alistairlees
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Smart ticketing is the replacement. So smart cards, barcode tickets, pay as you go. That sort of thing.
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Travelling during a storm on purpose, hoping to get money back (hypothetical)
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Bletchleyite
Veteran Member
I often do, what's wrong with that? I want the flexibility the car offers, and a walk-up fare is how you achieve that. And reservations are unnecessary if the train is known not busy.
Bletchleyite
Veteran Member
I don't "queue up", neither Bletchley nor MKC generally have significant queues at the TVMs other than on a Monday morning when people are buying weeklies, particularly not since Bletchley got its second TVM. I walk up to the machine (or maybe wait for one person in front) and have it spitting out a ticket within about 10-20 seconds, far quicker than I can operate an app or website.
(Exception: Northern's awfully designed TVMs)
But why would I? If I don't want reservations, there is no advantage to doing so. If, however, my plans change, that results in an unnecessary £10 admin fee.
Having said all that, abolition of the admin fee for refunds on walk-up fares would be something I would support and might make me do so.
Thanks. I was more specifically wondering what the changes currently taking place in Scotland are. I know all (?) Scottish stations have smart card readers, is it using them? Nationwide pay as you go has been mooted for a long time but I've not seen any sign it will happen in the near future.
Some companies will allow reservations to be made without actually buying a ticket, if you are still shoring up other plans, if you call or get in touch on social media, as a special favour. It is easy to see why, because it allows them to compete with the car, which does not need to be paid for in advance. Of course, they're not obliged to do this, and could ask you to pay before making a reservation.
alistairlees
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All Scottish stations have smart card readers and all flows wholly in Scotland have the majority of their tickets - both season and non-season - able to be fulfilled to smart card.
For PAYG I did not say ‘national’, though some aspire to that.
For PAYG I did not say ‘national’, though some aspire to that.
I have an anecdote about online vs ticket office buying from a few weeks ago. I agreed to purchase some advance TFW tickets for people confused by the ticket options on the TFW website. I checked the prices on the Trainline app (purely because it's what I use on my phone for times and real time info, I've never used it to buy tickets), agreed the times and prices with the people and said I would buy them the next day as I would be passing Llandudno Junction station. At the station, I bought the tickets and one of the legs was a pound cheaper per ticket than I expected. Before leaving I triple checked the tickets were for the train I wanted, they were. I thought I must have misread the app, but on checking it no, the tickets were a pound more expensive on the app.
I'm not going to be rushing to buy tickets online except when it's genuinely to my benefit.
I'm not going to be rushing to buy tickets online except when it's genuinely to my benefit.
Llandudno Junction to Chester (and return), TfW specific trains only.
If this happens again, please post the details here at the time so that we can investigate. It is difficult to check after the event. If you can say what day/times the journey was for, we can see if we can reproduce it for a future date on the same trains.
Yes there have been a few threads about this fraud; see https://www.railforums.co.uk/thread...enced-after-bogus-compensation-claims.126750/ for example!
Are you saying I will not be able to use a rail ticket unless I purchase a smartphone ?
And now somebody has explained what a CCST is, I am even more confused as I regularly buy these in Scotland and have never found that the journey I want to make has had the card ticket withdrawn. So on what journeys have they been withdrawn ?
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Bletchleyite
Veteran Member
I suspect he's referring to the issue of tickets on used bog-roll rather than credit card sized tickets. But these aren't a change of concept per-se, they just move what was on the magstripe onto a barcode instead.
Wallsendmag
Established Member
Smart Cards, Barcode , PRT and ITSO on Mobile not to mention the several hundred pay as you go providers touting for business. ScotRail are now allowing certain Flexipasses to only be issued on Smartcards
Saperstein
Member
This fraud annoys me. If it’s not complicated enough for genuine pax who are delayed to claim.
What next will we have to film the train on a mobile phone or similar to prove we boarded?
Best bet would be for the TOCs to get together and falsify/skew the train running data for some journeys and thus root out the fraudsters!
Don’t know how practical that is but something needs doing.
Hopefully a fraud or deception charge will make them cease and desist and send out the same message other would-be thieves
Saperstein
Bletchleyite
Veteran Member
The e-ticket data will, long term, be able to weed out this kind of thing. The more e-tickets get scanned, the more of a record there is of which train they were used on, which either backs up the validity of the claim or proves it to be fraudulent.
Obviously if a ticket isn't scanned it proves nothing either way, but the more scans there are the harder it is to commit fraud.
Obviously if a ticket isn't scanned it proves nothing either way, but the more scans there are the harder it is to commit fraud.
aye2beeviasea
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So you forget to make a note of the actual time you arrived (maybe because you're focusing on getting to where you need to go) so check it on realtimetrains - and as a result get accused of fraud?
I've never heard of these described as "used" bog roll before! That sounds a bit too unpleasant.
Bletchleyite
Veteran Member
Saperstein
Member
Err no, not quite.
It appears that some mush who never made the journey looks up a delayed/cancelled train and tried to benefit from it but saying they missed it.
Genuine pax would know roughly what time they arrived and could correctly argue with the TOC. Yes I agree it is a faff but the actual fraudsters need stopping on their tracks (No pun intended!)
Saperstein
Ah, that makes more sense. I'd have expected to read about it on here if physical paper tickets were beginning to be withdrawn.
Well, I say sense, I have no real opinion on barcodes vs mag stripes, other than some people don't know what to do with a barcode ticket as it's a new concept, and they've been introduced before all gates have readers (I think?), but I do have an opinion on bog roll tickets. They're awful. A ticket in your pocket no longer feels like a ticket, it's a scrap of paper which could be any old receipt easily discarded. They don't neatly fit in a wallet like a credit card size ticket, and perhaps just because they were new to me, I was slightly confused about which was the outbound and which was the return portion on a return - I think the return is to the left, which seemed counter intuitive to me.
Other than to prevent people using a barcoded ticket with a magstripe reader I don't see the advantage of them.
The TOCs will have decided how much fraud is likely via things like this and how much effort is or isn't worth expending on preventing it.
There are far easier ways to defraud the railways, I'd be surprised if unused return parts is of any significance in the scheme of things.
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