Exact Fare Only Buses

[Dai Corner]

We've discussed Contactless and other payment technologies recently, but the two remaining municipal companies in South Wales, Newport Transport and Cardiff Bus, do not give change if you want to pay cash. NT don't do Contactless either, though CB will do so very shortly.

Are there any other such operators?

 

[overthewater]

* First Scotland East Licence of Midland bluebird Ie Livingston depot/ West Lothian operations. ( Midland bluebird has two licenses. Forth valley area gives change: )
* First Glasgow
* First Aberdeen
* Xplore Dundee ( Nat Express Dundee)
* Coakley buses or whoever it is now that operate 107/109 circular around Bellshill, Motherwell and uddingston is also exact fares.

 

[bb21]

Plenty of others. Some long-standing ones include: NCT, Reading, NXWM (including Coventry), etc.

One that sticks out in my mind in Scotland is Garelochhead Coaches for some reason, possibly because trying to find £2.95 in change is no fun the last time I used them. It also seems a bit of an odd arrangement for a small operator.

All Stagecoach undertakings give change iirc.

 

[GusB]

* First Scotland East Licence of Midland bluebird Ie Livingston depot/ West Lothian operations. ( Midland bluebird has two licenses. Forth valley area gives change: )
* First Glasgow
* First Aberdeen
* Xplore Dundee ( Nat Express Dundee)
* Coakley buses or whoever it is now that operate 107/109 circular around Bellshill, Motherwell and uddingston is also exact fares.

Isn't Lothian still exact fare as well?

Essentially it used to be municipal/PTE operators that operated exact-fare schemes (often with dual-door vehicles), but as privatisation progressed the boundaries between separate town and country operators became rather more blurred. When I moved to Aberdeen to attend university, Grampian Transport (now First Aberdeen) had a pre-paid "Farecard" system which I used when I wasn't travelling frequently enough to warrant the purchase of a season ticket, but it was still exact fare. Bus stops had signage which told you where you were and how much it cost to where you were going, so if you were a regular passenger you'd know roughly what kind of change you should carry.

When I spent a summer in Edinburgh, we used to chuck 50p in the farebox and hope for the best.

 

[Dai Corner]

It's not as rare as I thought then.

I wonder what happens to the inevitable overpayments. I'd like to think they're donated to good causes.

 

[GusB]

It's not as rare as I thought then.

I wonder what happens to the inevitable overpayments. I'd like to think they're donated to good causes.

It's why I didn't ever feel guilty about going one stop beyond the fare stage. Swings and roundabouts.

 

[Volvodart]

It's not as rare as I thought then.

I wonder what happens to the inevitable overpayments. I'd like to think they're donated to good causes.

https://www.edinburghnews.scotsman....make-194k-from-keeping-spare-change-1-3317505

LOTHIAN Buses has been making an extra £530 a day from people who don’t have the correct change for their fare. Latest figures released under freedom of information show the company raked in £194,035 more than the value of ticket sales in 2012 – up from £142,882 the previous year. Figures for 2013 will not be available until May. Transport campaigners criticised the “exact fare” system as “an out-of-date embarrassment” but Lothian Buses said it had not offered change for 40 years and the system helped keep buses to time. The firm said it also offered other options like smartphone tickets.

https://www.edinburghnews.scotsman....es-take-50k-a-year-in-foreign-coins-1-3542943

EDINBURGH bus drivers end up collecting more than £130 every day in foreign and counterfeit coins, it emerged today. Passengers who successfully sneak the currency into their handful of change cost the council-owned Lothian Buses almost £50,000 last year. The amount lost is offset by other honest passengers who overpay on the exact-fare only buses, but that still leaves a deficit of £21,384. For a bus company with two million passengers a week, however, it is not likely to impact the balance sheet. CALLING ALL BAKERS! Are you egg-cited to bake for Easter? You could win a personal baking class and KitchenAid hand mixer to help #BakeEasterBetter. Promoted by Dr. Oetker Baking Transport consultant Robert Drysdale said nonetheless that the issue explained why many bus operators were trying to get rid of cash transactions altogether. He said: “The principle of not giving change is a good one and it’s a balancing act of running an efficient service while having to put up with people who will chuck in coins 
that are not the right denomination. “The only way to tackle it would be to have ticket machines on the streets and buses which don’t take change at all, but the investment to do that would be considerable.” Many operators see exact fares as a way of reducing assaults against drivers, by letting them sit behind safety screens so there is also no way for drivers and passengers to exchange money directly. Transport convener Councillor Lesley Hinds said drivers were trained to check fares but could not be blamed if people were determined to flout the rules by using counterfeit or foreign coins. She said: “It sounds like a lot of money but, in the grand scheme of things, it is probably a very small fraction of what they take.” It is understood that all foreign cash received is eventually given to charity while the counterfeit coins are disposed of so they cannot be used again. New figures also showed today that the amount of overpayments received by Lothian Buses has dramatically reduced to just £26,188 following the move last year to a £1.50 fare. The company raked in £194,035 more than the value of ticket sales in 2012 - when the fare was the slightly more difficult to find £1.40 – and £140,882 the year before when it was £1.30. It is not known how many foreign and counterfeit coins were collected in those two years. Earlier this month, the News revealed the new “citysmart” card for Capital commuters which can be used on Lothian Buses and the Edinburgh Trams. Dubbed an “Oystercard for Edinburgh”, the ID imitates the electronic ticketing used across nearly all public transport links in Greater 
London. A spokesman for Lothian Buses said the new card was one of the ways it was looking at to reduce how much cash was used on its routes.

