Northern TVM hiding cheapest fare?

[Segedunum]

Hi all,

Just come across this oddity at a Northern TVM at Manchester Vic.

I was after a return to Headbolt Lane (valid either via Wigan or Liverpool as I'm doing a loop) and just used the 'Quick Buy' facility to save faffing on - as I'd imagine most would if they knew what train they were after. I was surprised to see that while the fare I wanted was there, the (fairly significantly) cheaper fare valid only via Wigan wasn't there. I flicked through the list of fares and indeed - it wasn't being offered.

Is this fare no longer available or is this TVM seemingly missing fares? I didn't try using the journey planner - but that's besides the point really. Especially as anyone at Victoria going to Headbolt Lane will probably want the direct train.

Picture attached to prove I'm not losing the plot

 

[Bletchleyite]

The Via Wigan fares still exist, so it's odd that they aren't shown. Aside from on a Sunday, I doubt anyone would want to go via Liverpool* so this is an odd discrepancy indeed!

* There's no fare valid from Ormskirk to Preston on a Sunday as there isn't one valid via Liverpool - so at least they thought of it in this case!

 

[redreni]

From the screenshot, it looks like there would be more fares if you scrolled down? There seems to be a scroll bar on the right hand side of the screen.

Is it possible they're merely hiding the £7.30 via Wigan fare towards the bottom of the list, rather than not offering it at all?

 

[Segedunum]

From the screenshot, it looks like there would be more fares if you scrolled down?

Is it possible they're merely hiding the £7.30 via Wigan fare towards the bottom of the list, rather than not offering it at all?

Not in this case, I scrolled right down and the bottom of the list was just an assortment of more expensive fares, such as period returns and First Class.

 

[Bletchleyite]

It seems to be highlighting a fare that isn't cheapest as cheapest...

 

[redreni]

Does anyone get the sense that the 'Operator of Last Resort' TOCs seem to behave more like dodgy private enterprises than ever, despite being public authorities?

Very tempting to FOI them for policy documents relating to the range of fares to be sold from TVMs. If you want a ticket for immediate travel, the cheapest fare on Northern is often an Advance single anyway. Do the TVMs sell those?

 

[Wallsendmag]

Does anyone get the sense that the 'Operator of Last Resort' TOCs seem to behave more like dodgy private enterprises than ever, despite being public authorities?

Very tempting to FOI them for policy documents relating to the range of fares to be sold from TVMs. If you want a ticket for immediate travel, the cheapest fare on Northern is often an Advance single anyway. Do the TVMs sell those?

Yes the Northern Chiltern Avanti and LNER TVMs all sell Advance tickets

 

[Benjwri]

I wonder whether the quick buy function isn’t allowed to retail route restricted tickets? It seems the only reasonable solution…

 

[Bletchleyite]

Does anyone get the sense that the 'Operator of Last Resort' TOCs seem to behave more like dodgy private enterprises than ever, despite being public authorities?

It isn't in their interest in this case. One assumes TPE (yes, I know, also OLR, but they act separately) get a big chunk of the "via Liverpool" fare, whereas Northern will get most or all of the "via Wigan" one, presumably hence why it even exists.

I seem to recall reading that these TVMs run some sort of itinerary check before showing a fare on the "quick buy" screen, in order to avoid showing fares that have no validity (e.g. due to no Sunday service). If that is indeed so I wonder if that went wrong somewhere?

 

[jfollows]

Does anyone get the sense that the 'Operator of Last Resort' TOCs seem to behave more like dodgy private enterprises than ever, despite being public authorities?

Very tempting to FOI them for policy documents relating to the range of fares to be sold from TVMs. If you want a ticket for immediate travel, the cheapest fare on Northern is often an Advance single anyway. Do the TVMs sell those?

But not at ticket offices, which is a bit of a pain. And backs up your first paragraph.

 

[Bletchleyite]

But not at ticket offices, which is a bit of a pain. And backs up your first paragraph.

I suspect that was a means of pushing for booking office closures, though it's ironic that Northern's closure proposals were about the least swingeing of all the TOCs.

 

[Mcr Warrior]

Concur with @rg177. The TVMs at Manchester Victoria don't seem to offer the cheaper "via Wigan" walk-up tickets, for a journey from Manchester Victoria to Headbolt Lane if/when using the "Quick Pay" option. They can seemingly be obtained by faffing around using the "Journey Planner" option, but it's not particularly intuitive or user friendly, and you could quite easily inadvertently end up with inflexible Advance tickets.

 

[sheff1]

I never use the "Quick Buy" (on any TVM, not just Northern) unless the fare I want is on the first screen as not all fares appear, even with scrolling. Of course, many people will not know what fares are available and will end up paying more than necessary.

For some, quickness will be more important than saving a few bob by searchng. On the other hand, others will just select the cheapest fare they see (either on Quick Buy or the Journey Planner) and then fall foul of operator/route/time restrictions, as seen by various threads on here.

Almost as if the TVMs are designed to catch out the uninformed.

 

[Bletchleyite]

Sometimes it almost feels that TVMs are so bad on purpose, to encourage ticket purchases on your phone, which means the number of them can be reduced and money saved.

The only TOC that seems to have put actual effort into TVMs is LNER, who have made them to work similarly to their website and app, which is a nice touch. Ironically with their fare policy they're the TOC where people are least likely to want to use them!

 

[J-2739]

Sometimes it almost feels that TVMs are so bad on purpose, to encourage ticket purchases on your phone, which means the number of them can be reduced and money saved.

