New ticket design

[insidetrack77]

And again....

 

[insidetrack77]

And no idea how to turn them up the right way sorry!

 

[jon0844]

Wow. Seems like I was right. ATOC is going for a radical change, unless these are only concept designs?

 

[MCW]

I got given a new style ticket which was for Reading - Leicester single. Will do a phot/scan of the front and back to show you if I get a chance.

 

[MidnightFlyer]

The reverse of new style tickets I got from Temple Meads a couple of weeks ago are identical to Searle's cricket one above, including no Endorsement box provision.

 

[Temple Meads]

I also get a one of these last week from Bristol TM's ticket office, was for an excess fare.

Had the cricket advertisements on the back.

 

[maniacmartin]

Here are a couple of pics as promised.

This looks very promising. I especially like the URL on the front where you can go straight to the relevant restrictions text

 

[Harbon 1]

Wow. Seems like I was right. ATOC is going for a radical change, unless these are only concept designs?

They're still concepts by the looks of it, at the minute nothing has changed accept the card ticket

 

[swt_passenger]

They're still concepts by the looks of it, at the minute nothing has changed accept the card ticket

The example photos are still printed on 'rail settlement plan' marked blanks. Looks as though the two matters are probably unrelated...

 

[jon0844]

I realise they've not come into use yet, but they could still be beyond the concept stage.

With regards to what I said about basic modifications, the above will require quite a major overhaul of both ticketing software and some ticket machines that will be incapable of printing like this. I expect handheld ticket machines will be able to do it quite easily though.

I wonder if they'll be introduced over quite a long period time, used primarily by online sellers to begin with or everything will be upgraded behind the scenes between now and a clear switchover date?

 

[insidetrack77]

I work in a booking office. We were told these tickets are to be phased in from the end of February though have yet to see any in this neck of the woods. The tickets were probably a concept in 2011 as dated however I have been assured these are the finalised design and will definitely be printed in this format. The atoc images I have also show the endorsement box on the rear of the ticket.

 

[Clip]

There's still what must be a reference to Rail Settlement Plan in the bottom left (RSP No...).

thats just a ticket stock number for odering.

 

[jon0844]

thats just a ticket stock number for odering.

Yes, I assumed that was the case.

It will be interesting to see if such a new design will make it a lot more obvious to Joe Public what restrictions there are, and will make it harder for people to plead ignorance.

I guess there will be a 'learning curve' and Twitter will be full of people moaning about not understanding them, saying 'if it aint broke' and so on - but I do think we're perhaps moving in the right direction.

But, I'd still like to know what ATOC is intending to do about smartcard ticketing and how fares might be adapted in the future, with discounts based on regular usage or even routes taken (assuming we ever get validators on train platforms and on trains). I am talking about their intentions for the next 5-10 years, not actual concrete dates or actual costs.

 

[insidetrack77]

Interestingly Scotrail has had a trial of smartcards on the flagship Glasgow Queen St to Edinburgh route which I had been led to believe was largely unsuccessful.

However the company is now moving ahead with a plan to take smartcards across its network. The TVMs at the station I work at have been fitted with smartcard validators and a timetable has been put in place for their introduction, with more information at http://www.scotrail.co.uk/smartcardinfo

 

[F Great Eastern]

Well, they seem to be using different printers on those concepts to what is used normally these days, so unless they're going to change them all in the ticket machines, I doubt that they will come out anywhere near as crisp as that.

 

[jon0844]

How many different types of printer are in use to print tickets currently? Many TOCs down here seem to use the same machines in the ticket offices, and then there are the two common TVMs which I presume use the same printers regardless of TOC - finally, the handheld machines used by staff on trains, gatelines etc.

There must be older machines in use too, but I think most of the new ones just print a graphic/bitmap image on the ticket - so they can print anything, including images/logos if they so wanted. These will be on the paper stock that has just orange top/bottom (or whatever) and everything else is printed by the machine.

There is still some ticket stock that has the clearly defined sections and the rest is filled in by what I presume is/was a dot matrix style printer but I've not seen a ticket like that in years.

One problem is that some of the new printers FCC use issue tickets with lines missing and when there's smaller text that could cause problems (as in more excuses!!).

 

[barrykas]

How many different types of printer are in use to print tickets currently? Many TOCs down here seem to use the same machines in the ticket offices, and then there are the two common TVMs which I presume use the same printers regardless of TOC - finally, the handheld machines used by staff on trains, gatelines etc.

The vast majority of printers in Ticket Office and TVM use are Newbury Data ND4020 or ND4020V models (the difference being that the 4020V doesn't have a case around it, making for a smaller footprint for TVM use). These have a resolution of a very specific 203dpi

The printers used with Avantix Mobile are manufactured by a company called Steatite (formerly Blazepoint), but I can't find a spec for them.

