E-Tickets being inaccessible/difficult to use for the elderly.

[AlterEgo]

Of course not - good customer service is the very least I expect off a company I'm dealing with rather than being expected to pay a premium for it. An extra fee would be discriminatory anyway; what about disabled people such as the partially sighted who are unable to book online?

Are partially sighted people unable to book online because of their disability? Many partially sighted people use screen readers and assistive technology and can use the same websites you and I can.

Crosscountry charge an additional fee if you choose to collect or have something posted in situations when an eticket was offered. It’s not been problematic at all.

 

[Haywain]

Are partially sighted people unable to book online because of their disability? Many partially sighted people use screen readers and assistive technology and can use the same websites you and I can.

And the RNIB provide a service testing websites for their functionality for those groups.

 

[Halwynd]

I just Googled, and it appears the approximate cost of printing a page on a monochrome laser printer is £0.007. Yes, seven tenths of a penny.

This is the biggest non-issue I've seen in the whole world of non-issues. You have a printer, print out your e-tickets. There's just not a problem here.

HP tells me that my new toner cartridge will print 2,500 sheets of A4. Forget the price of paper, the toner for an average page of text is 3p. A PDF ticket uses considerably more. Still, not a huge deal. The railway wants to transfer some of the costs of ticketing to the passenger, I can see that, but one of the first rules in business is that you make it as easy as possible for as many people as possible to buy from you - I'm sure some other members will see the wider point I was making in my original post.

These things are for discussion, of course, but please at least try to accept other views without trying to ridicule them.

 

[Bletchleyite]

HP tells me that my new toner cartridge will print 2,500 sheets of A4. Forget the price of paper, the toner for an average page of text is 3p. A PDF ticket uses considerably more. Still, not a huge deal. The railway wants to transfer some of the costs of ticketing to the passenger, I can see that, but one of the first rules in business is that you make it as easy as possible for as many people as possible to buy from you - I'm sure some other members will see the wider point I was making in my original post.

These things are for discussion, of course, but please at least try to accept that others might not share your own views without trying to ridicule.

The thing that makes it hard to buy train tickets is the complexity of the fares structure. That it appears is finally being addressed.

I'm afraid anyone complaining about whether even ten pence or so for ink and paper (and that's the extreme high end, as I said I got 0.007p as the figure elsewhere) is significant when purchasing a train ticket of a far more significant cost is just being downright petty. It is a non-issue. If you have a printer and don't trust mobile devices, print the e-ticket out at your cost. Next thing you'll be complaining about half a penn'orth of electricity while buying the ticket but ignoring the shoe leather it'd cost to walk to the station to buy your Advance at the booking office (not to mention valuing your time at zero).

There are valid issues with closure of booking offices and moving to e-ticketing, but this is not one.

 

[Dave W]

This morning at our Tesco I had to wait several minutes while the woman in front of me hunted first for her Clubcard then the appropriate thing to pay on her smartphone. I imagine the same will happen with the trains if we go e-ticket only.

Several minutes! Really!?

Or in practice, did this lady take a few extra seconds because she hadn't prepared before paying? Which is just as likely if you are paying by mobile phone app, card, notes, cash, etc, etc, etc.

There may be a valid issue in all this, speed of transaction is simply not one. And even less so on trains, where you are explicitly told to produce tickets ahead of time.

 

[Halwynd]

The thing that makes it hard to buy train tickets is the complexity of the fares structure. That it appears is finally being addressed.

I'm afraid anyone complaining about whether even ten pence or so for ink and paper (and that's the extreme high end, as I said I got 0.007p as the figure elsewhere) is significant when purchasing a train ticket of a far more significant cost is just being downright petty. It is a non-issue. If you have a printer and don't trust mobile devices, print the e-ticket out at your cost. Next thing you'll be complaining about half a penn'orth of electricity while buying the ticket but ignoring the shoe leather it'd cost to walk to the station to buy your Advance at the booking office.

There are valid issues with closure of booking offices and moving to e-ticketing, but this is not one.

As I say, I think you've missed the wider point in my original post and prefer to try to discredit or ridicule my views in a slightly agressive way. I'll leave it there.

 

[yorkie]

If as some suggest you get many separate pdf's for a journey printing those out will involve lots of sheets of paper, a waste, as arranging your computer to print them on a single sheet may be beyond the technical ability of many.

That happened to someone who searched for multiple journeys. It won't happen if you search for one journey.

To be clear, the forum's split ticket site gives you one PDF per passenger for the whole journey. Easy.

This morning at our Tesco I had to wait several minutes while the woman in front of me hunted first for her Clubcard then the appropriate thing to pay on her smartphone. I imagine the same will happen with the trains if we go e-ticket only.

On most trains I am on, you hear the inspector coming due to the beeps, and most people get their scan done in less time than a paper inspection. People are also less likely to misplace phones than paper tickets. I've seen Northern Guards fully check really busy trains out of York before Church Fenton; this was unheard of 10 years ago.

