Introducing RailUK Tickets - support the forum when booking your rail tickets!

[MrJeeves]

Is this likely to be a Google issue which you have not much control over?

This is actually something we directly control!

The passes are grouped by an arbitrary identifier which we provide, and we coincidentally did some work to improve how these are generated which went live on 9 October, which was after you made your booking.

I think this shouldn't happen again, but I'll reproduce your purchase in one of our development environments to double-check and pass it on to the person who generates the grouping identifiers for my Google Wallet implementation if it's still an issue.

 

[infobleep]

This is actually something we directly control!

The passes are grouped by an arbitrary identifier which we provide, and we coincidentally did some work to improve how these are generated which went live on 9 October, which was after you made your booking.

I think this shouldn't happen again, but I'll reproduce your purchase in one of our development environments to double-check and pass it on to the person who generates the grouping identifiers for my Google Wallet implementation if it's still an issue.

That's great. I report something and it seems you have already fixed it.

If only more software and systems were like this.

I'm actually attending a software user group meeting tomorrow. Some of the software I use is great and other bits awful.

 

[Adam Williams]

That's great. I report something and it seems you have already fixed it.

If only more software and systems were like this.

You're far too kind!

What @MrJeeves' post was really saying was "@Adam Williams screwed it up the first time he implemented it" but he was too polite to say it

 

[infobleep]

You're far too kind!

What @MrJeeves' post was really saying was "@Adam Williams screwed it up the first time he implemented it" but he was too polite to say it

Well we are all human and I don't mine mistakes as long as they aren't by people who don't care, think they are alwqys right and dont listen or just do things in a hurry to keep people higher up than themselves happy.

 

[MrJeeves]

What @MrJeeves' post was really saying was "@Adam Williams screwed it up the first time he implemented it" but he was too polite to say it

Well, when you put it like that...

 

[Egg Centric]

That's great. I report something and it seems you have already fixed it.

If only more software and systems were like this.

I'm actually attending a software user group meeting tomorrow. Some of the software I use is great and other bits awful.

It certainly is great. This is why I use the site. Otherwise I'd be faffing around trying to get an extra 10% off through some unholy combo of retailer and credit card offers. You get what you pay for!

 

[infobleep]

It certainly is great. This is why I use the site. Otherwise I'd be faffing around trying to get an extra 10% off through some unholy combo of retailer and credit card offers. You get what you pay for!

There is always understanding the routing guide, which takes time. However, If you combine it with the forums site, it can be even more powerful.

 

[BRX]

One thing I wish trainsplit would do:

Many other sites show you that a railcard discount is being applied:



Maybe a decision has been made that to keep the interface clean, this isn't shown on trainsplit, however I find it reassuring to see confirmation that the price being quoted includes a railcard discount. Otherwise I sometimes find myself going back to double check. It's also a quick indidcator of, for example, whether I'm looking at a destination just outside of the Network Railcard area, because it can be useful to understand this when making a decision about what ticket to buy.

 

[MrJeeves]

Maybe a decision has been made that to keep the interface clean, this isn't shown on trainsplit, however I find it reassuring to see confirmation that the price being quoted includes a railcard discount. Otherwise I sometimes find myself going back to double check. It's also a quick indidcator of, for example, whether I'm looking at a destination just outside of the Network Railcard area, because it can be useful to understand this when making a decision about what ticket to buy.

You can press the information button next to the "Your selected ticket" in the sidebar on the beta site.

This opens a modal that shows all the names of all tickets we're offering, along with the Railcard breakdown for each.

 

[DynamicSpirit]

I suspect I'm going to be laughed at for asking this, but have you considered changing the 'From' name in the emails you send with etickets, so the From field is more dissimilar from standard railforums notifications? I get loads of emails every day from 'RailUK Forums' which are typically notifications of replies to threads. Etickets come from 'RailUK Forums Tickets' and if I'm quickly scanning a list of dozens of emails and deleting the ones that are not/no longer of interest then it's incredibly easy to not notice the difference and so delete the ETicket email along with the unrelated notifications. I think possibly a particular point of confusion is that I wouldn't expect to see 'Forums' as a separate word in sender name of an email containing ticket details. As a result, pretty much every time I've bought at ticket through railforums, I've ended up a few days later having to search my deleted items folder to recover the ticket.

Maybe something like 'Trainsplit/RailForums Tickets'?

