Inadequate Metrolink ticketing facilities at Manchester Victoria

[The exile]

How could tapping in possibly slow down the boarding process compared with having a lengthy chat about your destination and then tapping?

In London it is almost as fast as conductor operation. Indeed, it was what it took to finally get rid of that entirely - prior to it operation on some central routes was just too slow to be able to get rid of it.

True - but tapping out does. “Oh, I nearly forgot to tap out again. Now, where’s my card? Why won’t it read my card? Did it ping?” All with a queue of others behind you waiting to get off and people waiting to get on.

 

[Bletchleyite]

Can you still use cash in London on buses and underground etc.?

Not on buses, no, other than buying an Oyster and topping up at a newsagent beforehand. On the Tube you can at the TVM but near enough nobody does.

True - but tapping out does. “Oh, I nearly forgot to tap out again. Now, where’s my card? Why won’t it read my card? Did it ping?” All with a queue of others behind you waiting to get off and people waiting to get on.

One hopes that if the £2 cap thing sticks then operators just go for £2 flat fare (and agreements for reimbursement are set up properly), then no tap out is necessary. The London system really works.

 

[The exile]

One hopes that if the £2 cap thing sticks then operators just go for £2 flat fare (and agreements for reimbursement are set up properly), then no tap out is necessary. The London system really works.

We already have a £2 flat fare in the city zone and the buses I use run exclusively in that zone….

 

[Bletchleyite]

We already have a £2 flat fare in the city zone and the buses I use run exclusively in that zone….

Begs the question why they require tap out then.

 

[Haywain]

But I've bought Manchester Metroling tickets on many occasions over the past ten years or so. Why would I "prepare" for something different ?

So you would have been prepared for the queue at the TVMs?

Can you still use cash in London on buses and underground etc.?

While you can use cash to buy underground tickets they are much higher fares than are charged for using Oyster Pay-as-you-go or contactless.

 

[Mat17]

While you can use cash to buy underground tickets they are much higher fares than are charged for using Oyster Pay-as-you-go or contactless.

Thanks for the info. I haven't been to London since 2011. It would be something therefore I'd have to research a little before I go there again!

Likewise I haven't used Metrolink since 2018. I don't want to turn up one day when going to the ELR and find myself clueless about how to purchase tram tickets (should the TVMs have gone). There are few, if any, staff to ask.

 

[Bletchleyite]

Thanks for the info. I haven't been to London since 2011. It would be something therefore I'd have to research a little before I go there again!

Likewise I haven't used Metrolink since 2018. I don't want to turn up one day when going to the ELR and find myself clueless about how to purchase tram tickets (should the TVMs have gone). There are few, if any, staff to ask.

The TVMs haven't gone and aren't likely to. They're still there on the Tube as well, just hardly anyone uses them.

 

[edwin_m]

One hopes that if the £2 cap thing sticks then operators just go for £2 flat fare (and agreements for reimbursement are set up properly), then no tap out is necessary. The London system really works.

I can't see it staying on longer-distance routes, where the maximum fare without this intervention is much more then £2 and the fares vary by distance in some way. That requires contactless users either to tap in and out or to state destination to the driver in the traditional way. In Nottingham, TrentBarton allows either of these, but presumably just tapping in would result in a maximum fare being charged. NCT and the trams are tap-in only and presumably if you try to tap out your are charged twice - and I believe contactless on their out-of-town routes is a real mess. In London there is the potential confusion between DLR (tap in and out) and the trams, which look very similar to the casual user but are tap-in only - though the hop-on-hop-off bus and tram fare probably avoids most of the double-charging.

I'm not sure there's really a solution to this one. I guess with on-vehicle readers the software could (and maybe does) ignore a second tap on the same vehicle, but with fixed readers it would be hard to distinguish an unintended tap-out from the start of a new journey.

 

[Bletchleyite]

I'm not sure there's really a solution to this one. I guess with on-vehicle readers the software could (and maybe does) ignore a second tap on the same vehicle, but with fixed readers it would be hard to distinguish an unintended tap-out from the start of a new journey.