 

[skyhigh]

This morning at our Tesco I had to wait several minutes while the woman in front of me hunted first for her Clubcard then the appropriate thing to pay on her smartphone. I imagine the same will happen with the trains if we go e-ticket only.

Because of course the same thing would never happen if we stuck to paper tickets, would it...?

 

[AlterEgo]

This morning at our Tesco I had to wait several minutes while the woman in front of me hunted first for her Clubcard then the appropriate thing to pay on her smartphone. I imagine the same will happen with the trains if we go e-ticket only.

Nearly everyone on my train this morning had an e-ticket. As they do on nearly every long distance train I take. No problems with getting them checked at all.

 

[yorkie]

HP tells me that my new toner cartridge will print 2,500 sheets of A4. Forget the price of paper, the toner for an average page of text is 3p.

For comparison, at work our contract is for 2.36p for colour and 0.27p for mono. Admittedly that is a heavy duty printer but I am surprised yours is ten times the cost!

 

[AlterEgo]

Because of course the same thing would never happen if we stuck to paper tickets, would it...?

People famously always remember where their paper tickets are

 

[Ediswan]

For comparison, at work our contract is for 2.36p for colour and 0.27p for mono. Admittedly that is a heavy duty printer but I am surprised yours is ten times the cost!

Quite possibly the common principle that buying in bulk is a lot cheaper than buying a small quantity. The price of ink and toner for domestic printers is notoriously high.

 

[Halwynd]

For comparison, at work our contract is for 2.36p for colour and 0.27p for mono. Admittedly that is a heavy duty printer but I am surprised yours is ten times the cost!

Yorkie - the overall point I was trying to make is that in business, and particularly on public transport, you should try to make it as easy as possible for as many people as possible to travel. You don't put barriers, perceived or actual, in their way.

My father will buy a ticket from a booking office. No doubt he'll have a go at buying one from a ticket machine if he has to. He'll buy online and collect via TOD. Tell him that he'll need a smartphone app and/or a printer to print his own ticket and he'll just get in his car.

For what it's worth, my toner cartridge is around £75!

 

[ainsworth74]

I've seen Northern Guards fully check really busy trains out of York before Church Fenton; this was unheard of 10 years ago.

I was thinking the same actually. Busy trains my way the conductor would regularly struggle to get through both carriages of 2-car train due to checking and selling tickets. Now they can get through the entire train by Middlesbrough with ease as most people are on e-tickets or smartcard (80/90%) and the rest are either buying at the TVM or getting a promise to pay (or a Penalty Fare when RPIs are on and they've done neither!).

 

[yorkie]

Yorkie - the overall point I was trying to make is that in business, and particularly on public transport, you should try to make it as easy as possible for as many people as possible to travel. You don't put barriers, perceived or actual, in their way.

Agreed; having to potentialy queue at a station for a booking office or a TVM is a barrier that has thankfully been removed and I can simply jump on the train these days!

My father will buy a ticket from a booking office. No doubt he'll have a go at buying one from a ticket machine if he has to. He'll buy online and collect via TOD. Tell him that he'll need a smartphone app and/or a printer to print his own ticket and he'll just get in his car.

I don't use a smartphone app to buy tickets. I don't use a printer. No-one needs these things to travel by train and most e-ticket users don't either.

m-tickets did require apps and Print@Home early barcode tickets did require printing; both were archaic methods that are not a patch on, nor to be confused with, modern e-tickets.

For what it's worth, my toner cartridge is around £75!

It might be more economical to show things on your phone, but it's a choice that you have.

 

[Bletchleyite]

Nearly everyone on my train this morning had an e-ticket. As they do on nearly every long distance train I take. No problems with getting them checked at all.

I suspect the majority of non e-tickets are now flows where they aren't offered such as London Travelcards.

 

[AlterEgo]

Yorkie - the overall point I was trying to make is that in business, and particularly on public transport, you should try to make it as easy as possible for as many people as possible to travel. You don't put barriers, perceived or actual, in their way.

But you also don’t encourage customers to use a very expensive and environmentally unfriendly way of fulfilling their order either. The installation and running costs of machines to support ToD is quite significant.

 

[Bletchleyite]

But you also don’t encourage customers to use a very expensive and environmentally unfriendly way of fulfilling their order either. The installation and running costs of machines to support ToD is quite significant.

En masse yes. But I don't think we will any time soon (nor should) see a situation where it is never possible to arrive at a railway station and buy a ticket, so at least some of those will still exist, even if it gets as far as these purchases only being Anytime Singles.

 

[Wallsendmag]

En masse yes. But I don't think we will any time soon (nor should) see a situation where it is never possible to arrive at a railway station and buy a ticket, so at least some of those will still exist, even if it gets as far as these purchases only being Anytime Singles.

ToD is expensive and the hardware it runs on is nearly life expired, I'm sure RDG and GBRTT will be looking to see if it is still needed.

 

[Bletchleyite]

ToD is expensive and the hardware it runs on is nearly life expired, I'm sure RDG and GBRTT will be looking to see if it is still needed.

