Ticket office closed, no working ticket machines

Nuneaton's one and only ticket machine was out of order today with a sign on it telling you to use the ticket office or buy on the train.

Only one ticket counter was open. but that's an improvement. For the past year or more, the ticket office is frequently closed during posted opening hours "due to staff shortages" and London Midland never given any warning of this on their website. You won't know about it until you turn up and find it shut.

I'm wondering what the situation is for people turning up to collect already purchased tickets for immediate travel when the ticket office is shut. (I could potentially be in this situation myself on Sunday if the machine has not been fixed and the ticket office is closed.)

Telling passengers to buy a new ticket on the train and then reclaim the cost would involve the passenger in additional time and expense which would not be recoverable, so that seems wholly unreasonable. Besides which, some passengers may not have the means/credit to purchase a new ticket.

I'd like to think common sense would prevail and on-board staff would allow passengers to travel the first leg of their journey and collect the tickets then, but I rather suspect that this will not happen.

I would suspect they would ask for proof (i.e. confirmation email, or just a reference code - is there a way they could call a number and ask what is held in the reference code?) and let the customer travel to their next interchange point without a ticket, giving a note to the next station if there is fear of them being unduly hassled by the staff there!

causton said:

I would suspect they would ask for proof (i.e. confirmation email, or just a reference code - is there a way they could call a number and ask what is held in the reference code?) and let the customer travel to their next interchange point without a ticket, giving a note to the next station if there is fear of them being unduly hassled by the staff there!

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I've had to do this a few times when I haven't been able to pick tickets up at my origin or at the station I changed at.

On both occasions the message from the guard was "We are meant to sell you a new ticket that you can get refunded when you collect your original tickets... But you'll be ok"

If its possible, I would print off the acknowledgement or receipt from the online vendor so that you have evidence of the purchase. If I haven't had an e-mail acknowledgement, whenever I make an online purchase I always pdf the receipt so that I have a record.

Regards

Bushy

causton said:

I would suspect they would ask for proof (i.e. confirmation email, or just a reference code - is there a way they could call a number and ask what is held in the reference code?) and let the customer travel to their next interchange point without a ticket, giving a note to the next station if there is fear of them being unduly hassled by the staff there!

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Guards can phone up to request verification of a ToD collection code, but it is quite a faff.

island said:

Guards can phone up to request verification of a ToD collection code, but it is quite a faff.

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Some TOCs simply do not do this at all - for comparison I frequently used to see Midland Mainline TMs doing this, but EMT flat-out refuse whatever the circumstances.

island said:

Guards can phone up to request verification of a ToD collection code, but it is quite a faff.

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It's far easier to ring up a friendly ticket office rather than official telesales/online sales desks. Most ticket offices can run the ref number through their system and tell you the details of the ticket and whether it's been collected or not.

I've done this 100's of times while enroute and never been refused yet, this includes ringing Virgin. LM and EMT ticket offices. It helps if you ring a larger booking office thats likely to have a clerk available to answer the phone as opposed to a one man band station who may be busy at the desk.

As long as I have reception on the mobile then it takes on average about 2 minutes (this includes friendly banter ).

If you can collect the tickets early it might avoid any awkward problems. You can pick tickets up at any time from any TOD enabled station, it doesn't have to be either the station you selected or just before departure. The reason the system gets you to choose a station is so that it knows you won't go to one without TOD facilities.

MikeWh said:

If you can collect the tickets early it might avoid any awkward problems. You can pick tickets up at any time from any TOD enabled station, it doesn't have to be either the station you selected or just before departure. The reason the system gets you to choose a station is so that it knows you won't go to one without TOD facilities.

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All well and good, but in this situation one runs the riak of loosing them. Don't think I've ever picked up tickets early.

I once picked up my tickets just after booking them, which was months before travel. Gets to a few days before travel and I forget that I have already collected them so go into a panic before finally coming to the conclusion that I must have collected them!

34D said:

All well and good, but in this situation one runs the riak of loosing them. Don't think I've ever picked up tickets early.

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Oh dear.

This thread was about what to do if there were no facilities to print the tickets early on a Sunday morning (possibly tomorrow). Every scenario has pros and cons. Yes, you could lose tickets printed months in advance, you could also lose/drop them while running for the train. If you leave it until the last minute you might forget that your credit card company sent you a new card and you shredded the old one. There is NO risk free solution to this problem. You need to weigh up the relative risks and decide the best solution for your own situation.

MikeWh said:

Oh dear.

This thread was about what to do if there were no facilities to print the tickets early on a Sunday morning (possibly tomorrow). Every scenario has pros and cons. Yes, you could lose tickets printed months in advance, you could also lose/drop them while running for the train. If you leave it until the last minute you might forget that your credit card company sent you a new card and you shredded the old one. There is NO risk free solution to this problem. You need to weigh up the relative risks and decide the best solution for your own situation.

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Great answer Mike.

I'm told the machine at Nuneaton was still broken yesterday, but it had been fixed by 10:30 this morning, so I was able to collect my tickets.