redspottedhanky.com

spoony · 23 Mar 2011

Has anyone used this website before and have any good/bad experiences? I have tried them tonight for booking tickets from Sunderland to Bolton, splitting at Leeds, Manchester, out and York on the way back. I have managed to get this booked for £34.50 which I am quite happy about. What I do particularly like however is that you can earn loyalty points which add up to discounts off future tickets

.

Apologies if this has already been posted, but before last week I had never heard of these guys. Only decided to use them as they sponsor the local 10k Sunderland race so was wondering on peoples opinions.

RailUK Forums

yorkie · 23 Mar 2011

It's Atos Origin's own site.

I prefer to book with East Coast, they use the same booking engine, and I get 10% off EC tickets. I usually stick with EC so all my bookings are in one place, except I will occasionally book with other operators' sites if they offer a discount.

jd · 23 Mar 2011

As far as I'm aware, apart from a few TOC-specific tickets, all ticketing sites sell the same tickets at the same prices. It doesn't matter if you go to thetrainline, qjump, Arriva Trains Wales, First TPE, Southeastern, National Rail, or any other site.

The only difference is, TOCs don't generally charge booking fees - third-party sites do. Therefore, it's always cheaper to book with a TOC, because the ticket price will be the same, but the third-party will add a booking fee.

Edit: I just went to have a play, and it seems I'm wrong, they don't charge a fee! That's nice.

Also, a bit off-topic, but I just left the default journey times there for my search, which were for travel tomorrow (24th). It offered me advance tickets - I thought they were only available until 6pm the day before travel?

WestCoast · 23 Mar 2011

They are definitely legit and stand out from the other companies in terms of name.

The website I book all my ticket through is www.londonmidland.com, it's got the excellent ATOS booking system and charges absolutely no fees (postal/card/ticket collection). One of the few that still has NO FEES whatsoever - I used to use East Coast but the postal fees put me off and I don't buy many East Coast advances so the 10% isn't relevant to me.
--- old post above --- --- new post below ---

The only difference is, TOCs don't generally charge booking fees - third-party sites do. Therefore, it's always cheaper to book with a TOC, because the ticket price will be the same, but the third-party will add a booking fee.

Many TOCs now have fees for things - CrossCountry, Virgin, Southern, Southeastern, South West Trains e.t.c all have some type of fee.

spoony · 23 Mar 2011

WestCoast said:
They are definitely legit and stand out from the other companies in terms of name.

The website I book all my ticket through is www.londonmidland.com, it's got the excellent ATOS booking system and charges absolutely no fees (postal/card/ticket collection). One of the few that still has NO FEES whatsoever - I used to use East Coast but the postal fees put me off and I don't buy many East Coast advances so the 10% isn't relevant to me.

I like it as its like someone packing all their belongings in a handkerchief before setting off on their travels :lol:

One thing I dont understand is that they dont have any fees. I got the same prices quoted as on EC, and have not had to pay any postage fees. How in that case do they make any money and able to offer a loyalty scheme?

WestCoast · 23 Mar 2011

One thing I dont understand is that they dont have any fees. I got the same prices quoted as on EC, and have not had to pay any postage fees. How in that case do they make any money and able to offer a loyalty scheme?

I am sure they used to charge a booking fee - I was looking at the site about a month ago! No idea how they make money from it - just advertising?

The trainline should be boycotted - their fees are ridiculous.

SS4 · 23 Mar 2011

WestCoast said:
They are definitely legit and stand out from the other companies in terms of name.

The website I book all my ticket through is www.londonmidland.com, it's got the excellent ATOS booking system and charges absolutely no fees (postal/card/ticket collection). One of the few that still has NO FEES whatsoever - I used to use East Coast but the postal fees put me off and I don't buy many East Coast advances so the 10% isn't relevant to me.
--- old post above --- --- new post below ---

Many TOCs now have fees for things - CrossCountry, Virgin, Southern, Southeastern, South West Trains e.t.c all have some type of fee.

I use London Midland's site since I travel with them the most anyway and I have been known to book ERD-BHM online to avoid fiddling for change.

spoony said:
One thing I dont understand is that they dont have any fees. I got the same prices quoted as on EC, and have not had to pay any postage fees. How in that case do they make any money and able to offer a loyalty scheme?

I suspect it makes a loss which is made up for elsewhere within atos origin.
--- old post above --- --- new post below ---

WestCoast said:
I am sure they used to charge a booking fee - I was looking at the site about a month ago! No idea how they make money from it - just advertising? The trainline should be boycotted - their fees are ridiculous.

