How can rail fares be simplified?

[Bletchleyite]

Ripped off how?

Because finding the best value ticket for their journey is highly complex, so most people end up paying more than they should or getting less flexibility than they should.

 

[JonathanH]

If you're not an expert you get ripped off, basically. A poor, customer-disrespectful way to do business.

A lot of the 'simple' ideas (eg blanket peak periods, single fare pricing, reduction in the number of fares, no break of journey) would also lead to people being ripped off, just in a different way.

 

[Starmill]

The railway is not a natural monopoly

It is.

What Is a Natural Monopoly?
A natural monopoly is a type of monopoly that exists due to the high start-up costs or powerful economies of scale of conducting a business in a specific industry.

Natural Monopoly: Definition, How It Works, Types, and Examples

A natural monopoly occurs when a single company can supply a good or service more efficiently than multiple competing firms due to inherent market conditions.

www.investopedia.com

 

[JonathanH]

Someone recently messaged me saying that there were no results for Oxford to Brighton trains in mid October. They had spent some time on NRE getting confused because it kept saying 'no fares available'. It took me a while to determine that actually CrossCountry weren't available for reservation (now mandatory) on their chosen date. I simply advised that they should wait. They replied with annoyance that it was only a few weeks to go and asked me what prices might be. I said I had absolutely no idea because there was no way to know what Advance prices might be made available, but that it should cost no more than £52.40. Unsurprisingly this was around twice the maximum they were willing to pay for a journey that's nearly three hours and needs two changes of train. They were even more horrified that only paper tickets that you have to queue at a ticket machine for are available. As you will guess, in the end, they didn't use rail for the journey. It's not like Oxford and Brighton are small insignificant places miles apart from one another.

As 'hwl' noted above, "allowing XC capacity issues to set fares is a very bad idea". The issue here is a pretty bad limitation of the booking process at the moment, whereby because the XC train is the service from Oxford which connects into the North Downs Line train and then the train to Brighton, the whole journey doesn't show up.

 

[geoffk]

Perhaps the new regime will see the end of single-operator walk-on tickets. If Govt is taking the revenue risk, there's no benefit to the TOCs, or whatever they are to be called, in selling tickets just for their own trains. Merseyrail is called a concession yet the operator takes the revenue risk, unlike the case with London Overground.

 

[crablab]

The current situation with mandatory reservations appears to be making this worse.

I wanted to book a ticket between KGX and SMD (I've written this elsewhere on here before).

LNER's website told me that no fares were available on that route.

CrossCountry's website was marginally better in that showed me the fares, but then wouldn't let me book a through train, as it couldn't secure a reservation.

I ended up having to book the two legs (KGX -> PBO, PBO, SMD) separately.

Since I ended up with reservation on both services, I'm not sure what the issue actually was, but I'm not sure it's a great customer experience having to troubleshoot the booking engine and work around issues to book a valid journey.

 

[BayPaul]

Perhaps the new regime will see the end of single-operator walk-on tickets. If Govt is taking the revenue risk, there's no benefit to the TOCs, or whatever they are to be called, in selling tickets just for their own trains. Merseyrail is called a concession yet the operator takes the revenue risk, unlike the case with London Overground.

Pretty much confirmed by Grant Shapps:
In a statement, Transport Secretary, Grant Shapps said: "The model of privatisation adopted 25 years ago has seen significant rises in passenger numbers, but this pandemic has proven that it is no longer working."
He said the move to a new system would end "uncertainty and confusion about whether you are using the right ticket or the right train company".
https://www.bbc.com/news/business-54232015

 

[Meerkat]

Usually it's that people go online and are put off because:
- The best journey doesn't show up
- No fares at all show up
- Only the highest prices show up
- They cannot even make the user interface of the website work

So they immediately give up. Alternatively they pay in a panic, feel massively ripped off, and then resolve not to use the train again. This latter one is a regular at ticket vending machines which don't make it easy to find the cheapest suitable ticket. All the while, even pre-pandemic, people were being quoted crazy fares for trains where there's actually spare capacity.