 

[Adam Williams]

I suspect I'm going to be laughed at for asking this, but have you considered changing the 'From' name in the emails you send with etickets, so the From field is more dissimilar from standard railforums notifications? I get loads of emails every day from 'RailUK Forums' which are typically notifications of replies to threads. Etickets come from 'RailUK Forums Tickets' and if I'm quickly scanning a list of dozens of emails and deleting the ones that are not/no longer of interest then it's incredibly easy to not notice the difference and so delete the ETicket email along with the unrelated notifications. I think possibly a particular point of confusion is that I wouldn't expect to see 'Forums' as a separate word in sender name of an email containing ticket details. As a result, pretty much every time I've bought at ticket through railforums, I've ended up a few days later having to search my deleted items folder to recover the ticket.

Maybe something like 'Trainsplit/RailForums Tickets'?

I think it's a entirely valid request to make, along with useful context about why the current behaviour is a problem. Will see what can be done, but would want to discuss any changes with the forum team.

 

[infobleep]

I suspect I'm going to be laughed at for asking this, but have you considered changing the 'From' name in the emails you send with etickets, so the From field is more dissimilar from standard railforums notifications? I get loads of emails every day from 'RailUK Forums' which are typically notifications of replies to threads. Etickets come from 'RailUK Forums Tickets' and if I'm quickly scanning a list of dozens of emails and deleting the ones that are not/no longer of interest then it's incredibly easy to not notice the difference and so delete the ETicket email along with the unrelated notifications. I think possibly a particular point of confusion is that I wouldn't expect to see 'Forums' as a separate word in sender name of an email containing ticket details. As a result, pretty much every time I've bought at ticket through railforums, I've ended up a few days later having to search my deleted items folder to recover the ticket.

Maybe something like 'Trainsplit/RailForums Tickets'?

That's an iinteresting and good suggestion

It's never happened to me because I don't delete my e-mails but I can see how it could.

 

[Haywain]

I suspect I'm going to be laughed at for asking this, but have you considered changing the 'From' name in the emails you send with etickets, so the From field is more dissimilar from standard railforums notifications? I get loads of emails every day from 'RailUK Forums' which are typically notifications of replies to threads. Etickets come from 'RailUK Forums Tickets' and if I'm quickly scanning a list of dozens of emails and deleting the ones that are not/no longer of interest then it's incredibly easy to not notice the difference and so delete the ETicket email along with the unrelated notifications. I think possibly a particular point of confusion is that I wouldn't expect to see 'Forums' as a separate word in sender name of an email containing ticket details. As a result, pretty much every time I've bought at ticket through railforums, I've ended up a few days later having to search my deleted items folder to recover the ticket.

Maybe something like 'Trainsplit/RailForums Tickets'?

You don't have to have email notifications from the forum if you don't want them.

 

[DynamicSpirit]

You don't have to have email notifications from the forum if you don't want them.

I knew someone was going to say that

Mostly I don't need email notifications because see what's new when I go to the website, but just occasionally they are useful to let me know for example that someone has replied to a thread I haven't been actively watching for a while - hence why I keep email notifications turned on. But they all get deleted after a bit because once I've seen the notification and acted on it, I no longer need the email!

 

[Mike395]

I suspect I'm going to be laughed at for asking this, but have you considered changing the 'From' name in the emails you send with etickets, so the From field is more dissimilar from standard railforums notifications? I get loads of emails every day from 'RailUK Forums' which are typically notifications of replies to threads. Etickets come from 'RailUK Forums Tickets' and if I'm quickly scanning a list of dozens of emails and deleting the ones that are not/no longer of interest then it's incredibly easy to not notice the difference and so delete the ETicket email along with the unrelated notifications. I think possibly a particular point of confusion is that I wouldn't expect to see 'Forums' as a separate word in sender name of an email containing ticket details. As a result, pretty much every time I've bought at ticket through railforums, I've ended up a few days later having to search my deleted items folder to recover the ticket.

Maybe something like 'Trainsplit/RailForums Tickets'?

We've dropped 'Forums' from the email send name as of this morning - so emails will appear as from 'RailUK Tickets rather than 'RailUK Forums Tickets' which hopefully will help in terms of getting them to stand out vs forum notifications in your inbox. Thanks for the suggestion!

 

[DynamicSpirit]

We've dropped 'Forums' from the email send name as of this morning - so emails will appear as from 'RailUK Tickets rather than 'RailUK Forums Tickets' which hopefully will help in terms of getting them to stand out vs forum notifications in your inbox. Thanks for the suggestion!

Oh that's brilliant! Thanks for responding so quickly!

