Digital Ticketing Opportunities and Challenges

[Topological]

With the closure of ticket offices being a major discussion now, the role of the digital ticket takes on a new importance. This thread is not intended to be a discussion of the rights and wrongs of ticket office closures, but takes as given that there is a need for more digital ticketing. Note this is not directly designed to question split ticketing, the existence of advance, returns etc as those are all done elsewhere. Assume that there is a desire to maintain ticket types on the whole.

So, given that tickets are becoming digital, what can be done. To start the thinking:

1. How can groups without access to digital tickets be helped to go digital?
2. How can ticket simplifications be made to help people use the railway?
3. What is the role for support staff in enabling the transition?
4. What infrastructure challenges are posed?

In my opinion:

1. The set of people with a smart device is much larger than the set without. But there is still a telling group who do not have tickets. Can we continue with paper tickets that carry the same power as a digital ticket and/or state clearly on them that the "conditions of the ticket can be amended to the benefit of the holder" and direct to the appropriate policy. See my points in 2
2. Tickets can be updated "live" if they are truly digital. Passengers can get "notifications" and have the correct information on their "app" to display. QR codes do not need to be updated as the reader software can be updated "live". To my mind as soon as a cancellation / STP / delay happens then the ticket can be updated, advances for trains that will not run become valid on the best alternative etc. Clever software could ask the user to confirm what "best" meant, but the industry could simply use departure after scheduled departure to get earliest expected arrival at the destination. All splits etc can be dealt with by the computer provided they are in a linked booking. This is an area where computers are powerful. For paper ticket holders, their ticket will have the QR code and the policy will be clearly communicated as per 1.
3. Staff in the station can help with the app. The staff can also help with TVMs printing QR coded tickets.
4. Connectivity in stations will need to be better. Charging points will be helpful on ALL trains, but should not be expected. Again the paper alternative offers the flexibility and in times of disruption as long as tickets are designed with QR codes.

Note to this is that technologies will change, so QR codes may be replaced by something better. Charging will improve and battery life likewise. So please take my opinion as representing best available technology rather than specifically the points made.

 

[Wallsendmag]

Wow it's like you've been looking over my shoulder. Why wouldn't you update the NOT a QR code?

 

[sor]

can they make all tickets available on smartcard so I don't feel the need to print out the ticket as a backup or ensure that I have a working, charged smartphone to avoid the railway's "guilty even when proven innocent" style of fares enforcement?

ditto "digital" railcards. give me the option to stuff a paper backup in my wallet and/or allow guards or RPIs to search for a railcard and bring up the information and/or find some way to load the same onto the smartcard. Until then, I am thankful that the railcards I now use (having become ineligible for the "digital" only 26-30) are still available on plastic

 

[Bletchleyite]

Wow it's like you've been looking over my shoulder. Why wouldn't you update the NOT a QR code?

I think the OP is suggesting what I have suggested before, namely a move to true e-ticketing, that is a system where the ticket is a record in a database and the barcode (or PNR code or whatever) is simply a reference to it, so if your PNR code is ABC123 it remains ABC123 even if you've changed your train to a different TOC next week.

Without 100% mobile coverage this is a bit difficult, but it won't be long before that's a thing.

This is the approach now used by pretty much every other long distance transport service, from coaches to planes. The railway is a way behind.

 

[tomuk]

How about a central rail\travel account where you can lodge your debit\credit card details and either use contactless for local journies around the metropolitan cities or store your longer distance ticket purchase and then use your payment card as a token to open tickets barriers.

 

[Tazi Hupefi]

In the far off future, but within most of our lifetimes, ticketing will become biometrically linked in my opinion. A face, fingerprint etc is just another form of unique "token". Link it to your finances, and you can travel around as much as you like and you won't even have to do anything. The technology exists now, it's the ethical implications we aren't so comfortable with at the moment, but those fears aren't universal across the world.

At the moment that token is a smartcard, NFC mobile phone, watch etc, and we'd never have believed that possible 30 years ago.

In the short term, I'd like to see ticket retailers produce a much simplified mobile app (or setting within an existing app) so that people who struggle with technology can have an extremely simple and clean booking interface, using simple language, that can't really go wrong for them, and over time, their confidence will improve and may encourage them to try out other features and functionality that can help improve their journeys.

