Crazy route options on TVMs (and just a dot in lieu of 'Any Permitted')

[yorkie]

Great Western Railway (GWR) ticket vending machines (TVMs) offer some crazy 'route' options for flows where they have Season tickets for people who work part-time.

As there is no effective provision for such Seasons, the 'route' field has been used instead. You can see this at BRfares.com

When people buy Single & Return tickets, they are also presented with the list of 'route' options. However, presumably as part of this daft drive to get rid of the wording 'Any Permitted' being printed on tickets, the route option for 'Any Permitted' just appears as a dot!

This means many customers do not know they are supposed to click on the button with the dot. Some customers ended up clicking on all the boxes until finally realising that the dot was the correct option.

This is crazy, but not at all surprising.

The photo below shows these routeing options (the journey was Digby & Sowton to Dawlish; not my picture):-

Please select the route for your journey to Dawlish

• MO TU WE &WKND
• MO TU TH &WKND
• MO TU FR &WKND
• MO WE TH &WKND
• MO WE FR &WKND
• MO TH FR &WKND
• TU WE TH &WKND
• TU WE FR &WKND
• TU TH FR &WKND
• WE TH FR &WKND
• .

 

[jon0844]

GTR machines have also been showing '.' instead of any permitted on some tickets for some time.

 

[SaveECRewards]

That explains why you sometimes see any permitted as a dot on the VTEC site. I thought it was just another rough edge on the site.

 

[Starmill]

Everywhere where route 00010 instead of 00000 is used (that I have seen at least) appears as a '.' on a ticket machine.

Quite why the change to using this route went ahead without fixing this I do not know, but it seems breathtakingly foolish to me to present the customer with an intentional change from something that was not particularly clear ('Any Permitted') to something that conveys absolutley zero information at all ('.').

Of course it matters less where . is the only route, but there are plenty of examples where it isn't and this is one of them.

In some cases fares with route . and route Any Permitted are both available. In some cases, they are different prices - go work that one out!!!

 

[paddington]

Thanks all for explaining the . which has also confused me.

I always check how much the fare should be on brfares.com beforehand, so I have been reasonably confident that I was about to buy the correct tickets

 

[Haywain]

Everywhere where route 00010 instead of 00000 is used (that I have seen at least) appears as a '.' on a ticket machine.

In some cases fares with route . and route Any Permitted are both available. In some cases, they are different prices - go work that one out!!!

It's actually route 01000, and it is designed not to show any wording. Unfortunately it seems that some TIS cannot cope with a blank field and so the dot is in place to overcome that problem.

It appears that in some cases where the new route has been introduced the old route options have been left in unintentionally. I would expect many of those will disappear in the September fares round, but be replaced by new ones as the new route is rolled out more widely.

 

[Haywain]

That explains why you sometimes see any permitted as a dot on the VTEC site. I thought it was just another rough edge on the site.

On this occasion it is the correct implementation of the RSP-backed change.

 

[Haywain]

I believe the idea behind the change was that it would be applied where there is only one route for a flow, as there would be no risk of confusion. It appears that Great Western, in the case demonstrated by Yorkie, have rather overlooked how confusing they can make it.

 

[Wallsendmag]

Please don't get me started on the route 01000 implementation , I could write a book.

 

[RJ]

User Acceptance Testing on the railways really needs improvement. It's crazy that use of TVMs is legally mandatory when there's no ticket office, when rubbish like this is being signed off, as if everyone is supposed to work out that they must press on a nondescript dot to find more fares to muddle through.

Perhaps people with some realistic perspective of what is user friendly should be consulted when changes like this are implemented. Someone who possesses no knowledge of railway ticketing or complex logical reasoning skills should be able to navigate a TVM or ticket sales website.

 

[Haywain]

User Acceptability Testing on the railways really needs improvement. It's crazy that use of TVMs is legally mandatory when there's no ticket office, when rubbish like this is being signed off, as if everyone is supposed to work out that they must press on a nondescript dot to find more fares to muddle through.

This isn't just about TVMs as it will also impact desktop TIS and, to some extent, websites. It's a failure to see the problems and to implement the change correctly in my view.

