What proof do you need of a valid route?

[hairyhandedfool]

[Pops up from behind a parapit]

National Rail Conditions of Carriage, condition 21.

[Ducks back behind parapit again]

 

[A60K]

Given the wording about 'valid travel itinerary' I would think it is part of the contract and therefore can be considered as part of conflicting information.

A travel itinerary issued by one of the rail companies or ticket sales sites can by logic be valid or invalid. If it is invalid due to the issuer's error, but does not seem unreasonable to the passenger, then I would expect that any legal action would be decided in the passenger's favour.

I know exactly what Barry is saying though - there are plenty of people who will claim they were told something, and they don't like being given evidence of restrictions which they cannot then try and claim they didn't know about.

I've got a bee in my bonnet that all ticket restrictions should be printed on each ticket issued, on another card if necessary (with the ticket stating 'See Restrictions Attached'), and if the restrictions are too complicated to fit in a small space then simplify then.

 

[Barn]

I'm afraid it's not the case that, with a consumer contract, you can just quote clauses and assume they form part of the agreement with the customer.
--- old post above --- --- new post below ---
This is particularly true when standard conditions are only referred to in the background, like the NRCoC.

 

[Ferret]

I've got a bee in my bonnet that all ticket restrictions should be printed on each ticket issued, on another card if necessary (with the ticket stating 'See Restrictions Attached'), and if the restrictions are too complicated to fit in a small space then simplify then.

Absolutely bang on. Why for instance for an SVR BHM-SHF can it not be printed actually on the ticket that it is not for use before 09:30? Simple, and would save lots of grief for both staff and passengers.

 

[clagmonster]

Clause 13 of the NRCoC states:
"(a) You may travel between the stations shown on the ticket you hold in:
...
(iii) trains which take the routes shown in the National Routeing Guide
(details as to how you can obtain this information will be available
when you buy your ticket)."
When buying tickets over the internet, using both WebTis and Trainline powered websites, there is always a link to the conditions of carriage, which of course include this clause. I have never seen any other mention of the routeing guide when buying over the internet. Therefore, would it not be reasonable to assume that the information about the routeing guide which the NRCoC state will be available when purchasing is in fact the journey itineraries produced.

In the case Failed Unit describes, the advance ticket conditions, as published on the National Rail website state:
"If the ‘Route’ also states ‘and Connections’, travel is allowed on appropriate connecting trains where shown on the ticket(s) or other valid travel itinerary."
The Doncaster-Barnetby-Grimsby leg will be shown on a reservation, which could be considered part of the ticket, and borth the Doncaster-Grimsby and Grimsby-Market Rasen legs will be shown o the booking confirmation, which is a travel itinerary.

 

[dan_atki]

Dan, has there actually been a case brought against a TOC/agent using that piece of law? If not, it may not be 100% advisable to rely on that piece of law. It all rests on what a Court would deem to be unfair...

Not that I'm aware of, particularly with regards to the Routeing Guide, but I can see your point. Although, as I understand it (with the increased revisions to it), ATOC and the DfT are playing a bigger part in sorting it out. Indeed, the NRG is part of the contract of your ticket but as I explain here, it can be difficult for a customer looking at the guide to determine if Banbury is in fact valid here.

It is overly complicated and takes a higher than average IQ to even understand the instructions in it, let alone use it. All this shows is that the Routeing Guide contradicts itself, which, in an ideal world, it shouldn't. Ideally it should be binned and rewritten.

As clagmonster has stated, the CoC says to use the NRG to determine routes - which I have, quite legitimately used the guide for. Checking for any prohibition easement is NOT part of the instructions, and either way no mention is made of what to do if the easements prohibit a seemingly valid route.

What is interesting to note here is that WebTIS will only offer a route via Banbury for Hemel Hempstead to Oxford, but not for London to Oxford, despite the routeings (in the NRG) being the same. That suggests there is some form of easement programming within the system but either I've missed something in the published list (which may or may not be different to the programmed list), the easement in the published list is in fact incorrect and erranous, or the easement has been very shoddily programmed.

(I'll look into this a bit more but I believe Banbury Group is relatively new, invented with careless oversight as to other parts of the guide such as the prohibition mentioned which I believe is relatively old in comparison...).

Clause 13 of the NRCoC states:
"(a) You may travel between the stations shown on the ticket you hold in:
...
(iii) trains which take the routes shown in the National Routeing Guide
(details as to how you can obtain this information will be available
when you buy your ticket)."

Just a shame it doesn't take into account the times the NRG contradicts itself. Oh, of course, that doesn't happen...

 

[Ferret]

Not that I'm aware of, particularly with regards to the Routeing Guide, but I can see your point. Although, as I understand it (with the increased revisions to it), ATOC and the DfT are playing a bigger part in sorting it out. Indeed, the NRG is part of the contract of your ticket but as I explain here, it can be difficult for a customer looking at the guide to determine if Banbury is in fact valid here.