With ChatGPT/AI tools, it should theoretically be possible to simply ask your digital assistant of choice either verbally or by typing to recommend the best ticket for whatever you're asking about, and then go on to purchase it. Essentially a virtual conversation with an AI booking office.

I also suspect it will be some sort of ticketing enthusiast to first use AI or machine learning to help identify better or more complex split ticketing points or combinations, routeing anomalies etc.

 

[Hadders]

can they make all tickets available on smartcard so I don't feel the need to print out the ticket as a backup or ensure that I have a working, charged smartphone to avoid the railway's "guilty even when proven innocent" style of fares enforcement?

ditto "digital" railcards. give me the option to stuff a paper backup in my wallet and/or allow guards or RPIs to search for a railcard and bring up the information and/or find some way to load the same onto the smartcard. Until then, I am thankful that the railcards I now use (having become ineligible for the "digital" only 26-30) are still available on plastic

Is there a reason you can't make sure your phone is charged? You must be a very heavy user of your phone if it runs out of charge.

 

[sor]

Is there a reason you can't make sure your phone is charged? You must be a very heavy user of your phone if it runs out of charge.

some phones are just not that good on battery life (my 2020 iPhone SE is pretty bad unless you literally never touch it), but frankly I don’t feel I should have to worry about power to avoid the potentially serious legal issues that would come if I can’t display my eticket or “digital” railcard. The railway wants to get rid of paper tickets and I think it is their responsibility to provide a suitable solution (or to change the regulations to account for these problems).

I think the smartcards fulfill that role but there are still some very weird anomalies as to what you can do with it (eg GWR seems to let you buy singles but not returns)

 

[mr_jrt]

The problem with relying on "apps" is that you are then prescribing what software your customers can run on their devices. Limit yourself to the big two and you'll make it all but impossible for any new system to break into the market, let alone locking yourself into the software support cycles of said manufacturers.

Any software-based digital ticketing should have to be platform-agnostic, i.e. purely web-based. Which should be easy enough. A simple web frontend to a national database that displays QR codes and heavily caches the data on the device to enable it to operate largely offline should more than suffice.

 

[BJames]

Is there a reason you can't make sure your phone is charged? You must be a very heavy user of your phone if it runs out of charge.

I am a big fan of digital tickets and have exclusively used e-tickets for a while now. The other day though, for the first time in a long time, I found my phone running out of charge (up really early, relatively late travel back) and as I had plans that night as well, I really needed a charging point on the move (and I was worried about my phone running out of charge by the time we got back to London) - but the next few departures from Oxford Parkway back to Marylebone were 165s with no charging points.

What I ended up doing was going from Parkway via Oxford (on my flexible ticket), grabbed a bite to eat quickly before my onward connection to Paddington - I was about 15 minutes later arrival into London and had a phone which had charged from 10% to 70% in that time. While power coverage across the networks is pretty good already there are areas which could do with attention. But this diversion worked well for me - got food and charge, with minimal 'delay', and I was more than happy to take this route.

As an aside - the portable power bank I had was great for my iPhone 8, but doesn't seem to do anything for my 13, so will be upgrading that asap as well.

 

[tomuk]

In the far off future, but within most of our lifetimes, ticketing will become biometrically linked in my opinion. A face, fingerprint etc is just another form of unique "token". Link it to your finances, and you can travel around as much as you like and you won't even have to do anything. The technology exists now, it's the ethical implications we aren't so comfortable with at the moment, but those fears aren't universal across the world.

At the moment that token is a smartcard, NFC mobile phone, watch etc, and we'd never have believed that possible 30 years ago.

In the short term, I'd like to see ticket retailers produce a much simplified mobile app (or setting within an existing app) so that people who struggle with technology can have an extremely simple and clean booking interface, using simple language, that can't really go wrong for them, and over time, their confidence will improve and may encourage them to try out other features and functionality that can help improve their journeys.

With ChatGPT/AI tools, it should theoretically be possible to simply ask your digital assistant of choice either verbally or by typing to recommend the best ticket for whatever you're asking about, and then go on to purchase it. Essentially a virtual conversation with an AI booking office.