I swear they did too! As for the trainline I tell people to use the TOCs website

yorkie · 23 Mar 2011

jd said:
Also, a bit off-topic, but I just left the default journey times there for my search, which were for travel tomorrow (24th). It offered me advance tickets - I thought they were only available until 6pm the day before travel?

Depends on the TOC that sets the fare
--- old post above --- --- new post below ---

spoony said:
One thing I dont understand is that they dont have any fees. I got the same prices quoted as on EC, and have not had to pay any postage fees. How in that case do they make any money and able to offer a loyalty scheme?

Well, yes but the TOCs have to pay Atos Origin to run their site for them. Atos Origin don't need to pay anyone (other than internal charges!) as they run the site. The fees may well go toward the cost to the TOCs of paying Atos Origin or Thetrainline...

barrykas · 24 Mar 2011

I wouldn't touch redspottedhanky with a ten foot bargepole...If there are any problems with your booking you have to phone them on a premium rate number at a cost of over £1 per minute including VAT.

And for even more "fun", there's no number for station staff to call to try and resolve a problem either...

Cheers,

Barry

yorkie · 24 Mar 2011

That's partly why I stick with East Coast, because they operate my nearest major station, and they run the machines that I would be using. Most of my Advance journeys are with East Coast/TPE/Cross Country, and I'd rather use one site to keep the bookings together.

I've heard too many horror stories of people booking with a company then getting to a station run by another company and then travelling with a completely different company, and they all blame each other and they all want the customer to do the phoning and arranging, by which time you may have missed your train and it's considered to be your fault. I'm not getting into such situations.

I also aim for postal delivery where possible. It's usually no extra for me to get the ticket from Poppleton which means free postage

radamfi · 24 Mar 2011

While redspottedhanky.com give loyalty points at a rate of 1%, you can get 2.62% cashback from all tickets by clicking through to the South West Trains site via TopCashback.

That is normally only bettered by exclusive TOC fares through individual TOC websites (like EC Advance) or by getting the 4.54% cashback when booking Advance fTPE fares through their website via TopCashback.

embers25 · 24 Mar 2011

"As far as I'm aware, apart from a few TOC-specific tickets, all ticketing sites sell the same tickets at the same prices. It doesn't matter if you go to thetrainline, qjump, Arriva Trains Wales, First TPE, Southeastern, National Rail, or any other site"

That's not true as advance fare prices vary wildly between sites like plane fares do. Also many companies give discounts on their own tickets (EMT, Southern, East Coast and soon Southeastern) and there are more than a few operator specific fares that only are sold on that operators site.

They should all offer the same fares and in my opinion should match the fares offered if you were at the station that second but they don't and redspottedhanky,National Rail and Trainline are defintiely not the cheapest.
Also for Virgin advance fares often Virgin is not the cheapest site and the last time I travelled from London to Edinburgh on Virgin they offered me 37 and East Coast sold me mine for 18.50 so it can be a huge difference. fGW often undercut XC and sell XC advance fares much cheaper too.

Also several of the sites such as SWT and fTPE offer cashback through cashback sites which adds up and Southern have their rainy day guarentee offered no quibble refunds on certain tickets without the £10 fee.

Finally sites powered by the East Coast type booking engine enable tickets to be picked up immediately (altho they quote 2 hours they are always available) whereas Trainline powered sites such as SWT require you to wait at least 2 hours often more as people have highlighted on here.

As Yorkie stated earlier for clarity and ease of purchase the booking engine used by East Coast,Southeastern and Southern amongst others is by far the easiest and most transparent.

Yet again simple ticketing and purchasing at it's best! This could all be simplified very simply by ATOC but its not in their interests as overcharging customers without them realising it is in their interests as it lines the pockets of their members.

dzug2 · 24 Mar 2011

jd said:
Also, a bit off-topic, but I just left the default journey times there for my search, which were for travel tomorrow (24th). It offered me advance tickets - I thought they were only available until 6pm the day before travel?

It varies - some journeys go off sale at 6pm, others remain on sale for the rest of the evening. Presumably until midnight but I've never actually checked the precise time.

It seems to be the operator of the train who sets the policy.

Tom B · 24 Mar 2011

yorkie said:
That's partly why I stick with East Coast, because they operate my nearest major station, and they run the machines that I would be using. Most of my Advance journeys are with East Coast/TPE/Cross Country, and I'd rather use one site to keep the bookings together.

I've heard too many horror stories of people booking with a company then getting to a station run by another company and then travelling with a completely different company, and they all blame each other and they all want the customer to do the phoning and arranging, by which time you may have missed your train and it's considered to be your fault. I'm not getting into such situations.

