Some of you will no doubt have been following this on my Twitter - and it is has now largely been sorted 24 hours later after a phone call with a SWT manager and sending an email to a Southern manager too (and discussing it with relevant people in other TOCs with smartcard schemes).
Link to my blog post about this: http://thomas-cairns.co.uk/2011/10/itso-failings-on-the-nr-network-continued/
To summarise, 7 day season between Bournemouth and Southampton Airport Parkway issued on ITSO. The crux of it was Southern refused to accept it on their (limited) services between Southampton Central and Southampton Airport despite receiving ORCATS and it would have been valid on paper.
As I say, after a little to and thro with the important people this problem was resolved. However, this problem came to being seemingly due to a policy failure at either DfT/ATOC and I'm going to be taking this up with them next week.
Anyone who may be interested in the workings of ITSO generally and my experiences after using it on the railways for 2 years may be interested to read this blog post here: http://thomas-cairns.co.uk/2011/09/itso-smartcards-and-you/
Link to my blog post about this: http://thomas-cairns.co.uk/2011/10/itso-failings-on-the-nr-network-continued/
To summarise, 7 day season between Bournemouth and Southampton Airport Parkway issued on ITSO. The crux of it was Southern refused to accept it on their (limited) services between Southampton Central and Southampton Airport despite receiving ORCATS and it would have been valid on paper.
As I say, after a little to and thro with the important people this problem was resolved. However, this problem came to being seemingly due to a policy failure at either DfT/ATOC and I'm going to be taking this up with them next week.
Anyone who may be interested in the workings of ITSO generally and my experiences after using it on the railways for 2 years may be interested to read this blog post here: http://thomas-cairns.co.uk/2011/09/itso-smartcards-and-you/