I also suspect it will be some sort of ticketing enthusiast to first use AI or machine learning to help identify better or more complex split ticketing points or combinations, routeing anomalies etc.

Moscow Metro has face id ticketing already and I would be suprised that isn't in use in China somewhere.

Is there a reason you can't make sure your phone is charged? You must be a very heavy user of your phone if it runs out of charge.

But why do you need to carry your ticket around with you? All you need is a token to link back to the central registry. Be it bank card, Oyster or ITSO. It would also work with phones where the NFC chip can be preloaded with a core that works even when the battery is dead. I'd suggest that e-tickets are old hat.

 

[markymark2000]

ditto "digital" railcards. give me the option to stuff a paper backup in my wallet and/or allow guards or RPIs to search for a railcard and bring up the information and/or find some way to load the same onto the smartcard. Until then, I am thankful that the railcards I now use (having become ineligible for the "digital" only 26-30) are still available on plastic

I fully, fully agree with you and this is my main worry with mobile/etickets and for longer journeys especially, I refuse to use them because of the risk of my phone dying.

Sadly, most TOCs do not want to embrace easy NFC technology with smartcards. I know it's around for some TOCs but nowhere near enough and it's certainly not spoken about enough. Smartcards can easily have tickets loaded to it from a phone via NFC. why isn't this more available? Buy a ticket on the phone (as they want) but let people have the protection of the a physical token by letting them load all tickets to smartcards via NFC from phones? Where railcards are issued, they should all be NFC cards so that the above idea can be implemented and it means that people can have just 1 physical token rather than having to have tickets and a railcard, it's all in one place to make it easier. Sending tickets to smartcards via NFC can also be done at a ticket machine so it saves as many paper tickets being printed if people have these smartcards, they can use them for multiple things.

Good mix of paperless ticketing but also with the protection of a physical token

 

[TheManOnThe172]

Is there a reason you can't make sure your phone is charged? You must be a very heavy user of your phone if it runs out of charge.

Peoples' phones do run out of charge. Especially poorer peoples' phones They are the ones to whom the new phones cascade down when there is a newer model, or when the battery life starts dropping. It wouldn't be a problem if batteries were affordably replaceable, but governments don't insist on this - leaving an incentive for phone manufacturers to price battery replacement high enough that many people will opt instead for a new phone.

With phones as they are at present - ie the "installed base" of actual phones, not just "best case" performance of brand new phones, expecting people to be able to fire up a phone and show a railcard and/or ticket at the end of a long day leaves just too small a safety margin.

The railway seems to have a very skewed approach to harm.

For physical safety (small risk of very bad things), large safety margins are applied at every stage. We spend millions to deliver even the most basic new station because you can't compromise on safety. A near miss because someone left some equipment in the wrong place? There will be a formal investigation.

But for other harms (higher risk of things that are only reasonably bad), there are some major blind spots. What happens to people who can't show a railcard or ticket because their phone battery has emptied too much? The problem is totally predictable and not infrequent. It doesn't require people to have been grossly negligent: it only needs their day to have turned out a bit different from the way they had planned it - the public charging point the expected was broken or busy. Or a meeting over-ran. Then you are faced with taking the risk that your battery will last, or wasting time to find a charging point and wait while you get enough charge.

Because the consequence is only a moderate harm (innocent person being penalised, or wasting their time), the railway attitude is "tough". A cheap and good-for-the-railway solution has been developed, and because the consequences of the manifest risks aren't fatal, they can be ignored.

 

[Hadders]

some phones are just not that good on battery life (my 2020 iPhone SE is pretty bad unless you literally never touch it), but frankly I don’t feel I should have to worry about power to avoid the potentially serious legal issues that would come if I can’t display my eticket or “digital” railcard. The railway wants to get rid of paper tickets and I think it is their responsibility to provide a suitable solution (or to change the regulations to account for these problems).

I think the smartcards fulfill that role but there are still some very weird anomalies as to what you can do with it (eg GWR seems to let you buy singles but not returns)

Mobile phones can run out of charge (not that you'd think they do judging by the fact that everyone constantly seems to be using them).

My phone battery life isn't great but it's adequate enough. If I'm going to be out all day I make sure I carry a charging cable. To be honest there are more important reasons for me to keep a phone charged other than being able to display a railway ticket barcode.

