When did mTickets disappear?

[life210]

Random thought of the day - when did mTickets disappear?

Not that I miss them, e-tickets are a lot more flexible, can be added to mobile wallets.

 

[jfollows]

I don’t think they have, I think Scotrail still has them.

mTickets

Turn your phone into your train ticket – buy and download Advance, Single and Return tickets instantly. Your travel at your fingertips.

www.scotrail.co.uk

 

[zwk500]

Some bus companies still use them as well I think. As ever, these things don't just go bang overnight but drip steadily away.

 

[62484GlenLyon]

No doubt Scotrail and any other TOCs that use m-tickets will continue to do so having invested in them until their system needs renewal or change is forced upon them.

I am very familiar with e-tickets though I have never had to use an m-ticket so can somebody tell me, please, what is the difference between an e-ticket and an m-ticket?

 

[jfollows]

m-ticket requires download and use of a specific “app”
e-tickets are Aztec codes which can be displayed in any way, even be printed off

There are other reasons why relying on a mobile phone to display a ticket may or may not be a good idea, but relying on a phone and some third party application to use m-tickets is not thought to be a good idea, here at least. They are last decade’s solution to mobile ticketing.

 

[The exile]

m-ticket requires download and use of a specific “app”
e-tickets are Aztec codes which can be displayed in any way, even be printed off

Being pedantic, isn’t it more the case that e-tickets started off as “print at home” tickets, with the option of displaying them on a smartphone etc coming later? They existed long before smartphones (or at least long before most people had smartphones)

 

[OscarH]

Being pedantic, isn’t it more the case that they started off as “print at home” tickets, with the option of displaying them on a smartphone etc coming later? They existed long before smartphones (or at least long before most people had smartphones)

Self print was a separate fulfilment method to mTicket, and the former is actually defunct, rather than allowed to continue like mTickets because no one has teeth to tell people like ScotRail to get in the 21st century

 

[The exile]

Self print was a separate fulfilment method to mTicket, and the former is actually defunct, rather than allowed to continue like mTickets because no one has teeth to tell people like ScotRail to get in the 21st century

Sorry - should have made clear that I was referring to e-tickets.

 

[jfollows]

Yes, I remember Virgin doing something with “print at home” a while ago, but I didn’t trust it much at the time so paid the same for a credit card sized ticket which I picked up at my local station. I don’t remember it having many benefits for me. Now, e-tickets are fine. I remember m-tickets on Arriva local buses in 2013, thank goodness now they’re pretty much contactless.

 

[ainsworth74]

Yes it's worth clarifying that "Print@Home" was a separate thing to m-tickets and e-tickets that pre-dated them. I think a few different operators trialled it in the late 2000s and early 2010s? NXEC and East Coast were certainly one of them, possibly TPE as well? I seem to recall that there was an ID requirement with them so they were much less flexible than printing the tickets at a TVM.

 

[Haywain]

Self Print or Print at Home tickets were quite common by 2010, I think. I certainly used one on Wrexham & Shropshire in that year (it was the only one I ever used as I had Priv facilities then).

 

[nwales58]

Another way of looking at it from a revenue/fraud point of view:

Only one copy of an m-ticket can be made to exist at any point in time as it is in an app the ticketer controls. So as secure as a paper ticket. Therefore slipped easily into the historic paper ticket environment.

A scan database and near real-time access to it is needed to ensure that the, by design, easily copyable e-ticket cannot be abused if it has any flexibility.

So airlines and TGV or SJ-style fixed train+fixed seat could adopt e-tickets much earlier than for flexible tickets without a check-in requirement which need the investment in real-time scan infrastructure.

 

[island]

Yes it's worth clarifying that "Print@Home" was a separate thing to m-tickets and e-tickets that pre-dated them. I think a few different operators trialled it in the late 2000s and early 2010s? NXEC and East Coast were certainly one of them, possibly TPE as well? I seem to recall that there was an ID requirement with them so they were much less flexible than printing the tickets at a TVM.

The ID could be a credit card, so not especially onerous, and the main purpose was preventing multiple use as portable scanners for guards were not common.

