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Breaking a journey over multiple days

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sheff1

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I don't have the time to buy new tickets and then apply (potentially unsuccessfully) for a refund, nor do most people. There are likely people that simply cannot afford to do so either especially with longer distance stuff. If you were to have a Plymouth to York return and you broke your journey at Leeds on the way back you'd have to buy another single which would be £165.

There is no question of having to buy anything. If someone tries to charge you £165 (or any other amount) when you are already travelling on a valid ticket just politely decline then ignore any follow up "I'll let you off this time" as the twaddle it is.
 
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Doctor Fegg

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The only way to gain the upper hand is for people to join this forum and learn the specifics themselves so they can out-think unknowledgeable staff, or to massively simplify the fares system.

Or: encode the fare system into a smartphone app or embedded device, and train the staff that, in case of dispute, they should scan the ticket (with a unique validity ID encoded in a QR code) using the app/device.

In an age where most people carry in their pocket what was once known as a supercomputer, there is no excuse for simple reference material not to be readily available, and for staff to be trained to use it.

(There's actually an argument that the canonical routing guide et al should be a machine-readable, openly-licensed set of instructions, which would remove ambiguity and enable consistency across implementations.)
 
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miami

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There is no question of having to buy anything. If someone tries to charge you £165 (or any other amount) when you are already travelling on a valid ticket just politely decline then ignore any follow up "I'll let you off this time" as the twaddle it is.

And when they prevent you from leaving the station at the end of the journey? Who will BTP believe about your ticket validity.
--- old post above --- --- new post below ---
Or: encode the fare system into a smartphone app or embedded device, and train the staff that, in case of dispute, they should scan the ticket (with a unique validity ID encoded in a QR code) using the app/device.

In an age where most people carry in their pocket what was once known as a supercomputer, there is no excuse for simple reference material not to be readily available, and for staff to be trained to use it.

(There's actually an argument that the canonical routing guide et al should be a machine-readable, openly-licensed set of instructions, which would remove ambiguity and enable consistency across implementations.)

Modern tickets say "look at nationalrail.co.uk/9F" or whatever for validity. Old style tickets just have "9F" in the corder. That link shows unambiguously what is allowed, yet many rail staff ignore this.

However the better staff do do what you suggest as I chronicled in this previous post. They have the technology, however there are many stubborn guards who get off scott free without any remedial training.
 

David Goddard

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So following this thread I now need three printouts in my camera bag:
Guidelines for rail enthusiasts - so I can watch trains, note their numbers and take photos
Guide to split ticketing - so I can get the best fare for my trip
Rules on break of journey- so I can stop off at my Mums on the way home
The contents of all of which should be known by any member of staff I may encounter, but aren't.
 

RonnieMac

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Finally had a reply to the email I sent to Northern regarding this matter:

'Thank you for contacting Northern with regards to your concerns relating to staff on the Northern network providing incorrect information about the use of Anytime train tickets.

Your comments and have been noted and will be fed back accordingly.'
 

Bletchleyite

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I doubt pricing managers are saying that. But some people who are training Guards probably are...

Quite possibly.

BoJ is not complicated.

If a ticket permitting BoJ is valid for two days, you can take two days to make the journey. If it is valid five days, you can take five days to make the journey. If it is valid one day, you can take one day to make the journey. That is all they need to know - what else you do other than travel by train, provided you make the journey in the right order and don't cover any sections of your route twice is irrelevant.

The "can't complete" nonsense on Off Peak tickets needs getting rid of, though. Off Peak Singles and the outward part of Off Peak Returns need simply to be valid for two days.
--- old post above --- --- new post below ---
I travelled on the return portion of an off-peak return yesterday (in Scotland) and the guard wrote the date on the ticket. I do think the location or headcode is more appropriate.

I'm not sure why writing the date on the ticket is an issue. What it certainly does is show that the journey was commenced, or a leg of it took place, on that date.