 

[RJ]

This isn't just about TVMs as it will also impact desktop TIS and, to some extent, websites. It's a failure to see the problems and to implement the change correctly in my view.

The biggest moan I've heard in the office is that it has killed everyone's favourite fares shortcuts, slowing down the sales process. Nobody could work out why but I figured it was down to the route code change

 

[Haywain]

The biggest moan I've heard in the office is that it has killed everyone's favourite fares shortcuts, slowing down the sales process. Nobody could work out why but I figured it was down to the route code change

Yep, that happened with Tribute as well. You can type a single zero in the route field for Any Permitted but you have to type the full 5 digits for Any-Permitted. It's not been popular losing that shortcut.

 

[hairyhandedfool]

At least it seems to have the fares in, even if you have to search for them, some of Northern's newest installs apparently have fares completely missing.

 

[sheff1]

If confronted with this nonsense my first thought would be that the button with the dot had no fare behind it.

When I was involved with User Acceptance Testing, anyone who allowed a button with no text (or universally recognised symbol) to get out into a live system would certainly have been called in for a meeting without tea and biscuits. In practice no such meetings were needed.

 

[Starmill]

Please don't get me started on the route 01000 implementation , I could write a book.

As it is causing such problems, why press ahead with it?

It appears to have delivered absolutely no benefits to anyone thus far, and made several things worse.

Of course I could be wrong about that but...

 

[Joe Paxton]

Yep, that happened with Tribute as well. You can type a single zero in the route field for Any Permitted but you have to type the full 5 digits for Any-Permitted. It's not been popular losing that shortcut.

Stupid - or perhaps not quite so stupid - question from someone who's not clued up on these developments. What's the dashed difference between "Any Permitted" and "Any-Permitted", as Bertie Wooster might have asked?

 

[jon0844]

Here's a video I did a while back...

https://goo.gl/photos/kh5hecJkgADKz7Sp8

 

[Starmill]

It was intended that Any-Permitted [01000] (thanks for that correction) would be the replacement for Any Permitted [00000] in certain circumstances. The idea was that it would not appear on tickets at all, no words, no '.' Many new style tickets did not print anything where the route was 00000 anyway (and still don't). Any-Permitted is the expression of 01000 as it appears on ticket issuing systems.

 

[Paul Kelly]

When I was involved with User Acceptance Testing, anyone who allowed a button with no text (or universally recognised symbol) to get out into a live system would certainly have been called in for a meeting without tea and biscuits. In practice no such meetings were needed.

Reminds me very much of this: http://www.railforums.co.uk/showpost.php?p=1229585&postcount=14 (addition of "VIA" to route descriptions obscured the station name on Avantix Mobile machines). Similar mistake all over again except this one affects passengers and not just staff...

 

[Wallsendmag]

As it is causing such problems, why press ahead with it?



It appears to have delivered absolutely no benefits to anyone thus far, and made several things worse.



Of course I could be wrong about that but...

It wasn't our idea but it has to be implemented


Sent from my iPad using Tapatalk Pro

 

[alistairlees]

By way of a bit of background, route 01000 was introduced as a trial (for about 30 or 40 rural flows) in spring 2016 (I can't remember the exact date). It was then rolled out to many thousands of flows in spring this year.

The idea was to replace "Any Permitted" on tickets with just a blank space, as "Any Permitted" was considered to be confusing when there was only one possible route.

Routes in the trial were (for example) Ayr to Stranraer, and Eggesford to Barnstaple.

However, there was some concern as to whether all TIS would cope with a null value in the route description field from IDMS, so a full stop (".") was substituted instead. You'll see this on Trainline and Assertis online sites, as well as on TVMs. I haven't checked other sites.

This was only ever intended to be used on flows where there was only one flow. So the GWR use of it on flows where there are other route codes is mistaken and should be reversed. There shouldn't every be both route 00000 and route 01000 on the same flow - this is simply a mistake, and route 00000 should be deleted. Finally, there should be no price changes as a result of this (though I have seen some).

