http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk/7166663.stm
The worst offenders are:
* CrossCountry, who have disgracefully put unregulated fares up by a shocking 7%, despite their trains being overcrowded and no sign of them putting their HSTs into service.
* East Midlands Trains, who have also put fares up by 7%. Plus they abolished free tea/coffee in standard class. I suspect just about all of their regular customers would rather be back with the old MML company. I see they have also abolished EMT+Connections tickets from Leeds, replacing them with EMT only, this means that you cannot get advance purchase tickets on this route apart from at the extreme hours of the day.
* Farce TransPennine Express have kicked their passengers in the teeth by going back on their promise of having 6-car trains, by putting 2-car trains on services to Hull and very, very few trains in the peak are 6 car. There are less seats available in 185s than 158s so they promised lengthening but instead they make people stand AND PAY 6.4% more!
* National Express East Coast pretended to be a friendly company by giving us free wifi in standard, but they are charging us 6.6% more for their tickets, thus negating the goodwill they originally showed.
* 'one' have put fares up by 6.8%, and it's probably best to leave it to NickW to find some suitable comments for them!
George Muir has come up with a rather silly statement "These fares rises help reduce the burden on taxpayers", which is absolutely absurd given that all they are going to do is force people onto the roads, and putting more people on the roads actually results in higher 'hidden' costs such as healthcare (for people injured, also more pollution = higher rate of asthma etc).
Happy new year from the TOCs... NOT!!!
Watchdog condemns rail fare hikes
A consumer watchdog has labelled looming above-inflation rail fare rises "unfair and unjustified".
While regulated fares, which include most season tickets, are going up by an average of 4.8% from Wednesday, other fares are set to rise by more than 9%..... [Click here to read the rest of the article]
The worst offenders are:
* CrossCountry, who have disgracefully put unregulated fares up by a shocking 7%, despite their trains being overcrowded and no sign of them putting their HSTs into service.
* East Midlands Trains, who have also put fares up by 7%. Plus they abolished free tea/coffee in standard class. I suspect just about all of their regular customers would rather be back with the old MML company. I see they have also abolished EMT+Connections tickets from Leeds, replacing them with EMT only, this means that you cannot get advance purchase tickets on this route apart from at the extreme hours of the day.
* Farce TransPennine Express have kicked their passengers in the teeth by going back on their promise of having 6-car trains, by putting 2-car trains on services to Hull and very, very few trains in the peak are 6 car. There are less seats available in 185s than 158s so they promised lengthening but instead they make people stand AND PAY 6.4% more!
* National Express East Coast pretended to be a friendly company by giving us free wifi in standard, but they are charging us 6.6% more for their tickets, thus negating the goodwill they originally showed.
* 'one' have put fares up by 6.8%, and it's probably best to leave it to NickW to find some suitable comments for them!
George Muir has come up with a rather silly statement "These fares rises help reduce the burden on taxpayers", which is absolutely absurd given that all they are going to do is force people onto the roads, and putting more people on the roads actually results in higher 'hidden' costs such as healthcare (for people injured, also more pollution = higher rate of asthma etc).
Happy new year from the TOCs... NOT!!!