Someone recently messaged me saying that there were no results for Oxford to Brighton trains in mid October. They had spent some time on NRE getting confused because it kept saying 'no fares available'. It took me a while to determine that actually CrossCountry weren't available for reservation (now mandatory) on their chosen date. I simply advised that they should wait. They replied with annoyance that it was only a few weeks to go and asked me what prices might be. I said I had absolutely no idea because there was no way to know what Advance prices might be made available, but that it should cost no more than £52.40. Unsurprisingly this was around twice the maximum they were willing to pay for a journey that's nearly three hours and needs two changes of train. They were even more horrified that only paper tickets that you have to queue at a ticket machine for are available. As you will guess, in the end, they didn't use rail for the journey. It's not like Oxford and Brighton are small insignificant places miles apart from one another.

That all sounds like issues with vending systems, not the fares system itself.

== Doublepost prevention - post automatically merged: 22 Sep 2020 ==

It is.

Natural Monopoly: Definition, How It Works, Types, and Examples

A natural monopoly occurs when a single company can supply a good or service more efficiently than multiple competing firms due to inherent market conditions.

www.investopedia.com

Only if you view rail as the market rather than transport.

 

[WesternLancer]

Pretty much confirmed by Grant Shapps:
In a statement, Transport Secretary, Grant Shapps said: "The model of privatisation adopted 25 years ago has seen significant rises in passenger numbers, but this pandemic has proven that it is no longer working."
He said the move to a new system would end "uncertainty and confusion about whether you are using the right ticket or the right train company".
https://www.bbc.com/news/business-54232015

Good point - delivered by the abolition of all tickets apart from Anytime fares presumably.....

 

[Bletchleyite]

Only if you view rail as the market rather than transport.

Public transport is a natural monopoly. The car (and to a very limited extent air) competes, but public transport works best together.

 

[BayPaul]

Good point - delivered by the abolition of all tickets apart from Anytime fares presumably.....

Oh I never said it was a good thing! Personally I think that TOC only tickets were a huge benefit*, and part of how privatisation should have worked, if only there was any chance of having actual on rail competition without the whole system grinding to a halt!

*Edit - in most cases, some were just stupid, but even those where each operator reduced their price by 10p gave actual competition - people could choose between a slightly lower price ticket on their preferred operator, or more flexibility. All that was needed was to communicate it all a bit more clearly!

 

[ainsworth74]

Pretty much confirmed by Grant Shapps:
In a statement, Transport Secretary, Grant Shapps said: "The model of privatisation adopted 25 years ago has seen significant rises in passenger numbers, but this pandemic has proven that it is no longer working."
He said the move to a new system would end "uncertainty and confusion about whether you are using the right ticket or the right train company".

Is it though? That statement (and others I've seen) are so lacking in detail or precision that they can be said to mean all things to all people!

 

[markymark2000]

Sounds expensive!

== Doublepost prevention - post automatically merged: 22 Sep 2020 ==

Thate fare was based off the current local fares for the line. All local fare zones would have to be done as an average of the current point to point fares between the stations.

 

[WesternLancer]

Oh I never said it was a good thing! Personally I think that TOC only tickets were a huge benefit*, and part of how privatisation should have worked, if only there was any chance of having actual on rail competition without the whole system grinding to a halt!

*Edit - in most cases, some were just stupid, but even those where each operator reduced their price by 10p gave actual competition - people could choose between a slightly lower price ticket on their preferred operator, or more flexibility. All that was needed was to communicate it all a bit more clearly!

Yes, as you say no way of knowing it would be a good thing really - as you say - devil in detail no doubt

 

[Starmill]

That all sounds like issues with vending systems, not the fares system itself.

They need to be designed to accommodate the rules that apply to the relevant fares (unless some of the rules are reduced).

== Doublepost prevention - post automatically merged: 22 Sep 2020 ==

Only if you view rail as the market rather than transport

Still no.

== Doublepost prevention - post automatically merged: 22 Sep 2020 ==

As 'hwl' noted above, "allowing XC capacity issues to set fares is a very bad idea". The issue here is a pretty bad limitation of the booking process at the moment, whereby because the XC train is the service from Oxford which connects into the North Downs Line train and then the train to Brighton, the whole journey doesn't show up.