I also aim for postal delivery where possible. It's usually no extra for me to get the ticket from Poppleton which means free postage

I don't know if things have changed recently, but last time I had a problem with an East Coast Online booking, the staff acted as if it was another company - "It's an online thing, it's nothing to do with us, you need to phone this premium rate line" etc.

island · 24 Mar 2011

embers25 said:
That's not true as advance fare prices vary wildly between sites like plane fares do.

No they don't. The exact same advance ticket (ticket code and all) for the exact same train will be the same price (excepting TOC-specific discounts like the EC 11% off own advances) at the exact same time through all channels.

However, this may be difficult to observe in practice, because if you go through more than a couple of steps in the booking process the system will "hold" a ticket for you for up to two hours, and if this exhausts the number of tickets in that bucket you will then be offered the next price up if you call up another site.
--- old post above --- --- new post below ---

yorkie said:
I also aim for postal delivery where possible. It's usually no extra for me to get the ticket from Poppleton which means free postage

Funny you should mention it because I have had several bookings with EC from London Terminals and was not charged for postage at all, despite that there is most assuredly TOD available.

embers25 · 24 Mar 2011

"No they don't. The exact same advance ticket (ticket code and all) for the exact same train will be the same price (excepting TOC-specific discounts like the EC 11% off own advances) at the exact same time through all channels."

Thats simply not true...it should be but it isn't and it's not down to tickets being held altho I agree this would affect things.

Attached is a screenshot and check out the first advance prices for the 1455 and 1515 back from manc to London. Virgin normally charge more but here they actually charge less but still different.

dzug2 · 24 Mar 2011

embers25 said:
"No they don't. The exact same advance ticket (ticket code and all) for the exact same train will be the same price (excepting TOC-specific discounts like the EC 11% off own advances) at the exact same time through all channels."

Thats simply not true...it should be but it isn't and it's not down to tickets being held altho I agree this would affect things.

So what is it due to? Conspiracy? Incompetent programming? User 'error' (by which I mean the user not knowing how to manipulate the site to show the desired fare - easier with some sites than others)? Glitches in the system?

Don't know the answer though my suggestions are in ascending order of probability.

MikeWh · 24 Mar 2011

You won't be the only person accessing the site(s) though. And just like you might hold the last tickets at a cheap price meaning that they come up more expensive the next time, you might find that between your first and second enquiry some held tickets are returned to the pool so the price goes down again.

Greenback · 24 Mar 2011

Yes it's mainly the way the system works that make sit appear as though you can get different prices for the same journey within a few minutes.

Paul Kelly · 24 Mar 2011

spoony said:
One thing I dont understand is that they dont have any fees. I got the same prices quoted as on EC, and have not had to pay any postage fees. How in that case do they make any money and able to offer a loyalty scheme?

I believe they get a percentage of the ticket price as a commission for every ticket sold?

MikeWh said:
You won't be the only person accessing the site(s) though. And just like you might hold the last tickets at a cheap price meaning that they come up more expensive the next time, you might find that between your first and second enquiry some held tickets are returned to the pool so the price goes down again.

Yes, and perhaps easier to understand/visualise if you realise that any person buying (or thinking about buying and then cancelling) an advance ticket between *any* two stations that involves part of their journey on the same train as your journey does, can potentially affect the availability of advance fares for your journey (and all other journeys that involve using that train). E.g. someone buying an advance from York to Doncaster on a particular East Coast service will affect the availability of Edinburgh to London advances on the same train.

yorkie · 24 Mar 2011

embers25 said:
Attached is a screenshot and check out the first advance prices for the 1455 and 1515 back from manc to London. Virgin normally charge more but here they actually charge less but still different.

Allow me to answer this with ATOC-spin.

This is very "simple", and allows you to "buy with confidence" so you know "exactly where you stand". Basically, those trains have Advance tickets at £59, but the Off Peak Single is £35. Virgin's site allows Off Peak Singles to be sold at the half the Off Peak Return but other sites generally do not, charging an around 10p less than an Off Peak Return. Off Peak Single indicates that the ticket can not be purchased Singly in this case, which is "simple", and there is also an Off Peak Single that is 10p less than the Return and is available singly. The new names, Off Peak Single, describe when you can buy tickets. In this case, you can buy an Off Peak Single from the Virgin site only at £35, or an Off Peak Single at twice the price from any other site.

As you can see, buying the "right" ticket is "straightforward" and the "majority of customers" buy the right ticket, and 90% of people are happy with their tickets, and record numbers of people are travelling by rail, this proves we are doing a wonderful job and the system is so...

island · 24 Mar 2011

yorkie said:
The new names, Off Peak Single, describe when you can buy tickets.