The stampers BR used to use, and DB still use, and no doubt that are still knocking around somewhere, used to stamp date, headcode and I think a guard's ID. All a guard writing a date on in pen is doing is replicating that, and it has no bearing on the ticket's validity, save that you know that on that date some of the journey was completed, so anyone trying to reuse from the start is clearly up to no good.
--- old post above --- --- new post below ---
I'm certainly in favour of mass simplification, and the removal of many complex products. This is the only way to combat the "fear, uncertainty and doubt" referenced to upthread. It's not an enthusiast's solution, but I think the positives outweigh the negatives.

I agree, but BoJ is not complex, therefore my rule would be "you can always start short, end short or break your journey on any ticket provided you stay within its validity period and use any compulsory-reserved trains on an Advance ticket". Simple.
--- old post above --- --- new post below ---
The problem with this is that there would be a huge increase in fares...

People keep saying so, but I see no evidence as to why there would.
--- old post above --- --- new post below ---
Does this **** happen in any other industry?

Don't know about industry, but I'm a volunteer in Scouting, and people making up their own rules that don't really exist is one of the organisation's biggest challenges. So on that basis yes.
 
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Mikaila

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I found a bit of confusion on the Northern website. They have put together "Anytime Single" and "Anytime Day Single". For the ticket they call "Anytime single" they say "Your journey must be on the date, or the day after the date, specified on the ticket." and also "Outward journey must be on the date specified" but they call this ticket both "Anytime Single" and "Anytime Day single". Are they trying to confuse us?
 

Richard_B

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I am amazed at this thread. If the training for guards and other staff checking tickets isn't sufficient that they are aware of BoJ allowances then God help us for the rest of the system. BoJ is about the simplest as it comes apart from 2V. If they don't know BoJ how on earth is a permitted route or more complex time restriction ever going to end well.

To the questions about does making up rules happen elsewhere - ask any amateur sportsplayer if they've come across a referee or umpire making up the rules as they go..
 

fandroid

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It is amazing that anyone should think that the rule is complicated. If a return leg of a ticket is valid for 1 month, then that is the time available for the journey. It is no business of a guard or a TOC that I want to waste my life by getting off at every station and finding somewhere to kip for the night, so long as I don't try to do that beyond the date on the ticket. I suggest that any challenge is met by a request that the challenger shows the passenger where it says that any return leg must be completed in one day.
 

Hadders

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People keep saying so, but I see no evidence as to why there would.

This is the railway so you can't trust the people in charge (the TOCs, ATOC and the DfT) to undertake a mass simplification of fares without it resulting in huge increases. Some of the things we'd no doubt see:

- blanket time restrictions on Off Peak fares, including the evening peak, rendering many of them unusable thereby forcing passengers to use Anytime fares
- abolition of split ticketing, starting and finishing short
- abolition of excess fares
- Effective abolition of the 'walk on' railway - moving to compulsory reservations on longer distance services
- Abolition of through ticketing, making tickets operator specific

Such an exercise would see claims that ticketing was being simplified as that's what the majority of passengers say they want. However, you only need to look to the last 'simplification' to see that it's now more complicated than it was before...
 

Merseysider

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Unfortunately the message isn't getting through. Today I used the return half of a Gorton-York SVR (with 23/09 written on) which I'd already used partway and broken overnight, resuming today.

At Manchester Piccadilly, I was stopped at Northern's P13/14 'people gateline' and questioned by a lady who didn't understand and referred me to a couple of RPIs. I first had the route I'd taken questioned (York -> Manchester Victoria -> Salford Crescent -> Manchester Piccadilly (-> Gorton). That was quickly resolved when I showed the route on NRE and they checked on their Avantix.

Then they took a couple of minutes checking whether my ticket allowed break of journey at all (short answer: no restriction on I7)

The fact 23/09 was written on the ticket didn't do me any favours either, as I had to bring up both the old and new Conditions on my phone to show that such a break of journey (3 nights mid route) was permitted. Thankfully both RPIs were friendly and receptive but did seem surprised, with one stating he'd always believed overnight BoJ was only allowed for one night, not the three I'd done.

One pointed out that it was paid for with a Warrant, but the other said that that's fine.

I have no complaints about the attitude of the staff as they were willing to listen but it's pretty damn clear that Northern aren't doing enough to ensure every member of staff is aware of the rule, which is incredibly simple.

All in all this delayed me 30 minutes, as the train from Salford Crescent into Picc was already late, and this encounter meant the connection was missed.

