EMT Groupsave

[clagmonster]

Morning all,
Could those with access to the NFM please look up the cost of a Groupsave 4 day return from Derby-Leicester, as it no longer appears in any booking engines. As a cheap day return is £9.80 I would imagine the ticket for for people costs £19.60, but I would be grateful for confirmation.

Also, would I be correct in thinking that, rather than the GR4 ticket, it is acceptable to have these tickets issued as CDRs with the GS4 discount applied as if it were a railcard. I seem to remember a manual extract being posted on the forum once which stated this (so long as a GR4 exists, GS4 discounted CDRs are valid on EMT services I think is a good paraphrasing of the extract). The reason I ask is that when I last did this, the booking clerk struggled to issue the GR4 ticket so that was the work round.

Cheers in advance.

 

[FGWman]

Dont know why it does not appear in the booking engine but its in the fares manual. Ticket type is GR4 and priced at 19.60.

In reply to the second part of your questions could you be issued with CDR with a Group save discount applied. The answer is no. EMT do not accept Group save discounted tickets. You will need to get the GR4 ticket as above. Also if there is no GR4 ticket for a particular journey on EMT then you cannot get a discount.

 

[Greeby]

Bit conflicted on how I feel about GR3/GR4 fares. On the one hand, it is a tad limiting in that a through journey can't be issued. (MKC-Kettering on a Saturday night is a common one) On the other hand, I've had to non-issue conventional Groupsaves enough times that I can appreciate having it all on one piece of stock

 

[clagmonster]

Cheers. when did the rules change on that, as the manual stated that the Groupsave discounted tickets would be valid (as the GR4 fare exists) when this last cropped up, admitedly a couple of years ago. The quote is in this post:
http://www.railforums.co.uk/showpost.php?p=510827&postcount=49

May I ask, how does the GR4 fare print? I seem to recall at one point it was set up to print as one adult for the price of two.

 

[Bellwater]

On Avantix, it's set up to print as one ticket and i think now the same in TVMs/Booking Offices... used to have the option of single ones but it was getting abused too much.

 

[clagmonster]

On Avantix, it's set up to print as one ticket and i think now the same in TVMs/Booking Offices... used to have the option of single ones but it was getting abused too much.

Makes sense. Does it still print as "Adults: One" despite being valid for four people?

Anyone any gen on the Manual entry? Cheers in advance, and for the help so far.

 

[hairyhandedfool]

The manual hasn't changed (excepting for franchise name changes), there is a fault with the data in the system. FasTis reveals GR3/GR4 is valid for travel on EMT between Derby and Leicester, however if you put 4 adults it comes up as 4x£19.60 (£78.40) rather than 1x£19.60. It does also list a WR4 ticket at £19.60 (1x£19.60 + 3x£0.00) however this is noted as a 'Web Groupsave 4' fare.

Presumably the websites are confused and correctly don't show the fare for 1 adult but incorrectly multiply the fare (as FasTis does) for four people.

 

[clagmonster]

Cheers, HHF, that explains the confusion we had at the booking office last season.

The websites do not show either the GR4 or WR4 fares, whether you search for 1 adult or 4. I'll see what happens when I, or whoever is nominated to coordinate the tickets, buys them.

 

[hairyhandedfool]

If the websites are having the same problem as FasTis, they probably won't show the GR4 fare as it believes the fare is more expensive than the First Class Anytime fare. I can't say why the WR4 fare doesn't appear though.

 

[Bellwater]

Groupsave Tickets show 'Groupsave Day 3/4' and 'Adult - One' on them. The '3/4' denotes the number of passengers which causes a bit of confusion.

 

[clagmonster]

Cheers, it explains the issue in Fastis then - it is just an issue of strange ticket design.

 

[hairyhandedfool]

Probably just a 'stupid ticket machine programming' problem combined with a 'stupid people creating a new fare rather than a discount' issue that probably boils down to revenue.