Quite. An unreservable or open for reservations GWR service would have possibly been available, but the website doesn't offer that option.

 

[Bletchleyite]

They need to be designed to accommodate the rules that apply to the relevant fares (unless some of the rules are reduced).

Which is why single fare pricing is great - it allows a simple journey planner to give the cheapest fare for a given journey and to have simple checkboxes like "I want a flexible ticket", "I want to be able to break my journey" etc.

 

[Starmill]

Thate fare was based off the current local fares for the line. All local fare zones would have to be done as an average of the current point to point fares between the stations.

So the prices for shorter journeys would need to increase, one stop trips possibly significantly. An interesting proposal.

 

[Bletchleyite]

So the prices for shorter journeys would need to increase, one stop trips possibly significantly. An interesting proposal.

There's precedent for that - bus fares are tending towards simplicity rather than granularity, and TfL has had a flat fare for years now.

 

[Starmill]

There's precedent for that - bus fares are tending towards simplicity rather than granularity, and TfL has had a flat fare for years now.

Indeed, although that worked out because it was a flat fare of £1 which went down to £0.90 for a year before increasing slowly from 2010. If such single fares were to be introduced for rail short city hops then I would be all for it, but I can't see it somehow.

 

[markymark2000]

So the prices for shorter journeys would need to increase, one stop trips possibly significantly. An interesting proposal.

Yes and no. 1 stop trips are quite rare generally, even rarer so on some of these branch lines which have stations closer together, so while fares may increase significantly for 1 stop trips, when you look at the overall picture the tickets which people are purchasing, it should level out. In the example you picked up, the fare difference between current and proposed is around £1.
There are a few ways to work it out. Either base it off the average of the actual fares or base it off the average fare which people pay (so if lots of people pay for a 1 stop trip and only a few pay the higher fare the average becomes lower. That is a finer detail which should be consulted on.

 

[Ianno87]

Yes and no. 1 stop trips are quite rare generally, even rarer so on some of these branch lines which have stations closer together, so while fares may increase significantly for 1 stop trips, when you look at the overall picture the tickets which people are purchasing, it should level out. In the example you picked up, the fare difference between current and proposed is around £1.
There are a few ways to work it out. Either base it off the average of the actual fares or base it off the average fare which people pay (so if lots of people pay for a 1 stop trip and only a few pay the higher fare the average becomes lower. That is a finer detail which should be consulted on.

Controversial opinion: Should the railway be bothered if it overprices one stop trips, given those passengers (in urban areas at least) have alternatives like buses, walking and cycling?

 

[camflyer]

Pretty much confirmed by Grant Shapps:
In a statement, Transport Secretary, Grant Shapps said: "The model of privatisation adopted 25 years ago has seen significant rises in passenger numbers, but this pandemic has proven that it is no longer working."
He said the move to a new system would end "uncertainty and confusion about whether you are using the right ticket or the right train company".
https://www.bbc.com/news/business-54232015

If a fast non-stop service is going to be the same price as a slow stopping service from different operator then surely that is just going to make the fast service even more crowded.

For example between Cambridge and London you can do Great Northern to Kings Cross non-stop (or limited stop) or Greater Anglia to Liverpool St which is cheaper and slower (plus there's Thameslink to StP but I think that's the same price as Kings Cross). If I'm not in a rush I will use Liverpool St to save some money but if both routes were the same price then I may as well choose the quicker one.

 

[Meerkat]

Public transport is a natural monopoly. The car (and to a very limited extent air) competes, but public transport works best together.

Only if you include coaches, which compete with trains.
But if you want to be pedantic it doesn’t have monopolistic powers because there are alternatives to public transport.

 

[Starmill]

Yes and no. 1 stop trips are quite rare generally, even rarer so on some of these branch lines which have stations closer together, so while fares may increase significantly for 1 stop trips, when you look at the overall picture the tickets which people are purchasing, it should level out. In the example you picked up, the fare difference between current and proposed is around £1.
There are a few ways to work it out. Either base it off the average of the actual fares or base it off the average fare which people pay (so if lots of people pay for a 1 stop trip and only a few pay the higher fare the average becomes lower. That is a finer detail which should be consulted on.