Quite frustrating, as the problem hasn't gone away.
 

Clip

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All power to you Jake for playing the system with the tickets you held but the vast array of restrictions on many tickets means that not everyone is going to have a memory of them all and the RPIS did the right thing in checking validity on their avantix and agreeing that it was valid did they not? Id much prefer them to get it right by checking then just giving someone a penalty notice and having to challenge it afterwards which would cause all sorts of posts full of hyperbole.
Seems they cant win
 

furlong

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All in all this delayed me 30 minutes

Well if you want something to be done about it, ask the ORR to investigate the company regarding the incident.
--- old post above --- --- new post below ---
Then they took a couple of minutes checking whether my ticket allowed break of journey at all (short answer: no restriction on I7)

Shouldn't have been necessary to check.

Break of journey is allowed on the outward portion of Off-Peak tickets UNLESS OTHERWISE INDICATED BY A RESTRICTION SHOWN AGAINST THE TICKET'S VALIDITY CODE and in all cases on the return portion of Off-Peak return tickets.
 

Merseysider

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Well if you want something to be done about it, ask the ORR to investigate the company regarding the incident.
Yes, the letters had already been drafted before I posted. The passenger shouldn't need to take this step however.
All power to you Jake for playing the system with the tickets you held but the vast array of restrictions on many tickets means that not everyone is going to have a memory of them all and the RPIS did the right thing in checking validity on their avantix and agreeing that it was valid did they not? Id much prefer them to get it right by checking then just giving someone a penalty notice and having to challenge it afterwards which would cause all sorts of posts full of hyperbole.
Seems they cant win
Come on now, exercising my contractual right to stop over somewhere for a few nights isn't playing the system.

Like I said, I have no complaints about the staff themselves. They were willing to listen and for that I'm grateful. Clearly they can only go by what they've been taught. As furlong says it's simple - unless the validity code says otherwise a break of journey is allowed, and there's no limit to the number of times or period of which such a break can take place.

After the incidents mentioned upthread by other forum members one would hope Northern management would stop this reoccuring. It shouldn't be neccessary to have to prove that a three-night break is permitted.
 
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Haywain

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After the incidents mentioned upthread by other forum members one would hope Northern management would stop this reoccuring. It shouldn't be neccessary to have to prove that a three-night break is permitted.

As has been mentioned elsewhere, quite possibly on this thread, Northern management can do no more than try and stop this recurring. Ingrained 'learning' and peer pressure are very tough nuts to crack and it is good that you encountered staff willing to listen and learn from you. However, it is disappointing to hear that it took so much time - are you claiming from Northern for the delay?
 

robbeech

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Interestingly, i had another discussion with an EMT guard on my return from London last week. I was travelling back to Nottingham from Peterborough, i'd actually started my return journey short at Peterborough but that isn't relevant. She marked my ticket and put the date on it. 22/09. I politely asked why she wrote the date on it expecting her to say the usual "So you cannot use it after today" but got a different but confusing reply.

"I put the date on it so you can see that it has been used today BECAUSE it is valid until the 16th October" (my emphasis)

Apparently she believes a break of journey over night is ok if it is just overnight, but i couldn't for example break my journey overnight at Peterborough and then break it again at Nottingham for a week and then use the last part of if a week later. I questioned this and she said, it might have changed but she did her training 14 years ago.

To me, this isn't acceptable, My late father was an MOT tester for cars and light commercial vehicles. There were (and still are) strict guidelines about testing vehicles and what is and isn't covered in the test. At least every month, and often more frequently there would be a delivery of a laminated sheet as a replacement to the rules on a particular part of the test, for example if they change the rules about the minimum tyre tread depth, or the use of front fog lights then it will be updated and everyone doing this would receive this documentation and will read it and learn the new rules. If you failed or passed a vehicle following the old rules and the customer appealed against this you'd be stopped from testing and sent on a refresher course at your own cost until you knew the rules. This i considered very fair. So why in the rail industry are people allowed to learn rules and then not keep up to date with them. I don't know what the BOJ rules were 14 years ago of course.

