return tickets

[sevenhills]

Hi

Why are return tickets so cheap, when compared to a single? Someone mentioned it on another thread, and I have been told before that returns only cost a little more than a single. Are they always cheap?
I got caught out a few months ago, Leeds to Starbeck, I intended to just travel one way, ended up coming back on the train, but bought 2 singles.

 

[soil]

I believe the intention is to discourage fare evasion.

If the appropriate price of a single journey is £10, then two journeys should cost £20.

However if you charge £10 for one journey but most people make two, then they have a significant incentive to evade either fare, in which case the railway receives only £10.

If you still charge £20 for a return journey but £19 for a single, then it's not worthwhile to evade the £1 extra a return will cost, so people intending to make return journeys will nearly all pay the £20 for a return (or try to evade both fares - much harder than evading or 'forgetting' one).

For the same reason returns valid over several days tend to be more expensive than day returns, since it is often trivial to use the same ticket multiple times, whereas very few people could use the same ticket more than once if it expires the same day.

Of course there are other pricing dynamics involved , but this is a key one.

 

[yorkie]

Hi

Why are return tickets so cheap, when compared to a single? Someone mentioned it on another thread, and I have been told before that returns only cost a little more than a single. Are they always cheap?
I got caught out a few months ago, Leeds to Starbeck, I intended to just travel one way, ended up coming back on the train, but bought 2 singles.

Market forces.

If you want to return, the journey may be non-essential, and/or you may more easily be able to take the car instead.

If returns are expensive people will simply not travel.

If you want a single, your journey is likely to be essential, and a car isn't usually an option (how would you get the car back?). What's the alternative to a single? For long distance journeys a plane ticket (expensive at short notice), but for short or medium distance journeys it could be a taxi, which could be costly.

This leads to the situation where a return can be cheaper than a single (as recently discussed in the FCC Loophole article thread)

 

[sevenhills]

Market forces.

If that is the case, do other travel companies have the same system? I am not aware that they do.

 

[dzug2]

Some bus companies certainly do.

Not sure about airlines - some used to and some of the non-budget ones may still do.

 

[soil]

The ferry companies/Eurotunnel will let you go to France for about £10 on a day return, but if you want to stay a week the price jumps to £200.

 

[button_boxer]

I wouldn't say returns are cheap compared to singles, rather that singles are expensive compared to returns... But as yorkie points out there are sound commercial reasons for it to be that way.

 

[zero]

Not sure about airlines - some used to and some of the non-budget ones may still do.

Budget airlines generally don't offer return tickets.

The reason a one-way tends to be more expensive on a full service airline is that they don't sell the equivalent of CDSs. One way tickets in economy are usually only available in booking class Y, which is comparable to an Anytime ticket and also generally allows you to change or cancel for no fees.

If you want the flexibility, you can always buy airline tickets in class Y, and this will usually cost twice the one-way. Otherwise there are other classes in economy (which tend to be things like B, K, M, S, W) which work like CDRs or SVRs, having various restrictions such as Saturday night stays and loss of rights to change or cancel for free.

 

[ian13]

Not sure about airlines - some used to and some of the non-budget ones may still do.

Transatlantic, returns are significantly cheaper than singles - atleast with BA and US Airways.