 

[Mr Manager]

Ipswich Buses have been exact fare for as long as i can remember which is a bloody long time. They had a foray with contactless and paying by debit/credit card but that fizzled out.

 

[theblackwatch]

Do these firms which insist on 'exact fare only' advertise what their fares are? It seems to be something that bus operators in general dislike doing.

 

[bb21]

On the whole they are pretty good at advertising fare levels, although where staged fares apply, it isn't always easy working out where the validity of one fare ends with some, if a zonal approach were not adopted. Not sure if any still exist in the latter category these days.

 

[Typhoon]

It's not as rare as I thought then.

I wonder what happens to the inevitable overpayments. I'd like to think they're donated to good causes.

Exact fares in the West Midlands dates to the early seventies at least - long before the era of giving to good causes. They compensate by having a limited number of fair zones, currently two, so overriding is not very beneficial (the short hop is so short drivers remembered those who bought those tickets). Plus ticket checks, frequently accompanied by police officers, acted as a deterrent. Limiting the fair zones did have advantages, when I was hard up I used to travel to work on the Outer Circle - south of the city to the north for the same fare as a mile journey.

Many of the 'exact fare' companies were formerly council operations. They probably would have argued that surplus fares were given to good causes:- street lighting, parks, libraries, etc.

 

[robbob700]

Ipswich Buses have been exact fare for as long as i can remember which is a bloody long time. They had a foray with contactless and paying by debit/credit card but that fizzled out.

Ipswich Buses do at least give you a credit ticket for any overpayment which can be exchanged for cash at their enquiry office or used to pay for a future journey.

 

[overthewater]

Isn't Lothian still exact fare as well?

Yes and it has one fare at £1.70. Cheap :P

 

[carlberry]

Yes and it has one fare at £1.70. Cheap :P

Not if you've only got a note!

 

[GusB]

Yes and it has one fare at £1.70. Cheap :P

That illustrates how long it has been since I last visited Edinburgh. I used to buy a daysaver for round about the same amount. (when I were a lad...)

 

[smtglasgow]

It’s common to see tourists trying to board First buses at Kelvingrove or at Glasgow Uni with only a £10 or £20 note. Needless to say, they usually end up slinking off to the Subway. Not a brilliant look for a city trying to encourage tourism, but I guess contactless and m-tickets will help in the future.

 

[overthewater]

That illustrates how long it has been since I last visited Edinburgh. I used to buy a daysaver for round about the same amount. (when I were a lad...)

Day tickets are now Adult: £4.00

It’s common to see tourists trying to board First buses at Kelvingrove or at Glasgow Uni with only a £10 or £20 note. Needless to say, they usually end up slinking off to the Subway. Not a brilliant look for a city trying to encourage tourism, but I guess contactless and m-tickets will help in the future.

Do there think bus fare are that expensive?

 

[WelshBluebird]

Do there think bus fare are that expensive?

At least down here, bus tickets that cost over a fiver aren't exactly rare.
And if you are a tourist, then just having notes and not having coins isn't exactly an unusual situation (hell, when I worked at the cafe at my old university it was very common for the foreign students to pay in £50 notes).

 

[randyrippley]

Exact fares in the West Midlands dates to the early seventies at least - long before the era of giving to good causes. They compensate by having a limited number of fair zones, currently two, so overriding is not very beneficial (the short hop is so short drivers remembered those who bought those tickets). Plus ticket checks, frequently accompanied by police officers, acted as a deterrent. Limiting the fair zones did have advantages, when I was hard up I used to travel to work on the Outer Circle - south of the city to the north for the same fare as a mile journey.

Many of the 'exact fare' companies were formerly council operations. They probably would have argued that surplus fares were given to good causes:- street lighting, parks, libraries, etc.

