Train Operator Considers Charging For Specific Seat Selection

I have just been shown an Ipsos MORI survey on behalf of LNER, which asks for feedback regarding selling add-ons to tickets during the online purchase process, in the manner of the no-frills airlines.

One of the options that it focusses on (to quite an extent) is willingness to pay for specific seat reservations beyond 'forward' or 'back' to the direction of travel.

The survey includes a test for a form of price inertia - would you be willing to pay £x, £y, £z, £z+ for a specific seat, etc.

It's notable that, to complete the survey, the participant effectively has to agree with the premise that the basic idea is approved-of.

FQTV said:

One of the options that it focusses on (to quite an extent) is willingness to pay for specific seat reservations beyond 'forward' or 'back' to the direction of travel.

Click to expand...

Back in the days of British Rail and I'm talking 1970s, seat reservations cost extra. When did that change?

I'm not fundamentally opposed to this because it makes it less likely people will take seats e.g. with more legroom, so I can choose to pay for them.

(Edit: I'd do First Class if the markup was not so outrageous on walk-up fares!)

It also makes sense to discourage choice except for those who really want it, as you can allocate the seats more efficiently, for instance putting a Kings Cross to Peterborough and Peterborough to Leeds reservation in the same seat and leaving another one completely free for someone doing KX-Leeds, rather than blocking two seats with the first two and leaving nothing for the third. That is also a benefit of a charge - you can offer that value-added service to those who want it, and allocate more efficiently those who don't see it has an added value.

MarlowDonkey said:

Back in the days of British Rail and I'm talking 1970s, seat reservations cost extra. When did that change?

Click to expand...

In the 90si worked in a ticket office and I'm sure there was a reservation we charged £1 for ,but for the life of me I cant remember what,but don't think it was seats. Certainly on quota controlled apex and super advance fares the seat reservation was compulsory but included in the price.

FQTV said:

I have just been shown an Ipsos MORI survey on behalf of LNER, which asks for feedback regarding selling add-ons to tickets during the online purchase process, in the manner of the no-frills airlines.

One of the options that it focusses on (to quite an extent) is willingness to pay for specific seat reservations beyond 'forward' or 'back' to the direction of travel.

The survey includes a test for a form of price inertia - would you be willing to pay £x, £y, £z, £z+ for a specific seat, etc.

It's notable that, to complete the survey, the participant effectively has to agree with the premise that the basic idea is approved-of.

Click to expand...

What with VTs proposal to not allow standing and now this, it seems the long distance operators are paying close attention to the low cost airline model. Maybe they'll start charging for bags soon....

How will this work when you can't even get down the aisle for standing passengers only to find someone else sat in your reserved seat?

theironroad said:

What with VTs proposal to not allow standing and now this, it seems the long distance operators are paying close attention to the low cost airline model. Maybe they'll start charging for bags soon....

Click to expand...

Don't give them ideas. SNCF already had that one.

In the 70's as stated above a seat reservation cost extra if you fly you can pay a lot extra for a good seat or even for priority boarding or suitcases. In the US you can be charged double if your overweight so in this world of private companies franchising I am surprised they all don't do the add on extras to boost the take per passenger

paying for a seat reservation or for more convenient seats (shorter walk to and from the platform) might bring in a good chunk of money as might excess baggage charges or a package that includes seat reservation drink and a snack

Franchise profit margins are very thin and if the government is serious about letting the east coast franchise again they need to look at ideas to improve the revenue stream and hence the viability of the business

MarlowDonkey said:

Back in the days of British Rail and I'm talking 1970s, seat reservations cost extra. When did that change?

Click to expand...

Don't any TOCs charge these days then?

I remember ScotRail used to charge 50p.

hexagon789 said:

Don't any TOCs charge these days then?

Click to expand...

Most Advance tickets come complete with a reserved seat. Reservations are offered with flexible tickets as well when you book online. Whilst there's not so much point in reserving if your travel times are flexible, in practice if you don't you find the carriages a sea of reservations even when the seats aren't occupied. This can make it difficult to find a seat.

theironroad said:

In the 90si worked in a ticket office and I'm sure there was a reservation we charged £1 for ,but for the life of me I cant remember what,but don't think it was seats.

Click to expand...

Bike reservation perhaps,? I’m sure I remember having to pay on IC services at one time

MarlowDonkey said:

Most Advance tickets come complete with a reserved seat. Reservations are offered with flexible tickets as well when you book online. Whilst there's not so much point in reserving if your travel times are flexible, in practice if you don't you find the carriages a sea of reservations even when the seats aren't occupied. This can make it difficult to find a seat.

Click to expand...

I've never had that issue personally but I can understand how easily that could come about.

Reservation policies are never going to suit all

Bletchleyite said:

for instance putting a Kings Cross to Peterborough and Peterborough to Leeds reservation in the same seat and leaving another one completely free for someone doing KX-Leeds

Click to expand...