The only TOC that seems to have put actual effort into TVMs is LNER, who have made them to work similarly to their website and app, which is a nice touch. Ironically with their fare policy they're the TOC where people are least likely to want to use them!

I've always found Northern's TVMs some of the worst on the network actually. Big screen, but not much substance.

 

[Bletchleyite]

I've always found Northern's TVMs some of the worst on the network actually. Big screen, but not much substance.

GWR's similar ones are the worst for me because the card slot is so low I have to kneel on the floor to use it, which to me is an accessibility issue - great for wheelchair users, no good for a taller elderly person who can't easily bend to floor level. But I agree the software on the Arriva/ex-Arriva TOC TVMs is dire, though the worst prize (!) must surely go to Avanti, it's truly awful.

 

[Segedunum]

though the worst prize (!) must surely go to Avanti, it's truly awful.

I used to work at First and would regularly chat with an IT guy who was responsible for reporting issues with Avanti's PICO TIS. He said "I'd tell them there was a problem then a bunch of Italians would scream at each other for a while, then we'd repeat".

Back on topic, thanks all for confirming I wasn't going mad. Hopefully this gets fixed sooner rather than later.

 

[DelW]

I've had similar on SWR, where neither their ticket office nor their TVMs would allow me to buy a super offpeak ticket that was shown on every website I looked at, including the National Rail planner. SWR only offered me "normal" offpeak at around 50% higher cost. In the end I bought the super offpeak ticket via the forum's website, and collected it from the same TVM that wouldn't sell it to me. (It had to be CCST to use across London).

 

[Mcr Warrior]

Back on topic, thanks all for confirming I wasn't going mad. Hopefully this gets fixed sooner rather than later.

You weren't. Checked today at 15:55. So, who's going to fix the problem, and what's going to prompt them to do anything? Is this essentially a failure in accreditation?

 

[Bletchleyite]

You weren't. Checked today at 15:55. So, who's going to fix the problem, and what's going to prompt them to do anything? Is this essentially a failure in accreditation?

Doesn't the person who looks after Northern's TVMs post here? They certainly did at one point. This post might hopefully get it fixed!

Appears to be @northernman if he is still around!

 

[Haywain]

Is this essentially a failure in accreditation?

No, because accreditation cannot possibly look at whether every ticket combination is sold.

Hopefully this gets fixed sooner rather than later.

Have you advised Northern of the problem you encountered? While it might get picked up through the forum, that would be the best approach.

 

[Segedunum]

No, because accreditation cannot possibly look at whether every ticket combination is sold.

Have you advised Northern of the problem you encountered? While it might get picked up through the forum, that would be the best approach.

I have indeed. Hopefully one method or the other sees a positive outcome - Northern have said they'll look into it.

 

[Wallsendmag]

Sometimes it almost feels that TVMs are so bad on purpose, to encourage ticket purchases on your phone, which means the number of them can be reduced and money saved.

The only TOC that seems to have put actual effort into TVMs is LNER, who have made them to work similarly to their website and app, which is a nice touch. Ironically with their fare policy they're the TOC where people are least likely to want to use them!

The latest update to the web makes it look even more like the TVM display.

 

[janb]

An interesting one. Did a test on the TVMs at my station and Manchester Victoria to Headbolt Lane returned the via Wigan fares. Had thought it might be one where putting in Manchester Stations to Headbolt Lane might be answer but conversely that didn't bring up the via Wigan fares.

 

[Mcr Warrior]

An interesting one. Did a test on the TVMs at my station and Manchester Victoria to Headbolt Lane returned the via Wigan fares. Had thought it might be one where putting in Manchester Stations to Headbolt Lane might be answer but conversely that didn't bring up the via Wigan fares.

Which TVM menu option did you use to get the "via Wigan" fares to appear? They certainly didn't show using the 'Quick Buy' option at Manchester Victoria yesterday.

No, because accreditation cannot possibly look at whether every ticket combination is sold.

Why not? We're talking about a point to point ticket, not some ticket combination. Why shouldn't all walk-up fares for immediate travel be displayed, even if the possibly less common ones are only shown on a menu sub-page?

 

[Haywain]

Why not? We're talking about a point to point ticket, not some ticket combination. Why shouldn't all walk-up fares for immediate travel be displayed, even if on a menu sub-page?

Because testing for all of the millions of station combinations and associated fares would take years. Accreditation is mainly about manual testing.

Also, industry data is a mess and errors can, unfortunately, easily occur.

 

[MrJeeves]

One similar issue I found is that these TVMs don't seem to handle the concept of forcing the fares shown to match the origin/destination selected.

At Birmingham Moor Street, I used the Chiltern TVM to look at Travelcards, and all of the options it surfaced were just tickets to London Terminals!

 

[Bletchleyite]

That's consistent with most online retailers - you select London and Travelcards are just in the list.

 

[janb]

Which TVM menu option did you use to get the "via Wigan" fares to appear? They certainly didn't show using the 'Quick Buy' option at Manchester Victoria yesterday.

Yes, I used "Quick Buy".

So first test was about 0843 and it showed peak fares both via Wigan and Any Permitted. Just tried again now 1048 and I got the same results as you and the OP, it would only show the Any Permitted. So some sort of bug that only occurs in the off peak maybe?

 

[MrJeeves]

That's consistent with most online retailers - you select London and Travelcards are just in the list.

Not if they support a search explicitly to London Travelcard Zones 1-6! Perhaps I'm just spoilt by On Track Retail and TrainSplit... and most normal TVMs.