It's very easy to distinguish - on all the implementations I've seen, tapping out occurs on a separate reader which is on the pole so you walk past it on the way out and not on the driver's machine.

 

[edwin_m]

It's very easy to distinguish - on all the implementations I've seen, tapping out occurs on a separate reader which is on the pole so you walk past it on the way out and not on the driver's machine.

I'm pretty sure it was the same reader on buses in Dubai...

Having a separate reader in the sightline of people heading for the exit will help with (but not assure) people remembering to tap out. But it doesn't stop people trying to tap out when exiting a vehicle or leaving a stop on systems that are tap-in only.

 

[Bletchleyite]

Having a separate reader in the sightline of people heading for the exit will help with (but not assure) people remembering to tap out. But it doesn't stop people trying to tap out when exiting a vehicle or leaving a stop on systems that are tap-in only.

You'd either remove it, obviously tape it off/cover it over or have it accept the tap-off and just do nothing about it, depending on where the vehicle was also used.

With buses there's also no need to have a complex system of unresolved journeys etc. Just charge to the end of the route if you forget to tap out. That in most cases isn't disastrous, it'd be an extra quid or two, not a swingeing penalty. It also means quicker unloading at termini because there's no need to bother.

Indeed I think London overcomplicates this - on all such systems as they exist now*, just charge the highest possible fare if someone only taps in or only taps out rather than faffing with unresolved journeys at all.

* Wouldn't work with a national rail system covering the whole of the UK, but that's different from a self contained urban system.

 

[plugwash]

On the one hand, it does seem mean to exclude incomplete journeys from all caps, including the "everything" cap.

On the other hand as the "London" system grows into a "South East" system, and as there are proposals for systems of similar scale elsewhere in the county the true maximum fare could be pretty swingeing and I don't think there is an "everything" cap anymore. Although the incomplete journey charges on the London system are sometimes reffered to as "maximum fares" they are substantialy less than the maximum fare possible from those stations*. The same would presumablly be true if we ever get an integrated PAYG system in the north west**.

* According to TFL's website the "maximum fare" charged for unresolved journeys at readers in zones 1-9 is "up to £8.90" but a brentwood to reading fare is over three times that.

** Partly depending on the exact rules adopted, e.g. in London you don't have to touch out and back in when changing between train and tube, but I have no idea if similar rules are likely to be adopted elsewhere or if each mode would require seperate touch in and touch out, or indeed if we are likely to get an integrated system at all or if intermodal travellers in the north will need to continue purchasing tickets in advance to avoid overpaying.

 

[Bald Rick]

Can you still use cash in London on buses and underground etc.?

London buses went cashless nearly a decade ago.

 

[oxfordray1]

I wonder if someone at Metrolink reads this sub-forum.

There was some comment about the lack of signs at Victoria for the contactless system. When catching the tram at Victoria today I noticed for the first time that there were at least three large, yellow signs on each platform. They had a 'stylised' picture of the contactless reader with the instruction to tap in and tap out. Each sign was about 20 inches square and was either directly above the reader or very close.

I don't know how long they have been there, but today wax the first time I noticed them (which isn't saying much given my lack of observational skill).

 

[Roast Veg]

I wonder if someone at Metrolink reads this sub-forum.

There was some comment about the lack of signs at Victoria for the contactless system. When catching the tram at Victoria today I noticed for the first time that there were at least three large, yellow signs on each platform. They had a 'stylised' picture of the contactless reader with the instruction to tap in and tap out. Each sign was about 20 inches square and was either directly above the reader or very close.

I don't know how long they have been there, but today wax the first time I noticed them (which isn't saying much given my lack of observational skill).

This thread is a month old, and the lead time on signs like that can't be that long. I won't go as far as to say it's certain, but it only takes one right person to make it happen.

 

[507 001]

I wonder if someone at Metrolink reads this sub-forum.

