"Arriving in London 09:50 or later" anomaly

[talldave]

Southern Off-Peak tickets from Gatwick to London have a restriction of being valid on trains timed to arrive in London at 09:50 or later.

The 08:57 from Gatwick arrives in Victoria at 09:50 and yet Southern's website no longer shows Off-Peak tickets as being valid for this train.

Is this an error on their ticket website or has the restriction been modified?

[The 08:57 used to be the 08:56 and I still have the screenshot I carried on my mobile phone that showed the ticket as being valid on the 08:56, 09:23 and 09:27 - as that was the only way I could persuade staff at Gatwick with an "off peak is after 09:30" mentality to let me through the barriers to catch one of those departures.]

 

[telstarbox]

According to BRFares, the Off-Peak Return has restriction C0 - "OUTWARD TRAVEL - By any train scheduled to arrive London Terminals or Kensington Olympia at or after 0950."

http://www.brfares.com/#faredetail?orig=GTW&dest=1072&rte=500&tkt=CDR

 

[34D]

Can we assume that the restriction has been coded sloppily?

 

[Deerfold]

I wonder if the problem is anything to do with the train attatching to another at Redhill so the system isn't seeing one train that is at both Gatwick and London Victoria? RTT shows the train as only going as far as Redhill (but does correctly note what it then becomes). I wonder if some sites see this as a change?

Or it could just be that they've coded it for "after" instead of "at or after".

 

[talldave]

I suspect it's probably the latter - although when it was the 08:56 everything was fine!!!

 

[PermitToTravel]

The electronic version of the restriction code C0 (these are only the restrictions on the outbound leg, there are also some restrictions on the return leg which I have not included):

+-------------------+------------------+-----------+----------+
| ArriveDepartOrVia |   Description    | StartTime | EndTime  |
+-------------------+------------------+-----------+----------+
[COLOR="Red"]| A                 | REDHILL          | 02:30:00  | 09:14:00 |
| A                 | GATWICK AIRPORT  | 02:30:00  | 09:17:00 |
| D                 | GATWICK AIRPORT  | 02:30:00  | 09:19:00 |[/COLOR]
| A                 | LONDON BRIDGE    | 02:30:00  | 09:48:00 |
| A                 | BARBICAN UND     | 02:30:00  | 09:49:00 |
| A                 | MOORGATE UND     | 02:30:00  | 09:49:00 |
| A                 | WATFORD JUNCTION | 02:30:00  | 09:49:00 |
| A                 | LONDON EUSTON    | 02:30:00  | 09:49:00 |
| A                 | LONDON MARYLEBNE | 02:30:00  | 09:49:00 |
| A                 | LONDON PADDINGTN | 02:30:00  | 09:49:00 |
| A                 | KENSNGTN OLYMPIA | 02:30:00  | 09:49:00 |
| A                 | LONDON CANNON ST | 02:30:00  | 09:49:00 |
| A                 | LONDON CHARING X | 02:30:00  | 09:49:00 |
| A                 | LONDON WATRLOO E | 02:30:00  | 09:49:00 |
| A                 | VAUXHALL         | 02:30:00  | 09:49:00 |
| A                 | LONDON WATERLOO  | 02:30:00  | 09:49:00 |
| A                 | MOORGATE.        | 02:30:00  | 09:49:00 |
| A                 | LONDON KINGS X   | 02:30:00  | 09:49:00 |
| A                 | LONDON LIVRPL ST | 02:30:00  | 09:49:00 |
| A                 | LONDON FENCH ST  | 02:30:00  | 09:49:00 |
| A                 | WEST BROMPTON    | 02:30:00  | 09:49:00 |
| A                 | SHEPHERDS BUSH   | 02:30:00  | 09:49:00 |
| A                 | FARRINGDON UND   | 02:30:00  | 10:00:00 |
| A                 | LONDON BLKFRIARS | 02:30:00  | 10:00:00 |
| A                 | CITY THAMESLINK  | 02:30:00  | 10:00:00 |
| A                 | LONDON ST PANCRS | 02:30:00  | 10:05:00 |
| A                 | LUTON.           | 02:30:00  | 10:26:00 |
| A                 | BEDFORD.         | 02:30:00  | 10:50:00 |
| A                 | LONDON VICTORIA  | 04:00:00  | 04:57:00 |
| A                 | LONDON VICTORIA  | 04:59:00  | 05:48:00 |
| A                 | LONDON VICTORIA  | 05:50:00  | 09:49:00 |
+-------------------+------------------+-----------+----------+

The 0857 from Gatwick Airport arrives at Redhill at 0912, three minutes before the booking engines would be happy with it doing so. It also arrives at and departs from Gatwick Airport too early.

 

[talldave]

The electronic version of the restriction code C0 (these are only the restrictions on the outbound leg, there are also some restrictions on the return leg which I have not included):