It strikes me that many people on here are holding the railway to a higher standard than other areas of everyday life. People are quite happy to show a barcode ticket on a mobile phone when they go to the theatre, or a sporting match, or a supermarket loyalty app, or take a flight. But when it comes to the railway moving in this direction people start crying foul!

The problem with relying on "apps" is that you are then prescribing what software your customers can run on their devices. Limit yourself to the big two and you'll make it all but impossible for any new system to break into the market, let alone locking yourself into the software support cycles of said manufacturers.

Any software-based digital ticketing should have to be platform-agnostic, i.e. purely web-based. Which should be easy enough. A simple web frontend to a national database that displays QR codes and heavily caches the data on the device to enable it to operate largely offline should more than suffice.

You don't have to use an app to purchase a railway ticket on your phone. Simply use the browser on your phone. The ticket itself is delivered to you by email and you simply show the barcode attached to the email.

 

[crablab]

People are quite happy to show a barcode ticket on a mobile phone when they go to the theatre, or a sporting match, or a supermarket loyalty app, or take a flight. But when it comes to the railway moving in this direction people start crying foul!

Whilst I generally agree with the points you're making, I'm not sure this is a good comparison

If your phone dies half way through a theatre show, you're not at risk of prosecution for failing to show your ticket to the steward selling interval ice cream if they ask for it!

Likewise for a flight - losing your boarding pass is at worst expensive. Losing your train ticket is effectively criminal (if you continue to travel).

Of course, digitising these things significantly helps with avoiding losing things. Fewer people are likely to lose their phone than random pieces of card, and will keep them charged up because they want to do a myriad of other things on their device.

 

[sor]

Mobile phones can run out of charge (not that you'd think they do judging by the fact that everyone constantly seems to be using them).

My phone battery life isn't great but it's adequate enough. If I'm going to be out all day I make sure I carry a charging cable. To be honest there are more important reasons for me to keep a phone charged other than being able to display a railway ticket barcode.

It strikes me that many people on here are holding the railway to a higher standard than other areas of everyday life. People are quite happy to show a barcode ticket on a mobile phone when they go to the theatre, or a sporting match, or a supermarket loyalty app, or take a flight. But when it comes to the railway moving in this direction people start crying foul!


You don't have to use an app to purchase a railway ticket on your phone. Simply use the browser on your phone. The ticket itself is delivered to you by email and you simply show the barcode attached to the email.

OK, but those important reasons are more voluntary. There's a difference between needing a map and risking being hauled into court / given a hefty penalty fare due to an apparent lack of ticket (even if you really did have one, the rule is that you must be able to show it). I know they're "gracious" enough to offer one refund a year when you can't show a railcard and had to buy a new ticket, but that's not enough. I shouldn't *have* to maintain a charged phone or carry a cable so that I can comply with the railway's revenue-enhancing activities.

(and in the case of railcards, that's assuming the terrible app works - when I had a 26-30 there was one occasion where it disappeared right when an RPI wanted to see it. Fortunately they said they'd let me figure it out and come back later)

The examples you mention (and I'd include another - credit/debit cards) are quite different, as they are either voluntary such as in the supermarket card or they provide a fallback (airlines will print your e-ticket if you need them to, AFAIK the railway can't). My bank gives me a physical card and it is my choice as to whether I want to use it on my smartphone or watch too - and Apple's version of it still works for a while after the battery has died.

I hold the railway to a higher standard because it is considered an essential good, is heavily subsidised to that effect, and it needs to be as flexible and inclusive as possible. Quite different to whether or not the Tesco Clubcard is available physically (which it is of course)

 

[Bletchleyite]

One thing that might be of benefit would be to allow the option of named tickets. If a ticket was named, if your phone ran out of battery or you lost it it could be retrieved online and reprinted if you showed ID, which most people have in some form, particularly if you included things like bus passes and voter ID cards. You could still choose a transferrable, unnamed ticket but would not have this benefit.

People are used to airline tickets being named. They don't suit every situation, but I don't recall very often having bought a train ticket without knowing who it was for.

This does fit quite well with the idea of a truly media agnostic, true "record in a database" eticket.