ToD as it exists now, yes, but I struggle to see why a much simpler facility to (re)print an e-ticket on till roll shouldn't exist. If you still have a means of purchasing tickets at the station then running something like that on it doesn't strike me as costly.

 

[Halwynd]

Agreed; having to potentialy queue at a station for a booking office or a TVM is a barrier that has thankfully been removed and I can simply jump on the train these days!

I don't use a smartphone app to buy tickets. I don't use a printer. No-one needs these things to travel by train and most e-ticket users don't either.

m-tickets did require apps and Print@Home early barcode tickets did require printing; both were archaic methods that are not a patch on, nor to be confused with, modern e-tickets.

It might be more economical to show things on your phone, but it's a choice that you have.

I agree with your point about queuing at the booking office. Some - including myself - will certainly see that as a benefit. I am not anti-App as I said in the opening sentence of my original post: I use a number of Apps; banking, buying fuel from BP etc. None of them threaten me with a penalty charge (fare) - or an unwelcome letter - if something goes wrong with technology, or my battery runs down.

Clearly we all have firmly held views on the subject of ticketing. I have always tried to be polite in what I say to other members, but I'd rather not have my views misinterpreted, or isolated from the substantive point in an attempt to create ridicule (not by yourself I hasten to add), so I will bow out now, perhaps slightly regretting posting in the first place!

 

[philthetube]

I don't use a smartphone app to buy tickets. I don't use a printer. No-one needs these things to travel by train and most e-ticket users don't either.

But you have to have one of the above, unless I am missing something?

 

[Bungaroosh]

I think it's great that some elderly people have picked up the concept of online shopping etc however particularly my grandparents can't remember what I have taught them for more than a week and refuse to make purchases online purely because of not trusting devices with money.

Yes. My mother who is in her late 70s has had regular access to the internet using her own computer since 2002 (blimey, 21 years now!!), but she has never trusted to buy anything or enter her card details over the internet. On the rare occasion she's wanted something from Amazon or wherever, she's asked me to buy it for her and sent me a cheque through the post!

At least she is highly unlikely to fall victim to a scam, I suppose.

 

[Wallsendmag]

But you have to have one of the above, unless I am missing something?

You don't need a Smartphone to use an eTicket I don't know how many times it needs repeating. There are TVMs out there that issue eTickets they just print it right there and then.

 

[Haywain]

But you have to have one of the above, unless I am missing something?

No. You can buy a ticket online without having a smartphone app, and show the ticket on a smartphone without printing it out.

 

[Skymonster]

Now, almost all people over 70 that I know would not know how to purchase an online ticket or feel confident handing over bank details to their online device wich would mean in the event of an issue with facilities to buy a physical ticket, not traveling.

Really, we should be trying to improve digital literacy among the elderly.

This is a problem that’s going to diminish substantially as time passes. I’m not 70 by any means, but I don’t have much more than a decade to go, and I believe myself - and the majority of others in my age group - to be reasonably computer literate.

What bothers me more in this world of inclusivity is that there are - and still will be as the general age of mass computer literacy increases - people who don’t have the mental capacity / ability to use computers correctly, but who may be able to interact with a person across a ticket desk. What of those people if the railway does transform to all-digital. Hopefully it won’t come to that.

As for electronic fulfilment, I’ll continue to use TOD be it on CCST or till roll until it’s extinct Then I’ll think again. It’s not about access to or my trust in the platform, but rather that I regard paper as easier to deal with when I’m actually travelling.

 

[andythebrave]

This is a problem that’s going to diminish substantially as time passes. I’m not 70 by any means, but I don’t have much more than a decade to go, and I believe myself - and the majority of others in my age group - to be reasonably computer literate.

What bothers me more in this world of inclusivity is that there are - and still will be as the general age of mass computer literacy increases - people who don’t have the mental capacity / ability to use computers correctly, but who may be able to interact with a person across a ticket desk. What of those people if the railway does transform to all-digital. Hopefully it won’t come to that.

As for electronic fulfilment, I’ll continue to use TOD be it on CCST or till roll until it’s extinct Then I’ll think again. It’s not about access to or my trust in the platform, but rather that I regard paper as easier to deal with when I’m actually travelling.

Well said.

 

[Haywain]

Really, we should be trying to improve digital literacy among the elderly.

And stop being so blooming patronising too! This applies to many posters on this and similar threads. Being older is not the same as being thick!

 

[Cdd89]

Tickets are now explicitly transferable unless issued in someone's name (e.g. a season ticket). They can even be sold, provided no more than the face value is paid

I didn’t realise that. Given this, isn’t it a bit peculiar that a website specialising in re-selling unwanted advance e-tickets hasn’t sprung up. (“No more than face value” presumably doesn’t prevent such a web site from selling the ticket for £facevalue, and paying the original purchaser £facevalue minus fee).

 

[yorkie]

But you have to have one of the above, unless I am missing something?

e-tickets are PDFs so can be shown on any electronic device; no need for an active internet connection. They can alternatively be printed.