It is overly complicated and takes a higher than average IQ to even understand the instructions in it, let alone use it. All this shows is that the Routeing Guide contradicts itself, which, in an ideal world, it shouldn't. Ideally it should be binned and rewritten.

I completely agree. The routing guide is extremely confusing even for me, and I work on the railway. What chance does Joe Public stand?! And come to that, unless the Guard knows for a fact a route isn't valid, how the hell does he check from on board a train? OK, so if somebody shows you a London Terminals-Swansea ticket after leaving Sheffield (yes, believe it - it's happened!) then you'll smell a rat straight away, but what about Leeds-London Terminals? Valid via Birmingham to Euston/Marylebone/Paddington?

It's pretty clear that the current system isn't fit for purpose as nobody from your normal passenger to your RPIs/TMs can understand it! How about it then ATOC?

 

[dan_atki]

OK, so if somebody shows you a London Terminals-Swansea ticket after leaving Sheffield (yes, believe it - it's happened!) then you'll smell a rat straight away, but what about Leeds-London Terminals? Valid via Birmingham to Euston/Marylebone/Paddington?

, I'd be interested to hear the excuse given for that!

Then again the routeing guide did permit a Woking to Slough ticket to be valid at Exeter St Davids and even now at Newport (Gwent) - this was the 'temporary fix', by the way (remove Exeter as valid but allow Newport...).

A poster on here described how he was asked to leave the train at Salisbury and how the booking office staff there refused to look up the routeing guide for themselves (instead using RJIS' interpretation).

Then again the whole point of 'Any Permitted Route' was to get rid of 'Any Reasonable Route' as 'reasonable' is subjective and 'permitted' is not.

It's pretty clear that the current system isn't fit for purpose as nobody from your normal passenger to your RPIs/TMs can understand it! How about it then ATOC?

I think you're banging your head against a wall, personally .

 

[glynn80]

And come to that, unless the Guard knows for a fact a route isn't valid, how the hell does he check from on board a train?

I know for a fact the National Routeing Guide was, in the past, published in hard copy and produced in both A4 and A5 formats, the former to be kept within ticket offices and the latter to be carried with guards. However this practice was discontinued in 2002 when the Electronic Version took over.

I have a copy of the ATOC Retail Group minutes which explains ATOC's rationale for the removal of the paper copy of the guide:

National Routeing Guide.

[ATOC member of staff, name removed] referred to the fact that the National Routeing Guide had not been reprinted since it was first introduced in 1996, despite the fact that over 70,000 individual data changes had been made. A quote has been obtained for reprinting the amended document and this is in the region of £150k and because of the continuous updating process any reprint would be out of date before it could be distributed.

I have been told the process by which guards must now verify permitted routes, is to telephone their retail control desk who will then be tasked with looking up said route within the NRG and who will then return contact with the guard with the relevant answer.

 

[Ferret]

, I'd be interested to hear the excuse given for that!

Seeing as you've asked, the excuse was "It says any route on the ticket". Needless to say I showed him his ticket and invited him to read what it really said! What really made me smile was that he said he'd been allowed to use it by an EMT guard out of St Pancake (pre-barriers!). Why do I find that oh so believable!:roll:

I think you're banging your head against a wall, personally .

I know mate - a man can dream though can't he?!
--- old post above --- --- new post below ---

I have been told the process by which guards must now verify permitted routes, is to telephone their retail control desk who will then be tasked with looking up said route within the NRG and who will then return contact with the guard with the relevant answer.

Therein lies the problem. Easier to stamp ticket and walk off rather than fanny about hoping the "retail control desk" will bother to ring you back with an answer (let alone the correct one)!:roll:

 

[Failed Unit]

Probably for another thread, but Perth - London seems to be valid on most routes in the UK north of London!

 

[dan_atki]

Seeing as you've asked, the excuse was "It says any route on the ticket".

Should have tried Ryde Esplanade to St Johns Road via Portsmouth, London, Aberdeen, Dublin, Holyhead, Birmingham, and Southampton then!

I know mate - a man can dream though can't he?!

Yeah, I guess he can! Still, dreaming about things that have a chance of changing might mean less disappointment!!

Therein lies the problem. Easier to stamp ticket and walk off rather than fanny about hoping the "retail control desk" will bother to ring you back with an answer (let alone the correct one)!:roll:

Your last point really is the cruncher there. If you cannot use the NRG properly (indeed, are you even trained in its existance, let alone its usage?) then one must wonder if this 'retail control desk' can. It normally takes several days for them to come back with a result, where I guess they submit a request to ATOC to look on their behalf...

 

[John @ home]

Perth - London seems to be valid on most routes in the UK north of London!

