Baxenden Bank
Established Member
- Joined
- 23 Oct 2013
- Messages
- 4,017
Been on my jollies to the Yorkshire Dales.
Last week I followed Forum advice and tried to buy from a (Northern) ticket office - the source of impartial advice, more accurate than TVM's, keep the ticket office open, staff employed etc.
I was offered Anytime Day Returns (SDR) rather than Off-Peak Day Returns (CDR) and it took some effort to persuade the staff members to check and, yes indeed, the CDR is (now) valid at that time for that journey.
"Nobody has told us" - fair enough, can't sit there every day just looking if ticket prices have changed, but they did over-ride their own machine which first came up with the CDR fare to instead offer me the SDR fare. A case of 'I know better than the technology', or not as the case appears to be.
Had I not checked in advance of my holiday I would have simply paid the higher amount requested assuming that the ticket office was offering me the best value ticket!
The flows in question are Bradford (Yorks) to Gargrave and stations beyond to Carlisle. The restriction was previously 'any train after 0929' but is now 'any train after 0859'. This creates a discrepancy as fares as far as Skipton remain 'after 0929'.
Does anybody have access recent historical fare data to determine when this change came into force - at the May timetable change or some point between then and last week?
I don't necessarily blame the ticket office staff for this as it appears to be a recent change but there is clearly some kind of communication breakdown. How many people have been charged the higher peak fare erroneously?
As an aside, the TVM on the concourse automatically offered the CDR (at 0850). Perhaps I should stick to TVM's in future. The barriers refused to let me through - not valid at that time.
Last week I followed Forum advice and tried to buy from a (Northern) ticket office - the source of impartial advice, more accurate than TVM's, keep the ticket office open, staff employed etc.
I was offered Anytime Day Returns (SDR) rather than Off-Peak Day Returns (CDR) and it took some effort to persuade the staff members to check and, yes indeed, the CDR is (now) valid at that time for that journey.
"Nobody has told us" - fair enough, can't sit there every day just looking if ticket prices have changed, but they did over-ride their own machine which first came up with the CDR fare to instead offer me the SDR fare. A case of 'I know better than the technology', or not as the case appears to be.
Had I not checked in advance of my holiday I would have simply paid the higher amount requested assuming that the ticket office was offering me the best value ticket!
The flows in question are Bradford (Yorks) to Gargrave and stations beyond to Carlisle. The restriction was previously 'any train after 0929' but is now 'any train after 0859'. This creates a discrepancy as fares as far as Skipton remain 'after 0929'.
Does anybody have access recent historical fare data to determine when this change came into force - at the May timetable change or some point between then and last week?
I don't necessarily blame the ticket office staff for this as it appears to be a recent change but there is clearly some kind of communication breakdown. How many people have been charged the higher peak fare erroneously?
As an aside, the TVM on the concourse automatically offered the CDR (at 0850). Perhaps I should stick to TVM's in future. The barriers refused to let me through - not valid at that time.