It would be nice to get rid of the "." altogether, and it should be easier for online systems, which only require to add some additional rules about what to display (i.e. nothing at all) about the route when the route code is 01000, rather than text such as "valid via any permitted route". TVMs that involve an active selection of a route within a step might need to do more work, for example to get rid of this step entirely.

I'm sure all this will come in time, resulting in the "." disappearing on website front ends and on tickets too, for route 01000.

 

[Hadders]

Two new TVMs have been installed at Stevenage today. I had a quick look on my way home tonight and was extremely concerned at what I found.

There is a separate button for travelcards - so far so good.

Pressing the button gives a number of Zonal options, the top one being 1-6 but there were others as well. The only travelcard option available from Stevenage is Zones 1-6 so the inclusion of the other options appears to be to create confusion. You can purchase other combinations as season tickets but I would expect to find these under the 'Season Ticket' option.

I pressed Zones 1-6 and was presented with three options:

'Any Permitted' - pressed this and no fares were shown...
'VTEC Only' - this does show fares for the recently introduced VTEC only fares from Stevenage. I know who VTEC are but would an infrequent traveller know? Surely it should say 'Virgin Trains Only'
' . ' - it's only by pressing this option that you actually get to see the 'normal' Any Permitted travelcard prices. Rather than ' . ' as the description it really should say it is valid on 'Any Train Company'.

I pointed this out to the RPI who was manning the gateline and she said she would report it.

How many passengers will erroneously purchase 'VTEC Only' travelcards when what they want is the 'Any Permitted'. Worse still they'll be at risk of a Penalty Fare from GTR for the mistake.

This really isn't acceptable, it's misleading and is going to catch many passengers out. Even worse the same situation exists on all the other existing TVMs at the station.

As a minimum a notice explaining what to do needs to be placed on the TVMs explaining the position until it can be resolved. I suspect the same problem also exists for tickets to London Terminals and also fares to Peterborough although I didn't have time to check.

 

[JaJaWa]

Two new TVMs have been installed at Stevenage today. I had a quick look on my way home tonight and was extremely concerned at what I found.

There is a separate button for travelcards - so far so good.

Pressing the button gives a number of Zonal options, the top one being 1-6 but there were others as well. The only travelcard option available from Stevenage is Zones 1-6 so the inclusion of the other options appears to be to create confusion. You can purchase other combinations as season tickets but I would expect to find these under the 'Season Ticket' option.

I pressed Zones 1-6 and was presented with three options:

'Any Permitted' - pressed this and no fares were shown...
'VTEC Only' - this does show fares for the recently introduced VTEC only fares from Stevenage. I know who VTEC are but would an infrequent traveller know? Surely it should say 'Virgin Trains Only'
' . ' - it's only by pressing this option that you actually get to see the 'normal' Any Permitted travelcard prices. Rather than ' . ' as the description it really should say it is valid on 'Any Train Company'.

I pointed this out to the RPI who was manning the gateline and she said she would report it.

How many passengers will erroneously purchase 'VTEC Only' travelcards when what they want is the 'Any Permitted'. Worse still they'll be at risk of a Penalty Fare from GTR for the mistake.

This really isn't acceptable, it's misleading and is going to catch many passengers out. Even worse the same situation exists on all the other existing TVMs at the station.

As a minimum a notice explaining what to do needs to be placed on the TVMs explaining the position until it can be resolved. I suspect the same problem also exists for tickets to London Terminals and also fares to Peterborough although I didn't have time to check.

I’m not sure anyone would even intentionally purchase the VTEC only ticket with such a small % price saving

 

[causton]

As someone who deals with the same style of ticket machines myself, I will report it to either the manufacturers of the machines or the person in charge of all of them in the company.

In the ticket office, the route is shown as Any - Permitted. I am guessing it is intended that the "Any - Permitted" shows up on TVMs but so little testing happens before anything goes ahead things slip through the net...

 

[Hadders]

I’m not sure anyone would even intentionally purchase the VTEC only ticket with such a small % price saving

But many will as the Any Permitted is effectively hidden from view. Also many won't know who or what VTEC is and buy it as it's the cheapest fare.