Yes, There several tens of thousands of distinct permitted routes for this journey.

Perth to (London) Euston

There are too many routes. Only a summary will be generated.
Search took too long - interrupted.

There are 39511 routes found so far between these routeing points.
Shortest route: 487 miles 10 chains.
Longest route: 1057 miles 36 chains.

 

[Ferret]

Should have tried Ryde Esplanade to St Johns Road via Portsmouth, London, Aberdeen, Dublin, Holyhead, Birmingham, and Southampton then!

All Line Rover anyone????

Yeah, I guess he can! Still, dreaming about things that have a chance of changing might mean less disappointment!!

Yup! The real world quite often contains painful realities!:roll:

Your last point really is the cruncher there. If you cannot use the NRG properly (indeed, are you even trained in its existance, let alone its usage?) then one must wonder if this 'retail control desk' can. It normally takes several days for them to come back with a result, where I guess they submit a request to ATOC to look on their behalf...

In answer to your question, I was made aware that it existed by my employers, but was never actually shown it!!! What I do know about it has come from reading threads on here and through my own messing about with the damn thing.

Like you say, they won't know either - they'll ring ATOC, who'll then ring back about 3 hours later by which time the passenger has got off, or I've got off the train and have had my PNB and am heading back in the other direction again!

 

[Nick W]

Since the paper version of the routing guide is no longer official, no one has any authority to overall an electronic routing engine without manually deassembling the RSP data feeds. However given the lack of requirement for a magistrate to be technically competent or educated to a high standard, and the fact that they are known to favour big organisations and police witness judgement I could see a court case going highly against a passenger. I would love to see a test case.

 

[Darandio]

Seeing as you've asked, the excuse was "It says any route on the ticket". Needless to say I showed him his ticket and invited him to read what it really said! What really made me smile was that he said he'd been allowed to use it by an EMT guard out of St Pancake (pre-barriers!). Why do I find that oh so believable!:roll:

Funny thing is, how confusing is "any route" for some people? Not for me and you but to Joe Public, what do they really think it means? Of course, reading T & C's always helps so if it is tried as mentioned above, they deserve what they get.

Last week, on another forum I frequent a poll was started with the following guideline, and this is a genuine poll, not something I have made up.

Your going for a bash from Didcot to Reading and your ticket said "any route",
would you go via Oxford, Bristol, Aberdeen, York, Leeds, Coventry and Reading for fun? You decide, yes or no.

The OP genuinely thought that he could travel the length and breadth of the country on an "any route" ticket!

 

[Ferret]

Thing is, it says "any permitted"!!! Strikes me that some people either see what they want to see or are just too stupid to know any different!!!!

 

[Railjet]

Thing is, it says "any permitted"!!! Strikes me that some people either see what they want to see or are just too stupid to know any different!!!!

Not stupidity, necessarily. The terminology: "Route: any permitted" is highly ambiguous. For anyone not familiar with the system, it could easily mean "any route is permitted" just as much as "any permitted route".

 

[Ferret]

Well, that's seeing what you want to see then isn't it?! Anyone with a modicum of common sense wouldn't believe you could use (for example) a London-Brighton route : Any permitted ticket to travel the length and breadth of the country!!!

 

[theblackwatch]

It would be hardly unreasonable of a passenger to ask 'can you tell me what routes are permitted?' but I would be very surprised for a lot of journeys if a member of retail staff could do that, or if they did, they supplied the correct answers!

I rmember the wording used to be 'any reasonable route' for most tickets. One persons idea of that will differ from anothers which I would assume why it was changed - try defining that in law!

 

[DaveNewcastle]

Thing is, it says "any permitted"!!! Strikes me that some people either see what they want to see or are just too stupid to know any different!!!!

Not stupidity, necessarily. The terminology: "Route: any permitted" is highly ambiguous. For anyone not familiar with the system, it could easily mean "any route is permitted" just as much as "any permitted route".

Well, that's seeing what you want to see then isn't it?! Anyone with a modicum of common sense wouldn't believe you could use (for example) a London-Brighton route : Any permitted ticket to travel the length and breadth of the country!!!

No Ferret, that's just hyperbole. Sure, WE know what is intended, but Railjet is quite correct. Irrespective of what is intended by the words "any permitted", it is indeed ambiguous:-

ROUTE - any permitted
Meaning 1: (any is an adjective which qualifies route, and permitted is an adjective which qualifies route [as in any route is a permitted route]) So, the ROUTE conditions are that ANY are PERMITED. i.e. The ticket's restrictions on the Route are that the traveller may be confident that ANY route is PERMITTED whether or not they want to use anything other than the most obvious route, the ticket provides a "permission".
Meaning 2: (any is a qualifying adjective which qualifies permitted, and permitted is also an adjective qualifying Route) So, the ROUTE conditions are that [ONLY, not ANY OF] the [unspecified] PERMITTED ROUTES are valid). The ticket's restrictions on the Route are that ANY of the/ ONLY the PERMITTED routes may be used.
Noting that the Permitted Routes in the second interpretation would need to be defined for the ticket to explain anything, a ticket holder would be excused for thinking that that Meaning 2 might be wrong.
I also accept that you, with your specialist knowledge and expertise, may know where those definitions could be found and that some travellers might deliberately choose longer or slower routes, would be excused for thinking that Meaning 1 might be wrong.

