Tap and Go ticket points appear at Merseyrail stations

[Djgr]

New contactless payment points appear on Merseyrail platforms

There soon could be a new 'tap and go' platform payment method

www.liverpoolecho.co.uk

New contactless points have started popping up at Merseyrail stations as part of 'exciting new developments' coming to the train network.

Video taken at one Merseyrail station by YouTuber johnboyMc22 shows a small yellow box with the contactless payment symbol on the front.

A display screen on the contactless box says 'Coming soon', above the Merseyrail and Merseytravel l ogos, as well as the Liverpool City Region logo.

Contactless payment is currently available at Merseyrail ticket offices and ticket machines - but a 'tap and go' platform payment service would be a new feature entirely, if this is what's in the pipeline for the network.


Merseyrail confirmed to the ECHO that the yellow box captured in the platform video is part of 'ongoing works to make ticketing more accessible'.

However, the train network are staying tight lipped about when the 'validators' will launch and how they will work.

​

 

[Geeves]

Its currently being trialed on the Harrogate line as well. No real reason for them to stay tightlipped its fairly obvious it will be a no ticket, contractless bankcard type affair.

 

[Bletchleyite]

That will be good to see, though if it's widely used it could threaten viability of the ticket offices (which are still all open for the full period of service). That said, Merseyside is more of a cash culture than London, so will people still want to pay cash in far greater numbers than down South?

 

[RHolmes]

I would imagine these aren’t intended for contactless payment, and are more likely for use with metrocard ticketing such as the saveaway and trio and the new over 60s passes which are also now loaded onto a metrocard with photo ID to more accurately work out financial payments to operators and calculate more accurate passenger flows to improve the network at stations without ticket barriers

If anything contactless payment or capping will be an after-thought I would imagine

 

[markymark2000]

That will be good to see, though if it's widely used it could threaten viability of the ticket offices (which are still all open for the full period of service). That said, Merseyside is more of a cash culture than London, so will people still want to pay cash in far greater numbers than down South?

I don't know you know. London is an area where you are a bit more forced to use a card of some kind (bank card or oyster) with in some cases no option to pay by cash. In Merseyside, I can only base it off buses but the uptake for contactless is very high there and I think that there is potential for these contactless tap and go things to be used in Merseyside.
Something which I will be very interested to see is if Merseytravel allow capping or whether (as per Saveaways) they will force you to go to a ticket office and get the weekly tickets.

 

[Pacef8]

When I travelled daily into Liverpool their was no benefit in getting a weekly travel ticket hence everyone queued up to buy a day return at the last minute . The ticket guy printed 30 out in advance in preparation .

 

[markymark2000]

When I travelled daily into Liverpool their was no benefit in getting a weekly travel ticket hence everyone queued up to buy a day return at the last minute . The ticket guy printed 30 out in advance in preparation .

Are you are suggesting the railpass isn't very good value for money? (Not saying that it isn't true, just seems like an anomaly since almost all other season tickets have decent savings on standard day walk up fares).

 

[Fawkes Cat]

When I travelled daily into Liverpool their was no benefit in getting a weekly travel ticket hence everyone queued up to buy a day return at the last minute . The ticket guy printed 30 out in advance in preparation .

Are you are suggesting the railpass isn't very good value for money? (Not saying that it isn't true, just seems like an anomaly since almost all other season tickets have decent savings on standard day walk up fares).

Railpasses are zonal, while day tickets are (I think) charged on a point-to-point basis. So I can well imagine some railpasses giving very little (or possibly no) benefit over the day ticket if your regular journey is near-edge to near-edge of different zones while far-edge to far-edge might be a journey five or six stations further for the same railpass price.

(N.B. the above written without checking specific details of zonal boundaries or fares so E&OE.)

 

[Djgr]

Are you are suggesting the railpass isn't very good value for money? (Not saying that it isn't true, just seems like an anomaly since almost all other season tickets have decent savings on standard day walk up fares).

Hamilton Square to Liverpool return used to be much cheaper as 5 * Day Returns, due to the zoning structure.

 

[Pacef8]

I dont know what the savings are now but you had to travel more than 5 times a week to make it viable. St Michaels to Central Station .