For that to work as much as possible (and it is a good idea) you would need it to be more like the airlines with a check in close to departure date, so they could allocate seats as late as possible.
What would be the best way to fill the train? Carriage by carriage, or spread through the train and centre before ends to make it easier for walk ups to find seats?

Meerkat said:

For that to work as much as possible (and it is a good idea) you would need it to be more like the airlines with a check in close to departure date, so they could allocate seats as late as possible.

Click to expand...

Indian railways do this - on arrival at the station you check a list of names for your seat/berth number.

Bletchleyite said:

I'm not fundamentally opposed to this because it makes it less likely people will take seats e.g. with more legroom, so I can choose to pay for them.

(Edit: I'd do First Class if the markup was not so outrageous on walk-up fares!)

It also makes sense to discourage choice except for those who really want it, as you can allocate the seats more efficiently, for instance putting a Kings Cross to Peterborough and Peterborough to Leeds reservation in the same seat and leaving another one completely free for someone doing KX-Leeds, rather than blocking two seats with the first two and leaving nothing for the third. That is also a benefit of a charge - you can offer that value-added service to those who want it, and allocate more efficiently those who don't see it has an added value.

Click to expand...

Meerkat said:

For that to work as much as possible (and it is a good idea) you would need it to be more like the airlines with a check in close to departure date, so they could allocate seats as late as possible.
What would be the best way to fill the train? Carriage by carriage, or spread through the train and centre before ends to make it easier for walk ups to find seats?

Click to expand...

From what I can see, this already happens through back-end systems controlling selective availability of reservations tied to specific sectors/origins and destinations. Empirically, I see quite different seat availability for York < > Peterborough, compared to Newcastle < > King's Cross, on exactly the same service.

Of course, one should never ascribe to design what in fact could be a simple error.

I think one obvious problem with this proposal is that my definition of a 'good' seat includes 'not so many people sitting in neighbouring seats, and the people who are look reasonably present and aren't being rowdy or drinking alcohol'. How much I value a Window seat will depend on what the weather is like and how much work I discover I need to do (or how tired I am) on the day. These are all things that are impossible to determine at the time that I make a reservation. And off the top of my head, I can't think of many things that would distinguish a particular seat that would make me willing to pay to sit there at the time of booking - especially when I know that a fair number of 'reserved' seats are likely to turn out to be free after all when I board the train.

More fundamentally, this just adds to the complexity of buying rail tickets. I really don't want to have to worry about paying different amounts to get certain things. I'd much rather just pay one fare for the distance I'm travelling. I fear that rail tickets are getting closer and closer to the airline model, in which fares for the same journey vary so much, and there are so many hidden extras that you might not notice if you're not careful when you book, that you can basically spend all afternoon looking at different sites and flights to get somewhere near the best price - so booking a flight becomes a huge chore.

Edders23 said:

In the 70's as stated above a seat reservation cost extra if you fly you can pay a lot extra for a good seat or even for priority boarding or suitcases. In the US you can be charged double if your overweight so in this world of private companies franchising I am surprised they all don't do the add on extras to boost the take per passenger

Click to expand...

Yep. And that seems to be a fairly recent phenomenon. I'm pretty sure that even two years ago, no extra charges were applied for any economy seat.

Incidentally, a month ago I flew to San Francisco with Virgin. When I was invited to choose seats, it turned out that it would cost me about £80 extra to choose the extra-legroom seats by the emergency exits. I decided that was too much and declined. When I actually boarded and had a chance to look at the seats, I realised that the extra-legroom seats also had much smaller tables, had no window by them, were right next to the toilets, and if you were sitting at them, you wouldn't be able to watch tv during take-off/landing (because the tv's had to be stowed away - a restriction that didn't apply to all the other seats). If I had actually paid for one of those seats, I would have been extremely annoyed, and be pursuing a major complaint with Virgin. I think that illustrates how different people's tastes vary, making it very hard for a company to judge what counts as a good seat that's worth charging for.

FQTV said:

I have just been shown an Ipsos MORI survey on behalf of LNER, which asks for feedback regarding selling add-ons to tickets during the online purchase process, in the manner of the no-frills airlines.
One of the options that it focusses on (to quite an extent) is willingness to pay for specific seat reservations beyond 'forward' or 'back' to the direction of travel.
The survey includes a test for a form of price inertia - would you be willing to pay £x, £y, £z, £z+ for a specific seat, etc.
It's notable that, to complete the survey, the participant effectively has to agree with the premise that the basic idea is approved-of.

Click to expand...

So that when they go to the ORR for approval to implement it, they can say that everybody surveyed agreed with the idea.

Will you only be able to do this if you book on LNER's web-site? I can't see other TOCs upgrading their systems to suit LNER.

I am concerned that various TOCs are implementing fares and features that you can only access if you book on their web-site. That is OK if your journey only involves travelling on their trains. However, I am increasingly concerned that life is steadily being made more difficult for travellers whose journeys involve travelling on two or more TOC's services.