But its not good enough for YOU to decide which interpretation must be applied because you are adequately knowledgeable and informed about the possible implications, to then be able to work out which meaning must have been intended when the ticket was sold to the less-informed traveller.
The responsibility for clarity lies with the ticket's vendors.
A traveller who takes the first meaning might even agree with you that they really don't want to travel by anything other than the shortest and/or quickest route, but they'd be quite confident that their ticket would also allow them to deviate if exceptional circumstances arose. And that might be when they get into trouble.
Lack of clarity in ticketing is NOT to be defended on the grounds that those of us who know what is intended are not confused by ambiguity.

I'm personally a supporter of much more radical reforms than this, but it does seem clear that there's a simple fix to this question - The wording on the tix could use the word "only" instead of "any" and change the name of the field, perhaps from ROUTE to PERMITTED ROUTE or something less open to being interpreted in English quite correctly, but in Rail-speak being wrong.

 

[Lampshade]

Me and my mates were discussing this last night after quite a lot of beer. People buy a ticket saying "Route: Any Permitted" - how is the average passenger going to know what is or isn't a permitted route? People could quite easily think that going via any old route is permitted as there's nothing to tell them otherwise, other than NOT LONDON.

 

[DaveNewcastle]

Me and my mates were discussing this . . . how is the average passenger going to know what is or isn't a permitted route? People could quite easily think that going via any old route is permitted as there's nothing to tell them otherwise, other than NOT LONDON.

Exactly! Wouldnt the word "ONLY" rather than "ANY" help? "ONLY" does give you a sense of restriction, while "ANY" implies more of an inclusive permission.
(Why aren't more railway decisions made in your local pub?)

 

[Ferret]

Sorry gentlemen, but there is no change necessary. It does not say 'Any *is* permitted' to say you can use a ticket wherever you like! There is no ambiguity at all!!!!

With all due respect, you're trying to solve a problem that hardly exists. Out of all the tickets I've ever checked, I've seen about 3 who are off route on such a ticket, and in 4 years, how many tickets do you think I've checked?! We must be down to 0.0000000001% of peope who are seeing what they want to see in defiance of all rationality when they read what it says on the ticket!!!! This says to me that it works fine for the massive majority - that's the acid test!

 

[Daimler]

Sorry gentlemen, but there is no change necessary. It does not say 'Any *is* permitted' to say you can use a ticket wherever you like! There is no ambiguity at all!!!!

Common sense dictates that it means that any permitted route is allowed, but grammatically speaking, it could (as DaveNewcastle rightly pointed out) be taken either way.

 

[Ferret]

Well, to me, even that is debateable. Like I say, it says 'Any permitted', not 'Any is permitted' - there's a subtle difference. Still, it's a pointless argument over semantics!!! The current wording works perfectly well and it won't be changed!

 

[Lampshade]

It's a fair point that very few passengers would actually end up off route. If for example I wanted to go from Manchester to Preston, I wouldn't go over to York first, or down the Styal line to Crewe and then the WCML.

The confusing ones come when for example someone wants to travel from Manchester - London. I believe there are three permitted routes (WCML/Hope Valley and Midland/via Birmingham), but not every passenger is to know that and could quite easily go Manchester - Grantham and then up the ECML which is logical enough but not a valid route.

 

[glynn80]

The confusing ones come when for example someone wants to travel from Manchester - London. I believe there are three permitted routes (WCML/Hope Valley and Midland/via Birmingham), but not every passenger is to know that and could quite easily go Manchester - Grantham and then up the ECML which is logical enough but not a valid route.

This situation would be especially relevant when delays are occurring, when alternative routes need to be sought.

 

[Ferret]

This situation would be especially relevant when delays are occurring, when alternative routes need to be sought.

Glynn, quite often in that situation Guards receive pager messages advising that there is 'serious disruption on route X-Y, please allow travel by any reasonable route'. For example - if the WCML goes down the swanny, EMT will often accept BHM-London Terminals tickets as valid via Leicester to St Pancake even though I've a strong idea that's not a permitted route in the routeing guide....!

 

[Chris-P]

This situation would be especially relevant when delays are occurring, when alternative routes need to be sought.

When there were delays on NXEA (between Liverpool street and Witham), I was allowed to travel via cambridge (still NXEA though), despite it not being a valid route to colchester.