Scottish Rail & Sail Rover tickets no longer valid on Calmac

[thameslink2000]

Spirit of Scotland Travel Pass

Explore the whole of Scotland - four days’ travel over eight consecutive days, or eight days’ travel over 15 days.

www.scotrail.co.uk

Please note, from 25 April 2023, ferry travel is no longer included within the Spirit of Scotland, Highland Rover and Scottish Grand Tour passes. Any ferry travel should be purchased separately and directly from www.calmac.co.uk

 

[AY1975]

I presume this change only applies to Calmac ferries and the 20% discount on the Scrabster-Stromness and Aberdeen-Lerwick Northlink Ferries will still apply.

Until a few years ago the Spirit of Scotland (formerly known as Freedom of Scotland) Travelpass was also valid on Argyll Ferries' Gourock-Dunoon route, but there is no reference to that on the ScotRail website anymore so I presume they are already no longer valid there.

 

[Mak1981]

Until a few years ago the Spirit of Scotland (formerly known as Freedom of Scotland) Travelpass was also valid on Argyll Ferries' Gourock-Dunoon route, but there is no reference to that on the ScotRail website anymore

It's a calmac branded service now on that route

 

[Class800]

Shame, it was a good product, with such a high level of government involvement in transport in Scotland, surprised this has happened

 

[AngusH]

I can't see anything as to the motivations of the change.

Is there any information as to whether this is temporary due to the current issues with Calmac or permanent due to a change in policy?

If it's a temporary thing to reduce passenger numbers until the ferry situation stabilises then it seems perfectly reasonable.

If it's a permanent change of policy then it's rather disappointing and I can't see the justification. It would surely be better just to raise the price.

any thoughts?

 

[Wallsendmag]

The brief says that CalMac have withdrawn from the agreement, sounds permanent to me.

 

[AngusH]

Thanks for the extra information, that does sound pretty permanent.




Hopefully, even if its permanent now, when they get to a better position in the future and find they have more spare capacity then they might rejoin the scheme.

 

[TUC]

So much for those who say that public ownership leads to more benefits for passengers...

 

[Class800]

So much for those who say that public ownership leads to more benefits for passengers...

It should - so something's gone wrong here. And 'TUC' does believe in public services usually!

 

[jnjkerbin]

I assume the price of the ticket has been lowered to reflect the reduced validity?

 

[Tazi Hupefi]

This has more to do with the farce that they found themselves in when procuring a new booking / ticket/ revenue management system they're calling "Ar Turas".

Anger as CalMac ferry e-booking system which took ten years to deliver delayed again

STATE-OWNED ferry operator CalMac has defended a further delay of the launch of its £18m booking and ticketing platform - ten years after it was…

www.heraldscotland.com

CalMac refuse to release risk assessment done on new £18m booking system

Exclusive: The Scottish Government-owned ferry operator is launching its Ar Turas ticket booking system later on this month which will replace the ageing old one.

www.scottishdailyexpress.co.uk

Essentially, they want full end-to-end control of their sales processes and customers - third party points of sale like ScotRail / wider rail industry etc don't fit into this. If they've got any sense, (they don't), they'd create a generic discount/promo voucher code that allows you to book a reservation/ticket for a sailing on their new system- but with a requirement to produce the rail ranger/rover ticket when checking in/boarding.

I think it is somewhat outrageous that Scottish Government haven't intervened here - but I think the severe and prolonged issues with the booking system have probably made everybody very weary, especially at a time that the Scottish political landscape is so bad.

 

[Bletchleyite]

Given that Calmac's foot passenger operation is basically an extension of the railway, it'd make a lot of sense for it to use the railway reservation system, really, with a separate one for cars. The mind boggles that ScotGov can't manage to keep it all aligned.

 

[Starmill]

I assume the price of the ticket has been lowered to reflect the reduced validity?

A heroic assumption!

 

[jnjkerbin]

A heroic assumption!

Tongue firmly placed in cheek!

 

[AY1975]

I presume this won't affect ScotRail's ordinary point-to-point Rail & Sail tickets that are available from any station in Scotland to destinations served by Calmac.

 

[Tazi Hupefi]

I presume this won't affect ScotRail's ordinary point-to-point Rail & Sail tickets that are available from any station in Scotland to destinations served by Calmac.

They're all going eventually - unless, perhaps, if it's the other way round and an agreement can be made for ScotRail to accept Cal Mac issued tickets - but it won't be for a long while as the system isn't set up for that.

Again, whole purpose is for them to have full end to end control of their customer data and processes, so no third party suppliers until everything is sorted out and well bedded in I suspect.

 

[Wallsendmag]

I presume this won't affect ScotRail's ordinary point-to-point Rail & Sail tickets that are available from any station in Scotland to destinations served by Calmac.

ScotRail have taken steps to change their tickets to destinations including a CalMac leg. I'm not sure if this will work on any TIS other than Star though

 

[Tazi Hupefi]

ScotRail have taken steps to change their tickets to destinations including a CalMac leg. I'm not sure if this will work on any TIS other than Star though

Changed in what way?