I don't blame the guard here, she was very polite and doing a great job, she just didn't understand the rules. If one person doesn't understand the rules then you can maybe blame the person, but it seems many many people don't and that to me has to be looked at by the TOCs involved and sorted.

I'm sure there will be mixed opinions on my mini rant.

Rob
 

sheff1

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All power to you Jake for playing the system with the tickets you held but the vast array of restrictions on many tickets means that not everyone is going to have a memory of them all and the RPIS did the right thing in checking validity on their avantix and agreeing that it was valid did they not?

All SVR tickets allow for multiple break of journey on the return journey within the validity period (which is clearly shown on them). This has been the rule ever since such tickets were introduced. There has never been any "BoJ is only allowed for one night" restriction on the return portion.

So (i) there is no "playing the system" involved; (ii) remembering this simple and very long established rule should be easy for any RPI (unlike some of the other messy and complicated rules which I would not expect anyone to memorise !).



I don't know what the BOJ rules were 14 years ago of course.

On the return half of a SVR, exactly the same as they are now.
 
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Clip

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All SVR tickets allow for multiple break of journey on the return journey within the validity period (which is clearly shown on them). This has been the rule ever since such tickets were introduced. There has never been any "BoJ is only allowed for one night" restriction on the return portion.

So (i) there is no "playing the system" involved; (ii) remembering this simple and very long established rule should be easy for any RPI (unlike some of the other messy and complicated rules which I would not expect anyone to memorise !).





On the return half of a SVR, exactly the same as they are now.
Im well aware of the validity of such tickets and for me it is rather playing the system but hey ho Im not all that fussed whether you all agree or not but sooner or later these will be removed due to issues like JakeF created.

But hey, if you are all perfect in your line of work day after day with a bewildering array of different codes for each ticket and you firmly believe that the RPIs not checking his ticket was valid were in the wrong then again who am I to argue.
 

Hadders

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I suspect these guards are confusing break of journey on the outward portion (where you can continue on day 2 - well actually until 0429 on day 3) with break of journey on the return portion where you may break for up to a month.

Granted staff should know the rules and the fact they don't isn't acceptable but I suspect that's what's causing the problem.
 

najaB

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If you failed or passed a vehicle following the old rules and the customer appealed against this you'd be stopped from testing and sent on a refresher course at your own cost until you knew the rules. This i considered very fair. So why in the rail industry are people allowed to learn rules and then not keep up to date with them.
That, of course, is the root of this type of issue - there is no (or minimal) continuing testing once in the role. So unless someone is particularly conscientious there is no imperative to keep up to date with any changes. So, after years in the role people naturally come to believe that their understanding of the rules is the only possible interpretation.

Hence the reluctance to look things up when presented with an alternative interpretation.
 

Bletchleyite

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All SVR tickets allow for multiple break of journey on the return journey within the validity period (which is clearly shown on them). This has been the rule ever since such tickets were introduced. There has never been any "BoJ is only allowed for one night" restriction on the return portion.

There was never such a deliberate restriction, but for a short time after "simplification" a very bad piece of wording in the unified Off Peak restrictions did strongly imply that only one BoJ was allowed and that was only for one night, even if it didn't actually say that and wasn't intended to do so. Said wording was fixed some time ago.

So it is understandable that people might have thought that for a while.
 

LowLevel

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Given that I know the rules (fairly well) without being anywhere near an expert (I'm a humble train guard, doing people for in depth things is what Revenue Protection are there for) I always encourage people when engaging in debate about marking tickets and all that stuff to just tell me they're breaking their journey overnight and thus the problem goes away. I mark tickets with the date because I don't get issued with a stamper. This is generally sufficient to annoy the hell out of the 'try and make a period ticket a season' brigade and I am quite practiced on full trains for example from Manchester towards Liverpool at doing a full train check after Warrington to kill off a stack of Manchester - Mersey area period returns without troubling myself over day tickets which I only tend to mark when not in too much of a hurry as there is limited potential for re-use. I love the look of hatred in their eyes and sometimes draw smiley faces for good measure <D

This inevitably results in a very rare, flustered 'ooooh, you need to not mark it because I'm breaking my journey'.