 

[Paul Kelly]

Changes to tickets - eg. excesses to travel at peak-time or via a different route, is something that is really difficult with digital tickets and needs sorted. I think this is probably a consequence of the fact that digital ticketing has been led from the retailing perspective and easy changes after a ticket has been purchased has been seen as a "nice to have" rather than an essential feature. There is also the problem that some if it requires an element of discretion (e.g. How bad is the disruption? Whose fault was it that you missed your train?) which is very difficult to apply in an automated way.

 

[Bletchleyite]

Changes to tickets - eg. excesses to travel at peak-time or via a different route, is something that is really difficult with digital tickets and needs sorted. I think this is probably a consequence of the fact that digital ticketing has been led from the retailing perspective and easy changes after a ticket has been purchased has been seen as a "nice to have" rather than an essential feature. There is also the problem that some if it requires an element of discretion (e.g. How bad is the disruption? Whose fault was it that you missed your train?) which is very difficult to apply in an automated way.

Excesses could be solved easily with single fare pricing. Simply refund and reissue. If travel has started, just don't allow the origin or destination to be changed, just route, ticket type and class (overdistance excesses are not an entitlement).

Like the way these proposals have made a mess of modernising ticket sales, LNER/DfT made a mess of single fare pricing by trying, and failing, to hide fare rises in it. The idea is solid and very desirable, even if you do continue selling returns at double the singles on the same "refund and replace, if you want two different routes buy two singles" basis.

 

[yorkie]

One thing that might be of benefit would be to allow the option of named tickets. If a ticket was named, if your phone ran out of battery or you lost it it could be retrieved online and reprinted if you showed ID, which most people have in some form, particularly if you included things like bus passes and voter ID cards. You could still choose a transferrable, unnamed ticket but would not have this benefit.

People are used to airline tickets being named. They don't suit every situation, but I don't recall very often having bought a train ticket without knowing who it was for.

This does fit quite well with the idea of a truly media agnostic, true "record in a database" eticket.

I don't like the idea of naming tickets; this makes it a pain for buying tickets for a group, or on company business etc. The conditions of travel were simplified in this regard; your proposal is a backwards one.

Edit: I see there is already a thread for your proposal; I suggest that the matter is discussed in the existing thread, which can be found at the link below:

E-ticket "battery" issue - is names on tickets an option for a fix?

With yet another thread having come up in D&P about a battery having run out and a hefty out of court settlement being demanded, is there a simple fix to all this staring the railway in the face? Most train tickets are bought by the person who will use them with no intention of transfer, and of...

www.railforums.co.uk

Excesses could be solved easily with single fare pricing. Simply refund and reissue. If travel has started, just don't allow the origin or destination to be changed, just route, ticket type and class (overdistance excesses are not an entitlement).

Like the way these proposals have made a mess of modernising ticket sales, LNER/DfT made a mess of single fare pricing by trying, and failing, to hide fare rises in it. The idea is solid and very desirable, even if you do continue selling returns at double the singles on the same "refund and replace, if you want two different routes buy two singles" basis.

Unfortunately the DfT has decided that single leg pricing comes with a 4% to 50% increase in the fare paid (on top of the 6% annual increase); I reject that.

See the following thread, where the matter has been debated before; if you have anything new to add, feel free to reply to that thread, as it's best we keep it off this one:

LNER fare rises and single leg pricing on many flows, from 11 June

LNER's own booking engine does do single-point splits, I've had one before. It does it in a very curious way - issues a through Advance at the full fare then discounts it to what the split would have cost. But does it only work for "LNER Only" Advances? Only for LNER journeys and only on the App

www.railforums.co.uk

 

[wibble]

I don't like the idea of naming tickets; this makes it a pain for buying tickets for a group, or on company business etc. The conditions of travel were simplified in this regard; your proposal is a backwards one.

I agree, and there's also the GDPR issue if your name is linked to a itinerary/ticket. I can't imagine many customers would happily share this information with every TOC (to cover the multiple TOCs/routes a ticket might be valid on). Also, the poster mentions carrying ID - there are many people that don't carry any form of separate ID, or store ID on their phone.

 

[fandroid]

I like the idea of Railcards being Smartcards with the facility to load tickets on them, as well as the Railcard details. I musingly asked on another recent thread whether ITSO bus passes could be configured to take rail tickets too. I remember Alan Williams of Modern Railways suggesting years ago that Senior Railcards could be combined with bus passes for Seniors. In the digital and NFC age there seems to be little in the way of a technical barrier to combining the whole shebang.