 

[styles]

m-tickets are probably my least favourite form of ticket. They're least flexible, rely on specific apps, and are mobile-only which isn't very handy if battery dies etc.

The worst experience I had with them was Trainline issuing me an m-ticket, then it disappearing a day after use, then trying to get delay repay from a TOC for a journey and they want to see the actual ticket. Much back and forth ensued before the TOC relented and paid me.

 

[ainsworth74]

The ID could be a credit card, so not especially onerous, and the main purpose was preventing multiple use as portable scanners for guards were not common.

Yes that's a good point. My attempt to clarify has somewhat floundered by also needed to be clarified

 

[DeverseSam]

Interrail is also m-ticket I guess

 

[plugwash]

I am very familiar with e-tickets though I have never had to use an m-ticket so can somebody tell me, please, what is the difference between an e-ticket and an m-ticket?

m-tickets could only be presents through a rail-industry approved app and were required to be "activated" prior to travel. This was presumably used as part of the misuse prevention.

IIRC "print at home" tickets had an ID requirement, and were only sold for advance fares. Presumably these were seen as misuse prevention measures.

e-tickets do not require activation or ID, can be presented in a variety of ways (rail industry app, pdf on a device screen, wallet app from phone vendor, wallet app from third party, printout on paper) and the rail industry has no control over the number of copies made. So misuse prevention is entirely reliant on the scan database.

 

[43096]

Interrail is also m-ticket I guess

And also thankfully still paper given what an unreliable crock of **** the Interrail app is.

 

[62484GlenLyon]

Thanks to all for information on m-tickets. I assume that m-tickets can only be issued for journeys wholly within the same TOC's area of operation and on that TOC's services.

 

[OscarH]

Thanks to all for information on m-tickets. I assume that m-tickets can only be issued for journeys wholly within the same TOC's area of operation and on that TOC's services.

Not necessarily - the display rules are standardised, and the barcodes are the same across everyone, so just like eTickets they can be cross TOC

 

[alistairlees]

Thanks to all for information on m-tickets. I assume that m-tickets can only be issued for journeys wholly within the same TOC's area of operation and on that TOC's services.

The very first m-ticket multi-TOC trial route was Harrogate to Hexham in September 2014. This was for all tickets between all pairs of stations on this route. We chose it to get a good mixture of journeys that were one TOC only or multi-TOC; and also to test out TOC-specific as well as Any Permitted fares. Four TOCs - Northern, East Coast, XC and TPE - participated, as well as several technology suppliers (Assertis, Trainline, Masabi, TTK, Worldline). ATOC were there too. There were earlier trials on Northern using local flows from Arram, and elsewhere.

A year later, following low customer take up of m-tickets, we started to adapt the Apple Pass standard to create eTickets, which were launched (on Caledonian Sleeper, Virgin Trains and Gatwick Express) in autumn 2016. The rest is history, as they say.

 

[Adam Williams]

Only one copy of an m-ticket can be made to exist at any point in time as it is in an app the ticketer controls. So as secure as a paper ticket. Therefore slipped easily into the historic paper ticket environment.

I know some TOCs like to think this is true, but I'm going to call it out every time it gets posted, because it's not true and it leads to false reassurances. This is the same sort of thought that ends up justifying DRM measures for watching Stranger Things on Netflix or downloading an e-Book, which are just as pointless.

As soon as you allow a device in a user's physical possession to render a ticket, that's it - game over - you've lost control over that ticket. Anything else you're doing on top of that is security theatre. It might slow someone down a little bit, but it's not going to stop anyone.

E-Tickets are secure because of the eTVD and no reliance on client-side "security" measures.

 

[Wallsendmag]

Not soon enough is the answer, they are more or less extinct in England but linger on in Wales and Scotland.

 

[jfollows]

Yes, time and technology move on, there may have been a justification for m-tickets a long time ago, but it doesn’t stand up to analysis now. I remember cases here of peoples’ grannies being prosecuted for showing Aztec code images rather than using an “app”, fortunately I think that particular nonsense is not seen any more.