I really don't see the point of VTEC only tickets from Stevenage but that's a different debate. The real losers here (other than passengers travelling inadvertently with the wrong ticket) is GTR. They'll get no revenue from a VTEC Only ticket but would get the majority of the Any Permitted.

 

[Joe Paxton]

...
I really don't see the point of VTEC only tickets from Stevenage but that's a different debate. The real losers here (other than passengers travelling inadvertently with the wrong ticket) is GTR. They'll get no revenue from a VTEC Only ticket but would get the majority of the Any Permitted.

After skim reading your post I was going to say 'actually passengers are the real losers', but I see you made that point as well.

Arguably one could say the railway as a whole is the real loser, because it's just another reason for passengers to lose faith in the railway and what is often percieved as its Byzantine ticketing structure.

Seems like some TOCs appear to be running masterclasses in 'how to install the most misanthropic TVMs'.

 

[Silver Cobra]

Two new TVMs have been installed at Stevenage today.

Did these new machines replace those that were opposite the barriers? If so, that's rather a shame. They were the only Shere TVMs still available for use within a reasonable distance from my local station (Arlesey). Guess I'll be using the VTEC machine there more often now, as that's the only one that still allows you to change your starting station :P

 

[RJ]

By way of a bit of background, route 01000 was introduced as a trial (for about 30 or 40 rural flows) in spring 2016 (I can't remember the exact date). It was then rolled out to many thousands of flows in spring this year.

The idea was to replace "Any Permitted" on tickets with just a blank space, as "Any Permitted" was considered to be confusing when there was only one possible route.

Routes in the trial were (for example) Ayr to Stranraer, and Eggesford to Barnstaple.

However, there was some concern as to whether all TIS would cope with a null value in the route description field from IDMS, so a full stop (".") was substituted instead. You'll see this on Trainline and Assertis online sites, as well as on TVMs. I haven't checked other sites.

This was only ever intended to be used on flows where there was only one flow. So the GWR use of it on flows where there are other route codes is mistaken and should be reversed. There shouldn't every be both route 00000 and route 01000 on the same flow - this is simply a mistake, and route 00000 should be deleted. Finally, there should be no price changes as a result of this (though I have seen some).

It would be nice to get rid of the "." altogether, and it should be easier for online systems, which only require to add some additional rules about what to display (i.e. nothing at all) about the route when the route code is 01000, rather than text such as "valid via any permitted route". TVMs that involve an active selection of a route within a step might need to do more work, for example to get rid of this step entirely.

I'm sure all this will come in time, resulting in the "." disappearing on website front ends and on tickets too, for route 01000.

Most of the tickets down my way (not quite GWR land) seem to have the new Any - Permitted route so people are having a great time dealing with the TVMs.

Not sure what exactly is trying to be achieved with the removal of the words "Any Permitted" from tickets - the current implementation is confusing passengers and staff alike. Given the Routeing Guide is virtually incomprehensible to all but its custodians and the very, very few people determined to extract value out of it, it's neither here or there whether "Any Permitted" is shown on tickets. In reality, probably 99.9% of trips are done and tickets inspected on an "Any reasonable route" basis, with a minority of people claiming "Any Permitted" means any route is permitted.

Is it really about removing confusion on journeys with one route available, or keeping the TOCs happy by increasing the number of routes to facilitate revenue allocation, thus reducing flexibility for customers?

 

[Wallsendmag]

Most of the tickets down my way (not quite GWR land) seem to have the new Any - Permitted route so people are having a great time dealing with the TVMs.

Not sure what exactly is trying to be achieved with the removal of the words "Any Permitted" from tickets - the current implementation is confusing passengers and staff alike. Given the Routeing Guide is virtually incomprehensible to all but its custodians and the very, very few people determined to extract value out of it, it's neither here or there whether "Any Permitted" is shown on tickets. In reality, probably 99.9% of trips are done and tickets inspected on an "Any reasonable route" basis, with a minority of people claiming "Any Permitted" means any route is permitted.

Is it really about removing confusion on journeys with one route available, or keeping the TOCs happy by increasing the number of routes to facilitate revenue allocation, thus reducing flexibility for customers?

Nothing to do with the TOCs , all mandated by RDG