 

[markymark2000]

Fair point then. I didn't know that sometimes the railpass is worse value for money. That has to be an oversight somewhere which needs looking at. Hopefully that will be done in due course (perhaps make all fares zonal and rid point to point fares but that's another topic)

 

[Grumpy Git]

That will be good to see, though if it's widely used it could threaten viability of the ticket offices (which are still all open for the full period of service). That said, Merseyside is more of a cash culture than London, so will people still want to pay cash in far greater numbers than down South?

OT, but the cashier at the Morrisons filling station opposite the JLR factory in Speke told me that they took more cash than any other Morrisons filling station in the UK, most payments being in the £5 to £20 region!

 

[emoaconr]

Hamilton Square to Liverpool return used to be much cheaper as 5 * Day Returns, due to the zoning structure.

Yes, even more so since Area E covering central Liverpool plus Birkenhead was abolished some time ago. Equally the 'Off Peak Annual Trio' was scrapped a couple of years ago, forcing those who only needed off-peak season travel to purchase much, much more expensive anytime season tickets!

 

[Bletchleyite]

Yes, even more so since Area E covering central Liverpool plus Birkenhead was abolished some time ago. Equally the 'Off Peak Annual Trio' was scrapped a couple of years ago, forcing those who only needed off-peak season travel to purchase much, much more expensive anytime season tickets!

Didn't know that was gone - that was an unusual bit of Germanicism on Merseyside - most German Verbuende have such a ticket.

The thing I find to be missing is a Trio plus the non-Merseyside rail zones in one, but on one ticket.

 

[tpfx89]

For what it's worth I think these are more likely to be ticket validation points, Northern are in the process of installing these at other stations that I'm aware of. I don't think they're the sort of oyster tap and go solution. More like Metrolink's "get me there" validators when they first installed them.

 

[johntea]

Aren't they similar to the system in Amsterdam? I remember buying a 3 day tourist ticket or whatever it was called and you had to in theory tap in and out at the many validator points (some stations had ticket barriers of course)

I always wondered what the consequence would have been had I forgotten to tap in or out with it being essentially a 'unlimited travel until it runs out' ticket!

 

[Bletchleyite]

Aren't they similar to the system in Amsterdam? I remember buying a 3 day tourist ticket or whatever it was called and you had to in theory tap in and out at the many validator points (some stations had ticket barriers of course)

I always wondered what the consequence would have been had I forgotten to tap in or out with it being essentially a 'unlimited travel until it runs out' ticket!

From my observation of rather soft-touch Dutch revenue protection you'd probably just be asked to tap it.

 

[RichardAsh1981]

Re: Railpass, this is the rail part of the (heavily promoted) MerseyTravel season ticket offer and is sometimes worse value than returns because of zone borders - the zones are inherited from the bus network, and some make little sense. For example, B2 on the Wirral covers 9 stations (5 on the Chester/Ellesmere Port line and 4 on the West Kirby), where as B1 has 16 stops covering all the rest of the Wirral lines. Thus almost any journey from B2 towards Ellesmere Port or Chester will be cheaper on point to point fares.
This is still possible on a season ticket however - you just need to find a ticket office and get them to sell you a Network Rail season ticket for your specific journey, which will priced following the normal rules based on the point-to-point return fare. Pre-COVID I did this for Bromborough - Capenhurst because two zones for four stops never worked out!

 

[markymark2000]

Re: Railpass, this is the rail part of the (heavily promoted) MerseyTravel season ticket offer and is sometimes worse value than returns because of zone borders - the zones are inherited from the bus network, and some make little sense. For example, B2 on the Wirral covers 9 stations (5 on the Chester/Ellesmere Port line and 4 on the West Kirby), where as B1 has 16 stops covering all the rest of the Wirral lines. Thus almost any journey from B2 towards Ellesmere Port or Chester will be cheaper on point to point fares.
This is still possible on a season ticket however - you just need to find a ticket office and get them to sell you a Network Rail season ticket for your specific journey, which will priced following the normal rules based on the point-to-point return fare. Pre-COVID I did this for Bromborough - Capenhurst because two zones for four stops never worked out!

The Zones don't make much sense anymore and they do need updating. I think there are too many zones and too many which don't make sense. There is 12 zones I think it is and none of them make sense for a passenger making journeys on any mode of transport. Train especially though. I think they should just scrap the sub divisions and just have A, B, C, D, F and G zones. That halves the number of zones and would make much more sense for passengers trying to get tickets.