First Bus don't know the prices of their own Single and Return fares!

[swt class 450]

I emailed First Bus just over a week ago (using their extremely annoying online contact form which asks for way more information than necessary as they no longer have any email addresses) asking about the price of their Single and Return fares for a journey. They have just responded to me (from their customer service centre in Leeds which deals with the entire country) and told me that they don't have access to Single and Return fares and can only tell me the price of network Day/Week/Month tickets. They advised me to speak to the driver to find out the Single and Return fares for my journey.

This is just ridiculous! What sort of company doesn't know the prices of their own products!

Even the Arriva Bus customer service centre (which is based in Luton and deals with the entire country) have full faretables for all routes in the country and are always able to give out Single and Return fares if you email or phone or tweet them (also Arriva still have working email addresses unlike First so you don't have to use their contact form).

Surely it's not too hard for their customer service centre to get hold of faretables for all of their operations so that they can tell passengers the prices of Single and Return fares? Surely this is basic essential information which they should be able to easily find and advise passengers of the Single and Return fares?

 

[Gathursty]

I've often wondered this. I live in Greater Manchester and the norm nowadays is for the driver to not give you the point-to-point ticket and instead sell you an all day ticket which sometimes is cheaper but largely for the ease of the driver to issue the ticket faster and get on with driving.

 

[borage]

Reminds me of Roger French's account of trying to find out a bus fare from First: https://busandtrainuser.com/2018/11/08/first-for-fare-frustration/. At least they didn't tell you to ask Traveline.

Slightly strangely, the staff running First's Twitter accounts do appear to have access to fares information, sometimes.

Plenty of independent operators, and Stagecoach (https://www.stagecoachbus.com/tickets) even manage to put this information on their websites. The DfT will require basic fares information in England to be published by 2020 (https://twitter.com/busopendata).

 

[radamfi]

The DfT will require basic fares information in England to be published by 2020
(https://twitter.com/busopendata).

Why do we have to wait until 2020? Why not by, say 2015, by which time most operators had websites? What is the advantage to the passenger in keeping it a secret?

 

[PeterC]

Carousel seem to have taken a step backwards and their site only gives prices for zonal day tickets and carnets where it used to give full faretables for some if not all routes.

 

[swt class 450]

I don't know why most bus operators keep their Single and Return fares so secretive. I would estimate that probably around 90% of bus operators still don't publish their Single and Return fares on their website (plus there are still some bus operators who don't even have a website). Only a very small amount (probably around 10% or less) actually publish their faretables online. It is so easy and simple for bus operators to simply upload PDF faretables to their websites so i don't know why more don't do so.

 

[carlberry]

I don't know why most bus operators keep their Single and Return fares so secretive. I would estimate that probably around 90% of bus operators still don't publish their Single and Return fares on their website (plus there are still some bus operators who don't even have a website). Only a very small amount (probably around 10% or less) actually publish their faretables online. It is so easy and simple for bus operators to simply upload PDF faretables to their websites so i don't know why more don't do so.

This new idea of publishing information on websites is never going to catch on, not whilst the GPO insist on 1200kb being the maximum information transfer speed on the telephone system, it's the same as this new idea of fax machines that people keep on talking about, sending pictures via the telephone? Whatever next!

 

[Hophead]

This new idea of publishing information on websites is never going to catch on, not whilst the GPO insist on 1200kb being the maximum information transfer speed on the telephone system, it's the same as this new idea of fax machines that people keep on talking about, sending pictures via the telephone? Whatever next!

If there was a "like" button........

 

[krus_aragon]

This new idea of publishing information on websites is never going to catch on, not whilst the GPO insist on 1200kb being the maximum information transfer speed on the telephone system, it's the same as this new idea of fax machines that people keep on talking about, sending pictures via the telephone? Whatever next!

Far better to put it on teletext instead.

 

[Andyh82]

99% of the travelling public wouldn’t understand a fare table. Many don’t understand timetables!