+-------------------+------------------+-----------+----------+
| ArriveDepartOrVia |   Description    | StartTime | EndTime  |
+-------------------+------------------+-----------+----------+
[COLOR="Red"]| A                 | REDHILL          | 02:30:00  | 09:14:00 |
| A                 | GATWICK AIRPORT  | 02:30:00  | 09:17:00 |
| D                 | GATWICK AIRPORT  | 02:30:00  | 09:19:00 |[/COLOR]
| A                 | LONDON BRIDGE    | 02:30:00  | 09:48:00 |
| A                 | BARBICAN UND     | 02:30:00  | 09:49:00 |
| A                 | MOORGATE UND     | 02:30:00  | 09:49:00 |
| A                 | WATFORD JUNCTION | 02:30:00  | 09:49:00 |
| A                 | LONDON EUSTON    | 02:30:00  | 09:49:00 |
| A                 | LONDON MARYLEBNE | 02:30:00  | 09:49:00 |
| A                 | LONDON PADDINGTN | 02:30:00  | 09:49:00 |
| A                 | KENSNGTN OLYMPIA | 02:30:00  | 09:49:00 |
| A                 | LONDON CANNON ST | 02:30:00  | 09:49:00 |
| A                 | LONDON CHARING X | 02:30:00  | 09:49:00 |
| A                 | LONDON WATRLOO E | 02:30:00  | 09:49:00 |
| A                 | VAUXHALL         | 02:30:00  | 09:49:00 |
| A                 | LONDON WATERLOO  | 02:30:00  | 09:49:00 |
| A                 | MOORGATE.        | 02:30:00  | 09:49:00 |
| A                 | LONDON KINGS X   | 02:30:00  | 09:49:00 |
| A                 | LONDON LIVRPL ST | 02:30:00  | 09:49:00 |
| A                 | LONDON FENCH ST  | 02:30:00  | 09:49:00 |
| A                 | WEST BROMPTON    | 02:30:00  | 09:49:00 |
| A                 | SHEPHERDS BUSH   | 02:30:00  | 09:49:00 |
| A                 | FARRINGDON UND   | 02:30:00  | 10:00:00 |
| A                 | LONDON BLKFRIARS | 02:30:00  | 10:00:00 |
| A                 | CITY THAMESLINK  | 02:30:00  | 10:00:00 |
| A                 | LONDON ST PANCRS | 02:30:00  | 10:05:00 |
| A                 | LUTON.           | 02:30:00  | 10:26:00 |
| A                 | BEDFORD.         | 02:30:00  | 10:50:00 |
| A                 | LONDON VICTORIA  | 04:00:00  | 04:57:00 |
| A                 | LONDON VICTORIA  | 04:59:00  | 05:48:00 |
| A                 | LONDON VICTORIA  | 05:50:00  | 09:49:00 |
+-------------------+------------------+-----------+----------+

The 0857 from Gatwick Airport arrives at Redhill at 0912, three minutes before the booking engines would be happy with it doing so. It also arrives at and departs from Gatwick Airport too early.

Thanks for that info - it's fascinating - and I guess is a really good reason why the booking system isn't showing it as valid.

However, since it arrives at 09:50 - which is the only limitation displayed to the customer (on the TVM screen at the time of ticket printing) - there's a bit of conflict as far as a passenger is concerned.

This is one worth running past Southern - I'll drop them an email and wait the obligatory week for an amusing answer !

 

[PermitToTravel]

The booking engines are wrong. This would be extremely easy to fix.

A cynic might wonder if Southern are legally required to maintain the restriction as "By any train scheduled to arrive London Terminals or Kensington Olympia at or after 0950" by means of fare regulation or similar, but are working around this by having booking engines lie to people about which trains they can take.

 

[sarahj]

One of the main reasons of this starange time is the 08.45 departure from Brighton is still classed as peak, but the 08.52 from Hove is off peak. This catches out a few who buy off peaks from stations such as Shoreham etc,with the ticket office etc thinking they are travelling on the direct, but catching a Brighton train and running round with a 2 min connection and jumping on the 8.45. As on train staff its a case of pay the upgrade, or get off at Haywards Heath and catch the next one.

 

[talldave]

The booking engines are wrong. This would be extremely easy to fix.

A cynic might wonder if Southern are legally required to maintain the restriction as "By any train scheduled to arrive London Terminals or Kensington Olympia at or after 0950" by means of fare regulation or similar, but are working around this by having booking engines lie to people about which trains they can take.

Although I'm not one of Southern's greatest fans, I don't think it's deliberate because it used to be OK when the train was departing at 08:56.

However, even though it's extremely easy to fix, I suspect, based on past experience, that it'll take Southern a long time to fix.

Anyway, I've emailed them, and will report back here.

 

[JonathanH]

In the days when the restriction used to be C4 (ie valid for arrivals in London after 10am), there was also a long standing easement from Reigate / Redhill for off-peak tickets to be valid on the predecessor train of today's 0914 to London Bridge which used to arrive in London before 1000.

 

[talldave]

A quick report back on Southern's response. I'd love to say the situation was resolved but, as usual, Southern are going for a gold medal in the incompetence stakes.

Firstly, their reply was addressed to a woman, along with the first paragraph of their answer to her question. My reply followed below. Sloppy cutting/pasting but not a good start.

Their reply made no mention of the 08:57 or the validity of an Off peak ticket on that service; they simply apologised for the fact that I'm having problems buying tickets and told me how to buy a Travelcard!!!!

Needless to say, I've replied to say that I'm rather disappointed in their response, since I was expecting them to either say "yes, it's an error, we'll fix it" or "no it's not allowed for reason X".

If anyone from Southern reads this, I'd encourage you to do some "mystery shopping" on your customer services team, because at the moment they'd be outclassed by a group of primary school children with access to Wikipedia.

 

[yorkie]

Southern have quite a reputation for poor letter writing.

Their Customer Services Manager in particular gives some quite 'interesting' responses, demonstrating a lack of full understanding of the NRCoC and Routeing Guide (but, dangerously, he has some knowledge - a little knowledge can be a bad thing!)

However you can sometimes speak to someone excellent on the 'phone. This happened with me once, when I called on behalf of a member who received bad service. The person I spoke to seemed genuinely concerned at the poor responses her colleague had sent. So you could try phoning them and see if you get a resolution that way.

You could try writing to the Customer Services Manager, but if he doesn't want your ticket to be valid, he may find excuses that are a load of nonsense (as other members have found out!). If he agrees it should be valid, then he should be in a position to sort it though.

 

[talldave]

This is now fixed thanks to Yorkie's Twitter contact at Southern. Many thanks Yorkie.