That much is a lie! Off-peak tickets can only be bought from a vending machine after half past nine, but used whenever you want! There's at least one ticket office somewhere in the country (5142) that WILL issue any off-peak ticket when you want! Simple!

:roll::roll::roll:

embers25 · 24 Mar 2011

I understand the point that someone may be holding tickets which is why I get offered only a higher fare from some sites but these two sites were accessed the exact same time only about 1 second apart and even airline fares don't disappear that quick and jump that much. The lower fare was still available a few mins ago and yet East Coast still didn't offer it and so in my example East Coast costs more plain and simple and another point is that I hadn't held either of the tickets.

The issue about selling an advance fare for a train where the regular single is much cheaper is a whole different ball game and yet another con!

Also "Off-peak tickets can only be bought from a vending machine after half past nine" but only in some cases can they be "used whenever you want". Altho I agree off peak is not usually only valid off peak.

island · 24 Mar 2011

embers25 said:
"No they don't. The exact same advance ticket (ticket code and all) for the exact same train will be the same price (excepting TOC-specific discounts like the EC 11% off own advances) at the exact same time through all channels."

Thats simply not true...it should be but it isn't and it's not down to tickets being held altho I agree this would affect things.

Attached is a screenshot and check out the first advance prices for the 1455 and 1515 back from manc to London. Virgin normally charge more but here they actually charge less but still different.

I said it had to be the same ticket code. The £77 ticket is code BHO ("ADVANCE 1ST") and the £108.50 ticket is code LFB ("1ST ADVANCE"). They are both routed VIRGINTRNSONLY, although SET managed to dig up some slightly different fares for the same trains routed VWC & CONNECTNS.

Exactly why EC doesn't find the BHO ticket (which FGW, SET and Virgin all managed to discover, so it's not even a case of the different booking engines making a hames of it) I do not know.

With the best of respect to Yorkie, the question was originally about advances, so bringing in off-peak and SVH tickets confuses the issue even more!
--- old post above --- --- new post below ---

embers25 said:
Also "Off-peak tickets can only be bought from a vending machine after half past nine" but only in some cases can they be "used whenever you want". Altho I agree off peak is not usually only valid off peak.

That post was a joke, hence the :roll::roll::roll: at the end

Deerfold · 24 Mar 2011

island said:
With the best of respect to Yorkie, the question was originally about advances, so bringing in off-peak and SVH tickets confuses the issue even more!

But SVHs are sold as half a return when the other half is an advance. It does confuse things but that's not Yorkie's fault.

island · 24 Mar 2011

Deerfold said:
But SVHs are sold as half a return when the other half is an advance. It does confuse things but that's not Yorkie's fault.

True; the question was about a First Advance though!

mickey · 29 Mar 2011

spoony said:
One thing I dont understand is that they dont have any fees. I got the same prices quoted as on EC, and have not had to pay any postage fees. How in that case do they make any money and able to offer a loyalty scheme?

A combination of the fact that they're going for large market share and will therefore get a fair whack of commission and the fact that they're ATOS and have a booking system they developed and can use free of extra charge. I believe they've been planning this since they created it a few years ago now.

Anyway, my contribution is to note that Tesco clubcard reward vouchers can be used on this site, possibly giving many of you even more excuse to travel

WestCoast · 29 Mar 2011

mickey said:
Anyway, my contribution is to note that Tesco clubcard reward vouchers can be used on this site, possibly giving many of you even more excuse to travel

I had a search on the Tesco Clubcard webiste and couldn't find it under travel or even trains or buses. Found it in a bizarre section:

# Token type: redspottedhanky.com
# Category: Flowers & Plants / Outdoor Plants and Bulbs
# Location: United Kingdom
# Suitable for: Adults
# Product code: S0129

:lol:

mickey · 29 Mar 2011

WestCoast said:
I had a search on the Tesco Clubcard webiste and couldn't find it under travel or even trains or buses. Found it in a bizarre section:

# Token type: redspottedhanky.com
# Category: Flowers & Plants / Outdoor Plants and Bulbs

I had an email sent from Tesco to tell me, but yes that's bizarre! I can only assume it's something to do with the seeds they're also trying to flog at the moment...

WestCoast · 29 Mar 2011

mickey said:
I had an email sent from Tesco to tell me, but yes that's bizarre! I can only assume it's something to do with the seeds they're also trying to flog at the moment...

I know Tesco own Dobbies Garden Centres but someone's got a little confused!

It's an excellent offer as well, megabus/megatrain is only twice the value of the vouchers in the statement so this is the better deal at three times the value. I do hope it's permanent as well!

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