Well the specific example of Johnston has been given, a station for which one stop hops to the two nearby towns are much of the business that the station picks up.

== Doublepost prevention - post automatically merged: 22 Sep 2020 ==

Only if you include coaches, which compete with trains.
But if you want to be pedantic it doesn’t have monopolistic powers because there are alternatives to public transport.

Our net zero obligations (now in law remember) will require us to do everything possible to phase out the "alternatives" to public transport, at least within Great Britain. We've less than 30 years to achieve that. The date is likely to be brought forward 5 years too. A competitive market within public transport makes little sense, although differentiation based on costs is still important.

 

[Meerkat]

A competitive market within public transport makes little sense

Why? Not in the metro train service market maybe, but in the long distance market it focuses on what sells, and not on what a DfT CS deems fit for the travelling proles.

 

[Starmill]

Why? Not in the metro train service market maybe, but in the long distance market it focuses on what sells, and not on what a DfT CS deems fit for the travelling proles.

As I've found myself pointing out to you a few times recently, this has already been explained in detail upthread, by several of us. There is scope for segregation based on cost, which is what you're referring to e.g. Coaches are low cost and rail is medium or high cost, and for pricing rhat actually reflects that. But in general competition causes significant inefficiency in natural monopolies because it makes it more difficult to cover the fixed costs. The only way to have genuine competition would be to build two or three parallel railways everywhere and have different companies in control of each - enormously inefficient. But with respect we've already pointed this out. If there's a market failure in public transport it needs to be solved by regulation, not competition.

 

[Acton1991]

If a fast non-stop service is going to be the same price as a slow stopping service from different operator then surely that is just going to make the fast service even more crowded.

For example between Cambridge and London you can do Great Northern to Kings Cross non-stop (or limited stop) or Greater Anglia to Liverpool St which is cheaper and slower (plus there's Thameslink to StP but I think that's the same price as Kings Cross). If I'm not in a rush I will use Liverpool St to save some money but if both routes were the same price then I may as well choose the quicker one.

Exactly the same on the western branch of TfL Rail - why would I choose to travel from Slough to Paddington on the stopper if I can get there for the same price on the non-stop. There really should be some 'TfL Only' fares in place.

 

[Meerkat]

As I've found myself pointing out to you a few times recently, this has already been explained in detail upthread, by several of us. There is scope for segregation based on cost, which is what you're referring to e.g. Coaches are low cost and rail is medium or high cost, and for pricing rhat actually reflects that. But in general competition causes significant inefficiency in natural monopolies because it makes it more difficult to cover the fixed costs. The only way to have genuine competition would be to build two or three parallel railways everywhere and have different companies in control of each - enormously inefficient. But with respect we've already pointed this out. If there's a market failure in public transport it needs to be solved by regulation, not competition.

How does it make it more difficult to cover the fixed costs - sounds more like the access fees are set up wrong?
Regulation by those who gave the passenger the IET? It sounds more like a desire to rinse the passenger.

 

[Meerkat]

Exactly the same on the western branch of TfL Rail - why would I choose to travel from Slough to Paddington on the stopper if I can get there for the same price on the non-stop. There really should be some 'TfL Only' fares in place.

Or an IC supplement.....

 

[Starmill]

How does it make it more difficult to cover the fixed costs - sounds more like the access fees are set up wrong?
Regulation by those who gave the passenger the IET? It sounds more like a desire to rinse the passenger.

Because costs are higher if more trains with fewer passengers run, and because average revenue falls. It's as basic as that. Not to mention the performance disbenefit from running more trains than were really necessary.

Regulation should not lie with government. I'm not sure there are any areas where that's useful.

As for rinsing the passenger, my view would be that there should be more taxpayer support and lower overall fares than today. Taxpayer support for a system that allows cream-skimming behaviour like on-rail private competition is a waste of public money.