Having only just got acquainted with Smartcards I'm frustrated at how unimaginative their introduction is. An instance of the Balkanised railway making life very difficult for passengers. They quite simply should be valid between every station in GB that has ticket gates, plus others where readers have been installed, and every ticket seller should be required to offer them for every valid journey.

 

[Tazi Hupefi]

I like the idea of Railcards being Smartcards with the facility to load tickets on them, as well as the Railcard details. I musingly asked on another recent thread whether ITSO bus passes could be configured to take rail tickets too. I remember Alan Williams of Modern Railways suggesting years ago that Senior Railcards could be combined with bus passes for Seniors. In the digital and NFC age there seems to be little in the way of a technical barrier to combining the whole shebang.

Having only just got acquainted with Smartcards I'm frustrated at how unimaginative their introduction is. An instance of the Balkanised railway making life very difficult for passengers. They quite simply should be valid between every station in GB that has ticket gates, plus others where readers have been installed, and every ticket seller should be required to offer them for every valid journey.

Smartcards are already old school in terms of digital ticketing, albeit they still play a significant role.

The concept is still good - but a physical extra piece of plastic card with a small circuit in will more than likely prove to be an interim / stopgap measure when this is looked back upon in the future.

A smartcard is just a token - pretty much anything digital can be a token these days, be it biometrics, your phone, your watch, health/fitness trackers etc. Arguably they are more robust and reliable than some other alternatives, but there will eventually be very serious environmental concerns - debit/credit cards are increasingly under the spotlight owing to the amount of plastic waste they generate, and the materials required to produce them and dispatch them in the first place. Low value plastics will eventually be almost certainly banned once something more viable comes along. Some hotels I use are using wooden door keys etc now.

A lot of the younger generation, which obviously do get older (!) don't carry a wallet or purse at all anymore - and certainly don't want an extra piece of plastic. They'll just use whatever smart device for everything instead - and these things then become normalised in society as the population dies out and the next generation dominate.

 

[markymark2000]

but there will eventually be very serious environmental concerns - debit/credit cards are increasingly under the spotlight owing to the amount of plastic waste they generate, and the materials required to produce them and dispatch them in the first place. Low value plastics will eventually be almost certainly banned once something more viable comes along. Some hotels I use are using wooden door keys etc now.

I don't think anyone cares what the card is made out of, what matters is the chip inside and as long as that is readable, that is ok.

Given that concessionary bus passes are always being handed out, it would be a good idea to combine them with railcards and railpasses. You'd reduce the amount of cards in some peoples wallets by 1/3rd.

A lot of the younger generation, which obviously do get older (!) don't carry a wallet or purse at all anymore - and certainly don't want an extra piece of plastic. They'll just use whatever smart device for everything instead - and these things then become normalised in society as the population dies out and the next generation dominate.

The only way to make it easier for the younger generation is to get USBs and plugs more widespread in stations and on trains (ideally something like the ones Virgin installed years ago with the phone attachments (which now would be a lightning attachment and USB-C attachment). Many younger people, if they carry things to charge their phones, would only carry around a USB and not a 3 pin plug and so all of the trains with just 3 pin plugs are not a huge amount of use. If you want to make more digital tickets, you need to improve charging facilities else it will forever be a thing of people saying their phone is dead to avoid paying a fare or their phone dying and not being able to prove that they had a ticket.

 

[Tazi Hupefi]

I don't think anyone cares what the card is made out of, what matters is the chip inside and as long as that is readable, that is ok.

Given that concessionary bus passes are always being handed out, it would be a good idea to combine them with railcards and railpasses. You'd reduce the amount of cards in some peoples wallets by 1/3rd.


The only way to make it easier for the younger generation is to get USBs and plugs more widespread in stations and on trains (ideally something like the ones Virgin installed years ago with the phone attachments (which now would be a lightning attachment and USB-C attachment). Many younger people, if they carry things to charge their phones, would only carry around a USB and not a 3 pin plug and so all of the trains with just 3 pin plugs are not a huge amount of use. If you want to make more digital tickets, you need to improve charging facilities else it will forever be a thing of people saying their phone is dead to avoid paying a fare or their phone dying and not being able to prove that they had a ticket.