There was some comment about the lack of signs at Victoria for the contactless system. When catching the tram at Victoria today I noticed for the first time that there were at least three large, yellow signs on each platform. They had a 'stylised' picture of the contactless reader with the instruction to tap in and tap out. Each sign was about 20 inches square and was either directly above the reader or very close.

I don't know how long they have been there, but today wax the first time I noticed them (which isn't saying much given my lack of observational skill).

Yes I do, but it wasn’t me…

 

[plugwash]

which isn't saying much given my lack of observational skill.

I think this is a big problem, you can put up as much signage as you want about a new way of doing things, but people who think they know what they are doing will walk right past it.

 

[etr221]

I think this is a big problem, you can put up as much signage as you want about a new way of doing things, but people who think they know what they are doing will walk right past it.

That is because they do know what they are doing, and so have no need to read signs... which they don't think will tell them anything new...

 

[daodao]

It works the same as London, which will be a lot of the visitors. You tap in and out and it works out what to charge you. You don't need to understand it.

The trams in Manchester require one to tap out. Those in London (Croydon) do not. These electronic payment arrangements vary from system to system and how to make payments correctly isn't self-evident to non-local travellers.

 

[Watershed]

The trams in Manchester require one to tap out. Those in London (Croydon) do not. These electronic payment arrangements vary from system to system and how to make payments correctly isn't self-evident to non-local travellers.

I think that allegation could certainly be levelled against some systems, but certainly not Metrolink, where the signage is pretty clear about what you need to do - and there are announcements on board reminding you to touch out.

 

[Steddenm]

It's kind of the same here in Dublin with a Leap Card regarding different ways you tap in or out...

On Dublin Bus and GoAhead Ireland you only tap on a device located on the right of the entrance door.

On BusÉireann you tap on the ticket machine when you've told the driver where you are going and it debits the correct Leap fare.

On the Luas you tap in on a reader on the platform and tap out again when you leave the platform.

On DART, Commuter and some Intercity Irish Rail services you tap on either the ticket barrier or a reader on the platform before you board and do the same when you leave, unless you need to purchase a ticket on board where you tap the guards machine.

The Luas, Irish Rail, Dublin Bus and BusÉireann don't take contactless card payments for tap on/tap off, but buses do now take contactless (only Irish issued cards though) for payment of tickets. GoAhead Ireland take any card for ticket payment but not tap on/tap off.

The take up over here of contactless payments is lower than it is for the UK, and a lot of people still pay in cash for most things.

Like London, Leap fares are cheaper than cash, and the TFI 90-Minute Leap fare means you can tap on/off as many times as you like for 90 minutes from the first tap and only be charged the maximum fare of €2.

 

[Bletchleyite]

The trams in Manchester require one to tap out. Those in London (Croydon) do not. These electronic payment arrangements vary from system to system and how to make payments correctly isn't self-evident to non-local travellers.

Croydon is an oddity. Because they mostly replaced bus services (though some replaced rail services) they are priced in the London bus fare system, not the rail fare system, and London buses are flat fare, tap in only. I don't think any of the other tram systems work that way - even Blackpool, which is run by the major bus operator, has a different fare structure for tram journeys, as does Edinburgh.

It does make sense to have signs explaining it, as such.

 

[plugwash]

Croydon is an oddity.

Afaict if we look at tram and metro systems in the UK, we see two systems* (Metrolink, and DLR/Underground) use touch in/touch out contactlesss PAYG. Two systems, (NETT and Tramlink) use touch in only contactless PAYG. Three systems (Blackpool, Sheffield and West midlands) use conductors to sell tickets and two systems (Edinburgh, Tyne and Wear) require traditional tickets to be purchased before boarding.

* I regard the underground and DLR as part of the system system.

 

[Tetchytyke]

Tyne and Wear) require traditional tickets to be purchased before boarding.

Tyne and Wear offer a PAYG smartcard where you tap in and tap out, but do not yet offer contactless.