Simplified train fares ripoff scam price rises
April 30, 2008 3:35 pmThe Association of Train Operating Companies have announced a “simplification” of the fares - see also Rail fares ’set to be simplified’ (BBC)
Basically, despite the nonsense from AOTOC and Passenger Focus “welcoming” this move, it has meant BIG increases, in some cases DOUBLE the cheapest fare.
I spoke today to AOTOC, passenger focus and CrossCountry trains - this is well worth listening to if you are in any doubt that this new ticketing system is a scam:
Examples:
SINGLE JOURNEY from Oxford (OXF) to Aberystwyth (AYW)
Currently: £10 After 18th April: £20.50
SINGLE JOURNEY from Reading (RDG) to Shrewsbury (SHR)
Currently: £10, After 18th April:£18.00
It doesn’t appear to apply to ALL fares, for example, Reading to Castle Cary seems unaffected.
I would be interested to know if YOUR journey will be affected:
Using the fares finder, you can check what the CHEAPEST available price will be BEFORE the 18th of May.
If you add the option to select 5 days, you could try, say:
12th May, 16th May, 26th May, 21st June, 21st July
If you see the cheapest prices available only BEFORE the 18th of May, you will know you’re probably onto a loser.
So, next step is to pick a date WAY into the future, say a mid-day in June, and find the cheapest fare (using the “show all fares” button)
And that is your new fare. If you are affected, post details below and if you want, add to the thread here:
How did I find this and how did I know I’m not just making a mistake and getting unlucky on the dates? As I passed through Reading earlier I asked the booking office why I couldn’t find these cheap fares, and they explained about the 18th of May, and that many of the cheapest tickets had been merged into a higher price. And the thing that really got me was that a ticket supervisor made me feel almost like I should have been grateful to have got the lower price - “not everyone can get these cheap tickets you get - it just makes it fairer on everyone”.
Oh, right, so everyone who bothers to plan in advance is penalised (on certain journeys, it seems).
Finally, as if a doubling of the fares themselves wasn’t enough…from ICWales:
“…among the changes being introduced are a ban on refunds for cancelled pre-booked business and first class tickets.First Great Western – along with other UK operators Virgin, East Midlands Trains and TransPennine Express – currently offer refunds on their standard and first class pre-booked business tickets but will no longer do so under the new no-refund policy.
There is also likely to be an increase in the cost of changing journey times for return tickets bought in advance with some UK operators, with many routes doubling from £10 to £20″
PLEASE call Passenger Focus on 08453 022 022 and Crosscountry Trains on 0121 6547400 and also ATOC on (020) 7841 8000 as well as writing to your MP.
*UPDATE* 18th May 2008
I first contacted Arriva Cross Country, ATOC and Passenger Focus on 28th April to ask about these tickets price increases of over 100%. Since then, I have also contacted them and my MP in writing (only my MP has replied). Passenger Focus adn ATOC couldn’t have been less interested.
Last week, I was contacted by Vikki Miller from the Sunday Telegraph, who had heard my podcast and read similar travellers tales of unfair fares. Over the next couple of days, she and I put together a story (I put quite a lot of effort in too!).
Late on Friday evening, I got a phone call to say she had been called back by Arriva Cross Country.
Apparently, they (Arrive Cross Country) had “discovered”, on Wednesday 14th May (over 2 weeks after I’d contacted them) an error in the way the tickets had been entered onto the system. (An error…yeah right! Sussed out, more like)
However, despite tens of thousands of people booking tickets with at least a £10 premium on them because of the incorrect fare, there was no way of refunding them apparently! So, Arriva do well to the tune of… £50,000? £100,000? Who knows.
The result is that the story was watered down a bit - I still think it’s a shame this angle wasn’t covered - I think she missed a trick there. However, I’m guessing her intervention shook them up slightly and hopefully the result will be the proper priced tickets again.
However, I have just checked at 08:40 on Sunday 18th May 2008 and despite them having “discovered” the mistake 5 days ago, the incorrect fare is still showing on the National Rail website. So this story may have a little further to run…watch this space!
UPDATE: I received a letter dated June 10th with the following:
Thank you for your further letter about the re-structure of our tickets.
I am sorry for the confusion we may have caused in our previous communications with you. Following your original phone calls and letters to us we had discovered some anomalies in our fare structure. This affected a few fares where connecting train operators were involved.
As a result, we have had twenty incidents of customers being charged incorrect fares.
These fares have now been corrected and if the customers contact us we will reimburse them. Regrettably as these purchases were made at stations we do not have the customers details to contact directly. We have also made the Telegraph aware of these fare anomalies and our efforts to correct the fault.If you have purchased an incorrectly priced ticket please send it to us in customer relations and we will reimburse you for the difference in fares.
Thank you for giving us the opportunity to address this matter once again.
Yours sincerely
VIC SAVILLE
Team Leader
TWENTY incidents?!? I spoke to ten people on trains myself! Don’t tell me only 20 people went from the south to Wales (or any other combination of XC > non-XC) on advance tickets in that time!
And in spite of the above, there’s nothing on the Cross Country Trains or ATOC press release site, and nothing I can find in the Telegraph. There’s a mention of the Passenger Focus statement, though:
Passenger Focus is lobbying Virgin Trains, Cross Country and National Express following changes in ticket use restrictions in some parts of the country.
(click link above to read the rest)
Here’s the story in the Sunday Telegraph
UPDATE - 29th July 2008
2 months to not read my letter properly! My point was that the fare had gone from £12 to £21, then after MANY hours of calling and harrasment, XC admitted a mistake and the £21 become £17.50. But I also pointed out that I now have to book A>B B>C to get the price of the old A>C fare, otherwise it’s about £15 more! I also pointed out what a general nightmare the whole simplification thing was, and could we please have the old system back as I don’t really want to pay nearly £1000 more a year for the new system. This was their reply:
Another update - I now have a reply from passenger focus.