This is then resolved by my taking the time to endorse it 'PTO' on the front as it's hard to write on and on the back 'break of journey /BOJ used NOT-SHF 26/09 1R90'. Jobs a goodun. Regrettably this is only of use if my esteemed colleagues know what they're looking at.
 

Clip

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There was never such a deliberate restriction, but for a short time after "simplification" a very bad piece of wording in the unified Off Peak restrictions did strongly imply that only one BoJ was allowed and that was only for one night, even if it didn't actually say that and wasn't intended to do so. Said wording was fixed some time ago.

So it is understandable that people might have thought that for a while.

Quite and as everyone on this forum very well knows the BOJ restriction was never ever meant to turn a ticket into a multiple stop rover ticket. This was an unintended consequence of it wo therefore I stand by my earlier post of stating having a 3 day jolly somewhere else on the ticket certainly is playing the system.
 

maniacmartin

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Quite and as everyone on this forum very well knows the BOJ restriction was never ever meant to turn a ticket into a multiple stop rover ticket. This was an unintended consequence of it wo therefore I stand by my earlier post of stating having a 3 day jolly somewhere else on the ticket certainly is playing the system.

I disagree with your posts in this thread that Jake was playing the system or creating an issue.
A rover ticket lets you go back and forward an unlimited number of times on several lines, which is significantly more validity than Jake was able to use. He didn't travel a chain longer in total than if he had made the journey in one go
 

Merseysider

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Quite and as everyone on this forum very well knows the BOJ restriction was never ever meant to turn a ticket into a multiple stop rover ticket. This was an unintended consequence of it wo therefore I stand by my earlier post of stating having a 3 day jolly somewhere else on the ticket certainly is playing the system.
Sorry, but I must respectfully disagree. There's no requirement to complete the return journey in one day and if it was intended to be otherwise I'm sure we'd have heard about it by now. Instead, the new Conditions state at the top of Page 15 the following:
Condition 16.3 said:
Where a break of journey is allowed, there is no limit to the number of times that you can do so within a Ticket’s period of validity, until the journey is completed.
 

Clip

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Sorry, but I must respectfully disagree. There's no requirement to complete the return journey in one day and if it was intended to be otherwise I'm sure we'd have heard about it by now. Instead, the new Conditions state at the top of Page 15 the following:

Yes the new conditions but I didnt mention anything about the new ones did I? Or did I write something I cant see that Ive written.

And I still stand by my statement that the RPI was correct in checking your ticket was valid - thats their job after all - and if people dont think its reasonable then why dont we just save the railways costs and get rid of them all?

Answers on a fares workshop postcard
 

Merseysider

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clip said:
Yes the new conditions but I didnt mention anything about the new ones did I? Or did I write something I cant see that Ive written.

And I still stand by my statement that the RPI was correct in checking your ticket was valid - thats their job after all - and if people dont think its reasonable then why dont we just save the railways costs and get rid of them all?

Answers on a fares workshop postcard
No, you said that being able to break one's journey several times, or overnight, was an 'unintended consequence'.

I mentioned the new Conditions because they state in no uncertain terms that such a BoJ is intended to be allowed, completely refuting your argument.

Furthermore, given how rarely new Conditions are drawn up and put into effect, this would have been the ideal opportunity for the DfT or ATOC to remove overnight/multiple BoJ if they so wanted. The fact that they haven't speaks volumes, especially considering that they've gone in the completely opposite direction, and clarified for the passenger that there is no limit to BoJ.

Go to nre.co.uk/i7 (the code for the ticket I was using) and read what it says about the return portion.

National Rail Enquiries said:
No restriction.

No time restriction, no break of journey restriction, nothing.

I'm not aware that your interpretation of the rules has ever been correct. If your misunderstanding persists despite the information I've provided then I think there's a bigger problem here.

I've already said I had no complaints about the staff doing their job, so please stop harking on saying they were correct in checking. I've already agreed with that statement so there's no need to repeat it. When it takes a total of 3 staff members between 5 and 10 minutes to establish that a passenger, using only one ticket, is in fact okay to continue travelling then something, somewhere has gone wrong. Perhaps I should be grateful you don't check my tickets, especially some of the more complicated ones. You'd be there for hours ;)
 
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