 

[jon0844]

203dpi should be more than enough to print the tickets shown above.

 

[reb0118]

Does this help?.......

 

[jon0844]

Good to see the possibility of a QR code on the front, which can contain a lot of useful information both for staff and the customer (if they have a phone with camera and the right software).

I'd have thought that it would be better to say 'for the following services ONLY' to remove any doubt on the advance ticket.

Question is; what do rail staff think about these? Will these be easier to read from a distance (my guess is no) when doing routine checks?

 

[CardiffKid]

Question is; what do rail staff think about these? Will these be easier to read from a distance (my guess is no) when doing routine checks?

As important as staff are surly the customer comes first.

Do these tickets make things easier for the customer (YES), do these tickets reduce the chance of a customer getting the wrong train (YES) do these tickets reduce the "Well I didn't know I couldn't do that" attitude from customers (HOPEFULLY)

 

[jon0844]

It is just as important that the tickets can be easily checked by staff, or passengers will actually find themselves inconvenienced as the tickets have to be taken and inspected more closely than the current ones with a fairly large date and marking for things like OUT, RTN, DISC, 1ST or whatever.

These are just some examples though and I have no idea if they're final either.

 

[bb21]

What jumped out at me straight away is the CrossCountry logo at the top of the sample ticket. Why the logo? I assume that it is to help pasengers identify their train. What happens then when there are reservations on trains operated by different TOCs on the same ticket?

Totally unnecessary imo. This seems to me to be an idea by a designer rather than by someone with some insight into railway ticketing.

 

[Mojo]

Would be good if they moved towards a more consistent design definitely. At the moment there must be over 10 different printing/stock combinations which makes it very difficult to spot the increasingly large number of counterfeits.

 

[jon0844]

I expect that might be optional, for TOC specific tickets, and if the software is adaptable enough to use the top/bottom areas for useful information then it's no bad thing.

But a lot of it does seem to be very much like other ticket designs by students or rail fans, leaving off key information or making it harder for the rail staff that will check/validate tickets to do their job easily.

Knowing very little about the plans for these new tickets, whether they're still at a concept stage, if they're just one of a series of ideas, are still pending focus group trials and feedback from the industry etc - it's hard to comment further until someone on here gives more information or ATOC issues a press release giving a timeline and more detailed information and examples.

For the most part, I welcome a new ticket design that can convey a lot more information and do away with the current 16 character limitation on restrictions, but I am not entirely convinced these new designs are the perfect solution.

 

[F Great Eastern]

Well my point was that no ticket I've ever had has been using a font that crisp. It looks like a standard sheet of paper with print on from your average laser printer on the examples given with solid text, I've never had a ticket like that crisply printed.

Saying that though in the colour example posted they look nowhere near as crisp as they did in the black and white image posted, they look similar to the current ones font style more so in the colour one.

I think they look better than the current one though. I do remember MANY years ago though when seat reservations were on blue tickets rather than orange or is my mind playing tricks on me?

 

[jw]

Interestingly Scotrail has had a trial of smartcards on the flagship Glasgow Queen St to Edinburgh route which I had been led to believe was largely unsuccessful.

However the company is now moving ahead with a plan to take smartcards across its network. The TVMs at the station I work at have been fitted with smartcard validators and a timetable has been put in place for their introduction, with more information at http://www.scotrail.co.uk/smartcardinfo

Are you able to expand on why the trial was unsuccessful? The website seems to sing its praises!

I have noticed the validators being rolled out across the Glasgow suburban network, at stations where there are no barriers. Does this mean a 'touch in/out' system might be coming?

 

[yorksrob]

I think they look better than the current one though. I do remember MANY years ago though when seat reservations were on blue tickets rather than orange or is my mind playing tricks on me?

It's not. They were (well blue and white I think).

 

[34D]

What jumped out at me straight away is the CrossCountry logo at the top of the sample ticket. Why the logo? I assume that it is to help pasengers identify their train. What happens then when there are reservations on trains operated by different TOCs on the same ticket?

Totally unnecessary imo. This seems to me to be an idea by a designer rather than by someone with some insight into railway ticketing.

You'll note that it isn't shown on the offpeak single. To my mind it seems a useful feature on the xyz toc only tickets.
--- old post above --- --- new post below ---

It's not. They were (well blue and white I think).

I wouldn't have said _many_ years ago. I seem to recall them in the late 1990s. Someone will know, doubtless.

 

[Sammy h]

I work in a booking office and we were sent the examples as posted in this thread and asked to give feedback on what we thought.

It was never... 'Here are what the new tickets will look like, study them and they will be out on xx/xx/xxxx.'

Think they just wanted feedback so they could look into changing them. Feedback was given and so far nothing has been heard....