Agreed. It has been disappointing that most 'recent' refurbishments have seen old style and low speed/power USB ports retrofitted, rather than spending a little more and having a mix of USB A and C charging ports, although I suspect some of the older diesel fleets don't have sufficient power for high speed charging anyway. Wireless charging will be useful, but it is still quite limited and only offered by Avanti and SWR I believe (the latter may have even been disabled due to a safety issue). I suspect Apple will abandon the charging port entirely very soon anyway, which will then lead to others following.

I think both Apple and Google have some form of extreme low power mode, where even with a dead battery, it is still able to function as a NFC capable device - maybe the further development of that, supported by the likes of aviation, rail, venues etc could be worthwhile.

 

[HORNIMANS]

Hi All
Having read all the above as carefully as to try and understand, I find it incredible at the speed people want to make major changes.
1 I would never put a ticket onto my phone, seen so many people had to purchase a new ticket
2 i have a Senior railcard as a plastic card, would only have it that way.
3 Names on tickets good idea. Had All Line Rover ticket last week my name was printed on it.
4 what about rovers and ranger tickets. have to be paper tickets because dates can be chosen.
5 all these TVMs and people helping passengers will have to be before entry to platforms.
That just a few not being Disability Act compliant as well.

 

[Benjwri]

I think the smartcards fulfill that role but there are still some very weird anomalies as to what you can do with it (eg GWR seems to let you buy singles but not returns)

You can buy day returns, but not tickets valid for any longer than that, because unfortunately smartcards are open to abuse from using a ticket multiple times.

 

[Hadders]

I would never put a ticket onto my phone, seen so many people had to purchase a new ticket

No-one is being forced to put a ticket on their phone. Paper tickets will still be available but in the vast majority of cases these will be dispensed from a ticket vending machine rather than from a traditional ticket office window.

If you travel on a long distance train these days you’d see the vast, vast majority of tickets are presented on mobile phones, despite the misgivings of many on this forum.

i have a Senior railcard as a plastic card, would only have it that way.

You will still be able to get a plastic railcard.

Names on tickets good idea. Had All Line Rover ticket last week my name was printed on it.

I disagree. It cases confusion if a ticket is purchased for someone else, as well as other potential privacy reasons.

what about rovers and ranger tickets. have to be paper tickets because dates can be chosen.

In time I expect these to be available from TVMs although there’s no reason why they couldn’t be issued as e-ticket. Northern already sell rovers and rangers from their TVMs.

all these TVMs and people helping passengers will have to be before entry to platforms.

I agree, although we’re not going to see a mass increase in the number of TVMs at the majority of stations because in many cases people have already or will switch from buying at a ticket office to buying online.

 

[markymark2000]

In time I expect these to be available from TVMs although there’s no reason why they couldn’t be issued as e-ticket. Northern already sell rovers and rangers from their TVMs.

Sadly, this isn't happening across all TOCs.

I know that Chester isn't included in the proposals but it's an interesting scenario whereby off peak, the cheapest ticket for Chester - Liverpool is the Merseyrail Day Saver. This can no longer be bought at the TVMs and it isn't available on Merseyrails own TVMs (so Bache, Capenhurst, Little Sutton, Overpool and Ellesmere Port). The only way to get this ticket is by going to a staffed ticket office. Anyone going to a TVM will be charged £3 more for an anytime day return. IF it wasn't for Chesters ticket office, a lot of people would have been overcharged. Granted this is partly due to Merseyrails poor way of doing ticketing (just do a 'Merseyrail only' return at the same price as the day ticket, then TVMs will pick it up) but also due to Transport for Wales TVMs not selling rover and rangers.

 

[sor]

You can buy day returns, but not tickets valid for any longer than that, because unfortunately smartcards are open to abuse from using a ticket multiple times.

I'm not sure how smartcards are worse than e tickets or orange paper tickets in that regard though - if anything it's more secure, once they are scanned at an exit they can be disabled

(it also seems pointless to enforce in places like Cornwall where most stations are not barriered and so paper ticket abuse is trivial if not scribbled over/stamped by a guard)