess fares.

*WMT have recently installed some new card-only TVMs which seem to have unresponsive or buggy touchscreens which sometimes do nothing even when you are jabbing your finger on the screen. Some progress in technology.

 

[seaviewer]

Not everyone wants to or is able to 'buy on an app' or use contactless. Ticket machines are frequently faulty and out of use and many trains do not have guards. Many people like face to face contact. The fact of the matter is that it's an insidious proposal to de-staff stations, dishonestly passed off to the public and media as 'modernisation' and whichever side of the fence you sit on, that's got to be a bad thing.

== Doublepost prevention - post automatically merged: 14 Jul 2023 ==



If TVMs were easier to use, programmed with all the information needed to sell every ticket available and were 100% reliable then there might be a rather feeble argument for closing ticket offices but until those conditions are met, offices should remain open.

I couldn't agree more! You have to dodge around all over the screen and "confirm" before you have finished your transaction. And why can't you buy two tickets at the same time? I am reasonably familiar with the procedures now, but there was a lady in front of me a day or so ago who obviously wasn't and she was taking ages. I hope, also, the machines will be uniform across the network, as someone earlier in this discussion suggested.

 

[WelshBluebird]

From my perspective, ticket offices with glass screens and awful (pointless) intercoms to speak to the staff member are dated out of relevance. This whole setup is very 1980s, it's unfriendly to customers and should have been done away with years ago.

The idea of moving staff into the concourse with ticket slings (as per guards), able to assist with TVMs and, when less busy, provide general station assistance, seems to me like a good idea that moves the industry in the right direction.

Can I ask why does that make any difference for stations like Barnstaple where the only reaslitic place for a member of staff to locate themselves, apart from behind the the ticket office window, is right infront of the ticket office window (1m away from where they were before, but now in the way of passengers access to the platform)? How does that make it any more friendly to customers or move the industry in any direction really? Or even larger stations given those would have ticket barriers so the areas staff could be situated in order to help with ticket sales is pretty limited anyway! The whole "move staff out from behind counters" narrative is just total rubbish intended to smokescreen the public from the reality - that any such changes will result in less staff available at stations.

 

[tomuk]

Not everyone wants to or is able to 'buy on an app' or use contactless. Ticket machines are frequently faulty and out of use and many trains do not have guards. Many people like face to face contact.

I wouldn't characterise that as being a 'severe risk to Turn Up and Go'.

The fact of the matter is that it's an insidious proposal to de-staff stations, dishonestly passed off to the public and media as 'modernisation' and whichever side of the fence you sit on, that's got to be a bad thing.

What's a bad thing the dishonesty or closing the ticket offices?

 

[Joey Beauchamp]

It seems to me they're going too far, too fast and not communicating very well. On one website it looks like Rugby, Stoke-on-Trent and Manchester Piccadilly are all losing their ticket offices. On another it says Northampton and Nuneaton are having their ticket offices replaced by "travel centres" (whatever they are). I can only assume that there will be a facility to buy a ticket from a member of staff at all of the above stations, but it's far from clear.

Often when railway lines were closed in the 50's and 60's it was because buses were deemed to be cheaper, more reliable and more efficient. Many of the effected places no longer have any public transport at all, buses being easier to cut as they require hardly any standalone infrastructure. The same is true of the plan to replace ticket offices with roving members of staff.

 

[Krokodil]

What's a bad thing the dishonesty or closing the ticket offices?

Closing ticket offices. Dishonesty is routine these days.

 

[MikeWM]

Not everyone wants to or is able to 'buy on an app' or use contactless.

Many people, including myself, are wary of contactless in this sort of situation. There's a huge psychological difference between paying a bill with a card (or cash) when you can see, and authorise, the specific amount of money you're being charged, when compared with the contactless situation which is effectively 'here's my entire bank account, hopefully you'll take the right amount of money from it, I'll have to spend time later checking you got it right and if you didn't then it will take an awful lot of my time and effort to try to sort it out'.

I appreciate a lot of people are, for reasons I don't entirely understand, perfectly happy with doing that (at least until the first time it goes wrong!), but an awful lot of people aren't.

--

I don't know what you would do if the TVM failed to print all tickets (has happened to me), or how you would handle free refunds in disruption or excess fares.

I needed a refund a couple of weeks ago due to disruption that started immediately after buying my ticket at the TVM - it took all of 30 seconds at the ticket office. Without the ticket office, I guess I would have had to post the ticket to customer services and wait however many weeks it takes them to get around to it. This doesn't seem much of an 'improvement' to the passenger experience, but then we all know this isn't about that.

 

[urbophile]

At Liverpool Lime Street, the notice from Northern announcing a 'consultation' indicates that the office will remain staffed for most of the day (as you would expect for a major station) but close at (I think) 22.00 which would inconvenience many late night travellers. But despite the suggestion elsewhere that roving staff members would be around when the office is closed, it also states that 'other staff presence' would be available between those restricted hours, with no guarantee they would be there longer. Duplicity, or as Kenneth Williams would have said, infamy!