 

[SAPhil]

Trainsplit doesn't seem to offer me the correct fare from St Albans City to West Brompton arriving WBP at 18:30, return at 22:30 weekday travelling via West Hampstead Overground
It offers the any permitted fare at £12.85 rather than the fare of £11.35 that the Thameslink site offers me.

 

[ModernRailways]

It seems to be broken right now, or is it just for me?
Searching for any stations it fails and gives the below

Sorry, an error has occurred.​

Received HTTP 422: Leg origin/destination could not be located within train record Leg origin/destination could not be located within train record

 

[JoshD14]

What search are you specifically trying to complete? In the general case it all seems fine to me on both the main site and the beta...

 

[ModernRailways]

What search are you specifically trying to complete? In the general case it all seems fine to me on both the main site and the beta...

Sheffield to Newcastle, but have also tried Sheffield to Heworth, and Meadowhall to Newcastle/Heworth both give an error

 

[JoshD14]

Sheffield to Newcastle, but have also tried Sheffield to Heworth, and Meadowhall to Newcastle/Heworth both give an error

Thanks, we've located your searches in our logs and are taking a look at what's going on

 

[ModernRailways]

Thanks, we've located your searches in our logs and are taking a look at what's going on

Amazing, thank you

 

[signed]

Results | RailUK Tickets

TrainSplit is a free service that makes it easy to find the cheapest train tickets for your journey.

tickets-beta.railforums.co.uk

The 0729-0839 flow has a duplicate entry for the same exact Anytime Day Single between BZ6 and GTW

It happens as well on the 0828 flow, it does seem like every GX journey is affected

 

[Adam Williams]

Results | RailUK Tickets

TrainSplit is a free service that makes it easy to find the cheapest train tickets for your journey.

tickets-beta.railforums.co.uk

The 0729-0839 flow has a duplicate entry for the same exact Anytime Day Single between BZ6 and GTW

It happens as well on the 0828 flow, it does seem like every GX journey is affected

Thanks, this is a journey planner bug. Reported to supplier on Oct 7, 16:12

 

[1D54]

Just wondering why site doesn't give prices to the likes of Smethwick / Sandwell when booking tickets from East Midlands instead of looking for AP fares to New Street then OPDR to Wolverhampton.

 

[Farigiraf]

Some 'blog posts' from Trainsplit (which are also shown on RailUK Tickets' homepage) seem to be using AI generated train photos in the articles. Many of the 'travel tips' posts from the past do also seem very generic and artificial - for example there were multiple articles on best places to travel to by train in (insert season or holiday) which always seemed to recommend places without a station e.g. Keswick and Bourton-on-the-Water.


Images show 1. a very clearly AI generated thumbnail for an article with some fusion of a class 710 and a Voyager, 2. a Translink train photo in an article about GB rail travel (and currently through tickets to NI stations don't seem to be available on Trainsplit)

 

[DynamicSpirit]

Haha! That Thumbnail looks like it should be a creation of MC Escher!

 

[yorkie]

Some 'blog posts' from Trainsplit (which are also shown on RailUK Tickets' homepage) seem to be using AI generated train photos in the articles. Many of the 'travel tips' posts from the past do also seem very generic and artificial - for example there were multiple articles on best places to travel to by train in (insert season or holiday) which always seemed to recommend places without a station e.g. Keswick and Bourton-on-the-Water.
View attachment 168945View attachment 168946

Images show 1. a very clearly AI generated thumbnail for an article with some fusion of a class 710 and a Voyager, 2. a Translink train photo in an article about GB rail travel (and currently through tickets to NI stations don't seem to be available on Trainsplit)

Points noted. I am meeting some of the team behind the site later this month, so will discuss this with them then.

 

[Egg Centric]

TBF aren't most of these blog things done for SEO basically?

== Doublepost prevention - post automatically merged: 11 Nov 2024 ==

BTW A big shoutout to @Adam Williams (or I think it was he - was an "Adam" anyway) that did his best to get the reservation I requested tomorrow and explained fully which bit wasn't possible and why.

 

[Adam Williams]

BTW A big shoutout to @Adam Williams (or I think it was he - was an "Adam" anyway) that did his best to get the reservation I requested tomorrow and explained fully which bit wasn't possible and why.

Ha, I'd have been less formal about it if I'd clocked it was you at the time

I may ask you some follow-up questions about what you did with the Seat Selector at some point though, you shouldn't have been able to cause the failures you did in theory...