 

[bluenoxid]

I emailed First Bus just over a week ago (using their extremely annoying online contact form which asks for way more information than necessary as they no longer have any email addresses) asking about the price of their Single and Return fares for a journey. They have just responded to me (from their customer service centre in Leeds which deals with the entire country) and told me that they don't have access to Single and Return fares and can only tell me the price of network Day/Week/Month tickets. They advised me to speak to the driver to find out the Single and Return fares for my journey.

This is just ridiculous! What sort of company doesn't know the prices of their own products!

Even the Arriva Bus customer service centre (which is based in Luton and deals with the entire country) have full faretables for all routes in the country and are always able to give out Single and Return fares if you email or phone or tweet them (also Arriva still have working email addresses unlike First so you don't have to use their contact form).

Surely it's not too hard for their customer service centre to get hold of faretables for all of their operations so that they can tell passengers the prices of Single and Return fares? Surely this is basic essential information which they should be able to easily find and advise passengers of the Single and Return fares?

That is insane. Raise a formal complaint then take it to Bus Users UK. All of the operators need a kick up the backside on this matter

 

[Kevpbus]

As First buses are now fitted with Ticketer, all that the company has to do is to give their customer service team the Ticketer login so that they can look up any fare table in the country!

 

[Typhoon]

99% of the travelling public wouldn’t understand a fare table. Many don’t understand timetables!

True but it is not over difficult to have a couple of boxes on the website - journey start, journey end, click a button, hey-presto single fare, return fare. My local Stagecoach subsidiary does it and I set a similar task to school students in the '80s so it can't be that hard!

Is it any surprise that passengers who travel on the bus come on waving a £10 or £20 note if they don't know what the fare is?

 

[MedwayValiant]

Is it perhaps that some operators are embarrassed about how high their single fares (in particular) are, and don't want to draw attention to them?

 

[pdsalford]

Is it any surprise that passengers who travel on the bus come on waving a £10 or £20 note if they don't know what the fare is?

And First are one of the most vociferous companies in asking you to pay the right fare. Which they keep secret til you're on the bus!

 

[Busaholic]

Back in the day, all fares had to be approved by the Traffic Commissioners and it was anything but a rubber stamp job. My late father-in-law told me of inquisitions when he had the task of representing Ribble at hearings, especially when it was a jointly-operated route. Once approved, those fares had to be available for scrutiny by the public and, in the case of any individual route, on each bus on that route. Such meticulousness would have been scoffed at by Margaret Thatcher's Transport Secretaries, and probably derided as 'anti-competitive', all to be swept away in deregulation in 1986.

A serious point - as remuneration to bus companies by councils for pass use is supposed to be based on individual journeys, how is the calculation made? Does each council that remits to First have a chart of the actual fare that would have been paid if a pass hadn't been used? If not, are they just taking on trust what supporting information First provide to make their claim? Seems very dubious to me when it comes to auditing.

 

[Mwanesh]

Why not look for the number of the local depot and call that number you will get more sense than customer services.Customer services staff probably dont know what a fare chart is.

 

[swt class 450]

Unfortunately First Bus don't publish any phone numbers for bus depots. The only number they publish is the general number for their Leeds customer service centre. I wish they did as it would be a lot easier to speak to someone at the local bus depot who i am sure would be a lot more helpful and knowledgeable.

 

[CD]

Buses of Somerset reply to their Facebook questions direct from Taunton. I believe First Dorset and First West of England also answer from local offices.

 

[transportphoto]

Buses of Somerset reply to their Facebook questions direct from Taunton. I believe First Dorset and First West of England also answer from local offices.

Occasionally, yes, however you’re at a luck of the draw as to whether the social media team get their first.

This doesn’t surprise me at all - back before they merged everything into Leeds, the south of England team tended to have fares tables (usually scanned in as PDF, spreadsheet if lucky) however had nothing to assist them in correctly identifying which stop fell into which fare stage. It certainly required individual agents getting to know the routes/networks/rules and taking an educated guess at times…

 

[MedwayValiant]

Is it perhaps that some operators are embarrassed about how high their single fares (in particular) are, and don't want to draw attention to them?