Belperpete said:

Will you only be able to do this if you book on LNER's web-site? I can't see other TOCs upgrading their systems to suit LNER.

Click to expand...

The LNER seat selector is already only available on LNER's website.

It seems as though LNER has decided it has too many passengers and wants to discourage passengers from wishing to travel on their trains. Of course if LNER gets approval to do this and makes more money then the other TOCs will follow suit.

It appears that all this talk of encouraging people to travel by train instead of by car was just talk as usual.

LNER has decided everybody wants that aisle airline seat and if you want to reserve a window seat, a table seat or even a reserve a seat outside the 'default' coach, that will cost you extra.

The only outcome will be folk getting the free reservation and ignoring it, sitting in a seat of their pick elsewhere

(By default coach, I mean the coach which tends to get the bulk of the reservations, I tend to pick a seat outside that coach as on certain trains it will likely be quieter. Everybody in coach C/D with a handful of reservations in coach F etc).

Something you would expect from one of those evil private rail companies, and not the semi-nationalised one

Kite159 said:

The only outcome will be folk getting the free reservation and ignoring it, sitting in a seat of their pick elsewhere

Click to expand...

Or alternatively, charging extra on board if you have an advance purchase ticket and don't sit in your reserved seat.

theironroad said:

In the 90si worked in a ticket office and I'm sure there was a reservation we charged £1 for ,but for the life of me I cant remember what,but don't think it was seats. Certainly on quota controlled apex and super advance fares the seat reservation was compulsory but included in the price.

Click to expand...

Yep in the days before advance tickets became widely available, and almost all intercity travel was on open (anytime) tickets or savers (off peak), seat reservations were a quid. However there was no way of ‘linking’ the reservation to the ticket, so you could make multiple reservations with one ticket if you were so inclined (and had enough quids).

I’m fairly sure that the price went up to £2 shortly after privatisation, but then advances took off.

If charging extra for different seat locations were to be introduced the TOC would need to make sure that their systems for indicating reserved seats on board were much more robust then at present. Failing to provide somethiing that someone has specifically paid for will result in far more complaints/compensation claims than if that something is free of charge.

The alternative is to to have fully reserved trains with no reservation displays, as is already the case in some countries. I doubt that would go down well here.

sheff1 said:

The alternative is to to have fully reserved trains with no reservation displays, as is already the case in some countries. I doubt that would go down well here.

Click to expand...

Or reserved and unreserved coaches/areas. This is what PKP IC does, only the EIP (Pendolino) has true compulsory reservations i.e. there is a penalty if you board without one.

JonathanH said:

Or alternatively, charging extra on board if you have an advance purchase ticket and don't sit in your reserved seat.

Click to expand...

I imagine that would for all practical purposes be impossible to enforce - as any attempt to enforce would result in a flood of complaints along the lines of 'but there was someone sitting in my reserved seat. What else was I supposed to do?' swiftly followed by awful publicity in the media.

I am watching this with interest but opposed to it as it seems like the budget airline model.

if you are a family - you must pay to stay together. Otherwise you risk having the 4 people that booked together distributed down the coach.

on the positive side - it may make the solo traveler that insists on booking a table think twice, but if it forces groups to split up unless they pay that is wrong. I have already on the Azuma had a two party reservation split in 2 solo seats (first). Luckily a table of 4 was vacant to move onto. That would not go down well if it was the normal allocation and you need to pay to avoid it.

The other thing I have noticed even now is that on services such as London - Newark (terminator) all the reservations are in 1 coach. The rest of the train is empty. I hope the option for don’t reserve on APs exists so we can just choose our seat on the train.

Failed Unit said:

if you are a family - you must pay to stay together. Otherwise you risk having the 4 people that booked together distributed down the coach

Click to expand...

And like a certain airline, the system could deliberately separate groups even when they could be seated together to encourage people to pay the extra fees

If charging to reserve particular seats or groups of seats, or charging for groups to be able to sit together went ahead, is there any possibility of a legal challenge, on the basis that for all practical purposes, it would amount to an increase in fares, which must include at least some regulated fares?

DynamicSpirit said:

If charging to reserve particular seats or groups of seats, or charging for groups to be able to sit together went ahead, is there any possibility of a legal challenge, on the basis that for all practical purposes, it would amount to an increase in fares, which must include at least some regulated fares?

Click to expand...

No, because it would do nothing of the sort, because regulated fares are all walk-up fares so a reservation is not required, and seat reservation fees are not regulated, and even if they were a choice of specific seat (beyond facing/back/window/aisle etc) is not required, otherwise all the TOCs would have to do it.

DynamicSpirit said:

If charging to reserve particular seats or groups of seats, or charging for groups to be able to sit together went ahead, is there any possibility of a legal challenge, on the basis that for all practical purposes, it would amount to an increase in fares, which must include at least some regulated fares?

Click to expand...

I don’t see how any such challenge could proceed as it isn’t a compulsory charge