A related topic which confuses me: Lime Street ticket office is run by Northern, even though the station is operated by Network Rail, and most train services other than local ones are provided by other TOCs. Since stations sell tickets to anywhere on the national system, I can't understand why Network Rail or some other overall body does not operate an integrated ticket service for the whole country.

 

[158756]

At Liverpool Lime Street, the notice from Northern announcing a 'consultation' indicates that the office will remain staffed for most of the day (as you would expect for a major station) but close at (I think) 22.00 which would inconvenience many late night travellers. But despite the suggestion elsewhere that roving staff members would be around when the office is closed, it also states that 'other staff presence' would be available between those restricted hours, with no guarantee they would be there longer. Duplicity, or as Kenneth Williams would have said, infamy!

Yes, according to the information online the ticket office at Lime Street will close at 10pm and the "journey makers" will go home at the same time. No staff after that. But passengers at Lime Street are lucky. Unless I've missed somewhere, it looks like the only stations Northern will staff at all after 6pm are Lime Street and Leeds. Manchester Victoria, Oxford Road, Bradford Interchange etc all unstaffed after 6pm.

 

[Parham Wood]

Just found this on You Tube, apologies if already posted and I missed it.

 

[father_jack]

Post office syndrome has now officially arrived.

Yesterday I was at my local station, there was a small queue at the booking office. I overheard a conversation start up, guess what one said to the other. Yep, I am only using the ticket office to keep it open as I would normally use the vending machine.

But if they are only using the ticket office to collect the tickets they've already bought from Trainline no doubt and ask twenty questions about and then discover that the tickets are wrong/too dear and someone behind them is brandishing a £20 note for the next train well what point will that serve really..............

 

[tomuk]

Closing ticket offices. Dishonesty is routine these days.

I don't see a problem with closing unnecessary ticket offices the current proposals are disjointed haphazard and to a degree bizarre.

At Liverpool Lime Street, the notice from Northern announcing a 'consultation' indicates that the office will remain staffed for most of the day (as you would expect for a major station) but close at (I think) 22.00 which would inconvenience many late night travellers. But despite the suggestion elsewhere that roving staff members would be around when the office is closed, it also states that 'other staff presence' would be available between those restricted hours, with no guarantee they would be there longer. Duplicity, or as Kenneth Williams would have said, infamy!

The consultation is purely about ticket office opening hours and ticket selling staff not any other station staff or dispatch staff Lime Street won't be unstaffed outside the new ticket opening hours. I would also not describe 06:00 to 22:00 as restricted hours.

A related topic which confuses me: Lime Street ticket office is run by Northern, even though the station is operated by Network Rail, and most train services other than local ones are provided by other TOCs. Since stations sell tickets to anywhere on the national system, I can't understand why Network Rail or some other overall body does not operate an integrated ticket service for the whole country.

Network Rail don't sell train tickets that is a job of a retailer such as the train operating companies each NR station has a lead retailer. Lime Street Northern, Piccadilly Avanti etc. The existing system made up of multiple retailers is integrated you can buy almost all tickets for any service from any retailer whether that be a TOC at the station or other online providers.

 

[Krokodil]

I don't see a problem with closing unnecessary ticket offices the current proposals are disjointed haphazard and to a degree bizarre.

Even RMT privately recognise that some ticket offices are uneconomic. Avanti's scorched earth policy however - where every last one from Euston to Picc will go - is bat**** crazy.

 

[tomuk]

Even RMT privately recognise that some ticket offices are uneconomic. Avanti's scorched earth policy however - where every last one from Euston to Picc will go - is bat**** crazy.

It's not just Euston to Picc it all the way to Glasgow too. As a long distance operator it is very likely that their physical sales are very low and Birmingham International style floor walkers are adequate. However if this was an integrated process what would probably make sense would be to transfer the long distance Avanti stations to the local TOC and or TfL/TfWM/TfGM etc and make the city\region hubs. Although TfL (ex Overground/ Liz Line) are down to Tourist Info centres at Heathrow, Kings X/St P, Liverpool Street, Victoria and Piccadilly Circus.

 

[HSTEd]

Not everyone wants to or is able to 'buy on an app' or use contactless.

The cold blooded truth is the railway is a bulk public transport system.

It cannot cater to every niche requirement out there and remain even remotely economic to operate.
In person ticket sales are at 12-13% and falling.

Maintaining and staffing a thousand ticket offices will make up a significant fraction of the entire rail industry headcount (a few percent in all likelihood), and thus a significant fraction of the entire railway industry payroll.

Given how much money the industry is haemmorhaging, at some point maintaining such an expensive infrastructure surely ceases to be reasonable?

Many people like face to face contact

The key question being, how much are they willing to pay for it?

If in person tickets were charged for the fully burdened cost of maintaining this ticket selling apparatus their price would skyrocket. The electronic sales apparatus costs almost nothing by comparison.

 

[Blindtraveler]

I responded to the consultation with my local TOC but can I provide a response nationally to this or do I have to complete every operators consultation who I might potentially travel with or have traveled with

I absolutely do not approve of closing any booking office except perhaps those that are complete basket case scenarios and I suspect that they've already been done sometime back