The new EXCH AT CALMAC PORT ticket type?

 

[Wallsendmag]

They've added a coupon that can be exchanged for a boarding pass.

 

[Tazi Hupefi]

They've added a coupon that can be exchanged for a boarding pass.

Just read what you're referring to, thanks.

8AA EXCH AT CALMAC
PORT

 

[trei2k]

I emailed Calmac and got a copy and paste response (the key message was in a different font!).

The best customer experience for travelling with Calmac is booking direct as we can keep customers updated on disruptions to service and they can amend their booking and in some cases of disruption are eligible to make a claim via our passenger rights policy . We are transitioning to a new booking system which involves e-tickets which are incompatible with Scotrail systems. Once this is implemented we hope to work with scotrail to find a solution that works for everyone.

A little bit of hope there at the end. However, passenger rights shouldn't be removed, simply because of an internal change to systems!

 

[reb0118]

I've heard anecdotal reports that passengers holding rail & sail tickets have been held back from boarding until all Cal-Mac booked passengers - including those who have walked up after the rail passengers have arrived - have boarded first. In some extreme cases that could result in denied boarding.

Far cry from a few years back when we were constantly being told to issue through tickets, where available, to those passengers travelling to ferry terminals to avoid those passengers missing the boat due to having to rebook at the port.

Surely by now ScotRail's & Cal-Mac's ticket/reservation system should have been fully integrated with only on board train purchases being on a standby basis.

 

[TUC]

I emailed Calmac and got a copy and paste response (the key message was in a different font!).



A little bit of hope there at the end. However, passenger rights shouldn't be removed, simply because of an internal change to systems!

In other words, yet again the public sector making a hash of implementing everyday technology. Why does it keep happening?

 

[Ianigsy]

I think it is somewhat outrageous that Scottish Government haven't intervened here - but I think the severe and prolonged issues with the booking system have probably made everybody very weary, especially at a time that the Scottish political landscape is so bad.

One hopes Private Eye’s Dr B Ching gets hold of this - surely it defeats the point of the Scottish administration taking rail back in house if they can’t knock heads together to make this kind of thing work.

 

[Bletchleyite]

In other words, yet again the public sector making a hash of implementing everyday technology. Why does it keep happening?

There just seems to be an attitude in the UK that boats are my empire, trains are yours and buses are his and we keep ourselves to ourselves. It's long been so - rail to bus integration was no better in British Transport Commission days when it was all under one organisation. It's just a classic attitude problem in the UK that never quite seems to be resolved.

 

[Flying Snail]

There are many ways this could have been made to work with little effort. The obvious one being a booking option on the Cal-mac website for a free reservation for holders of named rail-sail tickets.

Of course the assumption that they want to make it work is probably where the problem lies, these sort of things are more often than not a useful excuse for removing a ticket they don't really want to honour in the first place, more revenue for them if those tiresome rover passengers just cough up the full fare.

 

[TUC]

There just seems to be an attitude in the UK that boats are my empire, trains are yours and buses are his and we keep ourselves to ourselves. It's long been so - rail to bus integration was no better in British Transport Commission days when it was all under one organisation. It's just a classic attitude problem in the UK that never quite seems to be resolved.

But that should be part of the role of government in publicly funded services, to insist 'this is what we require'.

 

[zwk500]

There just seems to be an attitude in the UK that boats are my empire, trains are yours and buses are his and we keep ourselves to ourselves. It's long been so - rail to bus integration was no better in British Transport Commission days when it was all under one organisation. It's just a classic attitude problem in the UK that never quite seems to be resolved.

The 'Little Kingdoms' problem runs deeper than just trains, planes and automobiles. It runs into territories, services, operational divisions, you name it.

 

[Cloud Strife]

I think it is somewhat outrageous that Scottish Government haven't intervened here - but I think the severe and prolonged issues with the booking system have probably made everybody very weary, especially at a time that the Scottish political landscape is so bad.

I have an MSP friend who is interested in ferry issues, and he says that he's frankly had enough of Calmac. He says that it's very much an empire within an empire, and any attempt to reign them in is usually met with threats by management. He gave the example of the booking system: whenever he's attended a meeting on the subject, there's always a litany of excuses as to why it hasn't been implemented yet.

Another absurdity is that the online booking system won't handle commercial reservations, nor will it handle the existing Calmac credit facility offered to companies. It's completely not fit for purpose.

Surely by now ScotRail's & Cal-Mac's ticket/reservation system should have been fully integrated

Absolutely. There's no reason why not, except that this is very much the typical "Calmac is different and you don't understand us" mentality.

 

[lyndhurst25]

Those Scottish train/bus/ferry rovers were high on my list of trips that I wanted to do. Without the ferries being included, then no deal. And no, I won’t just be just buying the rail rover anyway and paying extra for the ferries.