This is something I said a few weeks ago, and it was brought home to me today. In the course of an expedition to Crowborough, I discovered that a return ticket on Brighton & Hove Buses from Tunbridge Wells to Crowborough (about eight miles) is cheaper than a return ticket on Arriva Kent and Surrey from my house to Chatham Bus Station (1.3 miles). Is it more than a coincidence that B&H's website allows you to see the full fare table, and Arriva's doesn't?

Also, I get the impression that Go-Ahead companies (such as B&H) and Stagecoach companies do in general charge lower fares for a comparable distance than Arriva companies and First companies. Does that just happen to be so for the places that I've been, or is it more or less true nationwide?

 

[Typhoon]

In the course of an expedition to Crowborough, I discovered that a return ticket on Brighton & Hove Buses from Tunbridge Wells to Crowborough (about eight miles) is cheaper than a return ticket on Arriva Kent and Surrey from my house to Chatham Bus Station (1.3 miles).

Do you have any idea whether Arriva were charging the same fare as B&H when they ran the 228/229 to Crowborough? If it was higher it could explain why when I travelled on the Arriva route with a day ticket, the buses would be almost empty (and they subsequently gave the routes up).

Also, I get the impression that Go-Ahead companies (such as B&H) and Stagecoach companies do in general charge lower fares for a comparable distance than Arriva companies and First companies.

Same area, unfortunately, but in the days when Arriva and Stagecoach operated a joint Explorer ticket. I was travelling on Arriva 12 from Tenterden. A passenger paid more for a day return to Maidstone than I had paid for my Stagecoach issued Explorer which I had already used to get from the Kent coast, could then replicate his journey, before returning home. ​

 

[higthomas]

This is something I said a few weeks ago, and it was brought home to me today. In the course of an expedition to Crowborough, I discovered that a return ticket on Brighton & Hove Buses from Tunbridge Wells to Crowborough (about eight miles) is cheaper than a return ticket on Arriva Kent and Surrey from my house to Chatham Bus Station (1.3 miles). Is it more than a coincidence that B&H's website allows you to see the full fare table, and Arriva's doesn't?

Also, I get the impression that Go-Ahead companies (such as B&H) and Stagecoach companies do in general charge lower fares for a comparable distance than Arriva companies and First companies. Does that just happen to be so for the places that I've been, or is it more or less true nationwide?

Can't say, but in my experience those are the two large companies whose fares are generally available...

 

[GaryMcEwan]

Glasgow got rid of their return tickets a while ago now. But I would imagine the Customer Service team down south couldn't even tell me how much a single is from the City Centre to Bridgeton.

 

[A Challenge]

Arriva Kent and Surrey doesn't have a fare table available, and so I would find them being forced to publish it useful, although I know off the top of my head the prices which I'm likely to pay (and some of the adult ones as well, though not as many!) - and I also know the fare stages along the appropriate line of route for where I would buy the tickets to.

 

[route101]

Glasgow got rid of their return tickets a while ago now. But I would imagine the Customer Service team down south couldn't even tell me how much a single is from the City Centre to Bridgeton.

£2.40 i think .

Was £5.10 from Hamilton to Glasgow .

 

[GaryMcEwan]

£2.40 i think .

Was £5.10 from Hamilton to Glasgow .

It's only £1.65, even had a few drivers trying to charge me a £2.40. For some strange reason, it's £2.40 going into the City Centre though...

 

[route101]

It's only £1.65, even had a few drivers trying to charge me a £2.40. For some strange reason, it's £2.40 going into the City Centre though...

Is it less than 5 stops to Bridgeton?

 

[GaryMcEwan]

Is it less than 5 stops to Bridgeton?

From Union Street to Bridgeton Cross it's actually 12 stops and has always been the lower of two fares.

 

[route101]

From Union Street to Bridgeton Cross it's actually 12 stops and has always been the lower of two fares.

Should be £2.40 as the 1.65 is for 5 and under stops