Mid 70's West Midlands were definitely "exact fare", but (at least on some routes) they had a strange ticketing system that used thermally sensitive paper to create a facsimile of all the coins you'd put in the machine. No writing on the ticket as far as I remember, no stage details, no ticket number, just photos of the coins. From memory it was a standard fare of 17p.........which I misheard the first time as 70p and got yelled at by the driver for not hearing his Brummie accent properly. 70 pence bought a lot of beer back then

 

[ARN556B]

Mid 70's West Midlands were definitely "exact fare", but (at least on some routes) they had a strange ticketing system that used thermally sensitive paper to create a facsimile of all the coins you'd put in the machine. No writing on the ticket as far as I remember, no stage details, no ticket number, just photos of the coins. From memory it was a standard fare of 17p.........which I misheard the first time as 70p and got yelled at by the driver for not hearing his Brummie accent properly. 70 pence bought a lot of beer back then

That was the Videmat system. Ribble tried it on one bus on Carlisle City Services in the early seventies. Once the kids realised how it worked they used the smallest denomination coins to try and get the longest ticket.

 

[PeterC]

Do there think bus fare are that expensive?

A Bureau de Change will typically give a customer as few notes as possible which will mean that tourists end up with all large denominations when they come off the plane or ferry.

 

[Andyh82]

I remember when WYPTE/Yorkshire Rider had exact fare buses it was only in Bradford and Huddersfield. Leeds and Halifax buses gave change.

Both areas started giving change in the mid to late 90s initially as a benefit on some routes when the Badgerline fleet (in the case of Huddersfield) and the FirstGroup corporate Sovereign fleet (in the case of Bradford) were introduced.

 

[Busaholic]

Preston Corporation had exact fares on their opo services for as long as I can remember, the cash going into a glorified bucket which the driver had no access to (or, at least, that's what management thought!)

 

[Mojo]

Thamesdown in Swindon used to be Exact Fare Only however unfortunately that was scrapped not long after GoAhead took over.

I wonder what happens to the inevitable overpayments. I'd like to think they're donated to good causes.

I should imagine some of it would be offset by people who underpay as well! Certainly with coin hoppers and vaults it’s quite easy to pay less than you should as well, particularly if you use a lot of coins.

 

[AndyW33]

That was the Videmat system. Ribble tried it on one bus on Carlisle City Services in the early seventies. Once the kids realised how it worked they used the smallest denomination coins to try and get the longest ticket.

And weren't the exact-fare-only VRs in Carlisle a performance. Driver had no access to the cash vault, and the vault door was unlocked by garage staff at the end of the vehicle's working day, releasing an inner locked steel container, which was then transported from Willowholme depot up to the cash office at the bus station for emptying, counting and banking. The cash office had a then revolutionary machine which allowed one container load at a time to be tipped into a hopper, sorted, counted, and bagged ready for banking. It worked most of the time.
Then the garage staff who opened the vault doors went on strike, so no cash containers were removed and replaced, and after about three days the containers were all full and drivers had no choice but to allow free rides. The unexpected side effect was that much of the supply of coins in Carlisle city were trapped in the buses, and armoured vans had to be sent from Newcastle to restock the local bank branches. Eventually the strike ended, it was all hands on deck in the cash office to deal with the inflow of containers. Luckily the machine didn't break down. Normally banking was done by two depot clerks using a car. This one time we needed to use a bus, and every driver who wasn't on a statutory break or about to take a service out was roped in to help, the endless procession of bus staff carrying cloth bags full of coins from the bus to the bank raised quite a few eyebrows.
It would have been worse, but only the VRs had the exact fare system, all the other routes used Setright ticket machines and gave change, with the drivers paying in at the end of their shifts in the usual way. There may have been a handful of conductors left still at that time as well.

 

[SCH117X]

Do these firms which insist on 'exact fare only' advertise what their fares are? It seems to be something that bus operators in general dislike doing.

NCT have a fare calculator on their web site. Oddly they appear to expanded the exact fare as it now appears to apply to all services whereas their were exclusions in respect of the South Notts and Pathfinder. When I lived in Nottingham I had a choice of NCT, Barton or South Notts (pre NCT ownership) and used NCT the least due to the exact fare policy. I was under the impression making full fare details readily available was a requirement of the new Act.

 

[StoneRoad]

When I visit a new area, and plan any bus travelling finding out they are "exact fare" always puts my teeth on edge. Who carries lots of change these days ?

 

[ainsworth74]

Dublin Bus are exact fare only and I think they might be coin only as well! Which made them rather visitor unfriendly to use.

 

[Dai Corner]

Do these firms which insist on 'exact fare only' advertise what their fares are? It seems to be something that bus operators in general dislike doing.

Newport Transport do, with zonal fares for most routes and published fare tables for the rest.
All Cardiff Bus fares are zonal I believe.

 

[Hophead]

Exact fare can be made easier to use by charging a coin-friendly sum. Reading is now £2 per journey and £4 per day (£1.50/£2.50 for under-18s). Previously the single fare was £1.90, which I presume got rounded up by quite a few passengers.

Back in the 1980s, Hull (KHCT) operated flat fares on a simple 10p/20/30p fare scale. EYMS also used fareboxes on their in-city and near-city routes, but charged ridiculous amounts like 73p.