Thank you for your complaint with Cross Country which we received in this office on 3 June. I have now had the opportunity to review your complaint.
I understand you are unhappy about the availability of the Value Advance fares on a number of your routes. I can understand your frustration as these fares do represent great value for money if you’re able to get them.
With the advance fares, there is limited quota on some services and they are not a guaranteed fare. I’m aware that the quota does change depending on whether the service is busy and whether it’s a peak time service or not. If it is a busy service, they are unlikely to offer advance fares as this could cause further problems like overcrowding.
Because the train companies advertise these fares as ’subject to availability’ there are no ground in which we can enforce them to make more available. However, we are very much aware of the importance of these fares to passengers and the benefits they bring, considering the cost of a standard fare.
I would like to clarify that these fare increases are not due to the simplification of the fares. The train companies were due to review their fares and they have done this at the same time of the simplification. We did ask them not to do this as we knew it would cause confusion and discredit the whole simplification of fares process, which is something we have long campaigned for.
Thank you for your comments and I hope I have clarified our position on this.
Is that a toothless watchdog or what?!
Link update: This has been picked up by MoneySavingExpert at last.
Here’s the main thread. Here’s another forum thread.
Other media articles: The Independent The Sunday Mirror
Other forums discussing this:
The RailUK Forum [1] [2] [3]
The Student Room
Google Groups
8 Responses to “Simplified train fares ripoff scam price rises”
Sorry, tried local and long distance journeys and can’t find any major problems (Bristol - Doncaster, York - Kings Cross, Goole - Sheffield, Sheffield - St Pancras).
Checking journeys 9th May & 20th May has a couple of price differences of a pound or so on the long distance routes, but Advance tickets readily available.
I see your Oxford - Aberystwyth problem, so thought it might be a Great Western thing again, but Paddington to Dockyard prices are unchanged.
So is it a multi-TOC thing? So I tried Shoeburyness to Caldicot, via c2c, FGW & ATW, but again, prices are unchanged.
Last chance to get to the bottom of this, so Reading to Doncaster via Birmingham using the evil CrossCountry. Cheapest Advance option £46.50. May 20th, cheapest ticket on the same route £34.00 (prices via FGW & NXEA via London were unchanged).
Good luck with exposing this obviously crippling nationwide scandal. Heres some advice - You win some, you lose some, move on.
That’s great that your journeys are working out for you - for some, there may be improvements, for millions of others, there are doubling of fares. As I said: “It doesn’t appear to apply to ALL fares”.
Why would you want to go to Doncaster via B’ham? Reading > Doncaster is £11 via London.
I am talking about the heavy penalties for ALL inter-TOC journeys involving an AXC > ATW interchange affected by this “simplification”.
You heard ATOC saying this will NOT mean a price increase. And you heard AXC saying there will be price increases because of this. How can you defend that?
And thanks for your good luck wishes - and well done for representing your industry in some an embarrassingly “missing the point” fashion. Shouldn’t you be prosecuting women for standing near 1st class?
BTW, the journalist I spoke to yesterday (Wed) also read the release saying that this would not mean higher prices, and will be giving it “the works” when the local elections are done.
Yes what a rip off! On Arriva cross country trains you can no longer use a cheap day return before 09:30 (used to be 09:00) and worst of all you cannot use a cheap day return to travel between 15:30 and 18:15 Monday to Friday. You have to buy the full standard return usually costs 70 to 100% more depend on journey! I travel to work after morning peak Burton on Trent to Birmingham (35miles) now I haVE TO PAY £13.80 INSTEAD OF £7.80 to return at a reasonable time. The increase will also hit shoppers who travel these times. Also any SAVER ticket priced by cross country is not valid before 09:30 before it only applied if your were travelling to London. How about Birmingham to Bognor regis £58.30 before and now £141. I think Arriva Cross Country are the first train company to try this before it affects everyone in September.
I think there are too many rail industry contractors, shareholders, consultants with their greedy snouts in the public trough. I have read that the government want to reduce public subsidy by letting us pay the high cost of a fragmented railway. But don’t be dishonest and dress this increase as simplification.
Yes indeed!
Cheapest advance (railcard) fare from Reading to Weymouth before 18th May:£5.60.
18th May onwards:£8.90.
Representing a 59% increase.
Having contacted X-Country Trains about this, they basically said the fare hike was due to “other train operators” ie:SW Trains.
I won’t waste more of my time contacting SWT, as I’m sure they’ll blame “other train operators” as well!
What I really want to know is: How are large organisations seemingly allowed to get away with misleading/ conning the public (ITV/BBC with their premium rate phone scams to name but one example)?
Network Rail’s ‘Simpler Rail Fares’ leaflet clearly states that “fares will not increase as a result of the new fares structure”.
I bet if I made such blatently false & misleading statements to my customers, I’d be carted off to one of Her Majesty’s “Hotels” quicker than any train can travel!
Prior to May 18 I could buy a saver return from Manchester to Reading for £64.90 which allowed me to depart on the 07:54 and return on any train later in the week. To travel now with the same flexibility costs £108.00 if I want to catch the 07:54 from Manchester - This was quietly slipped in by XC under the quise of the Advanced Fair rationalisations. This is a fare increase of 66% - They claimed after much proding that only Virgin now allow savers before 09:30 and that they were just aligning with the rest of the TOCs.
Because of this I started buying Advanced when they are available (which seems to be quite rarely on the journeys I take) which reduced my flexibity and I now find that there has suddenly been an unannounced increase in these fares as well - this week the cheapest Standard Advanced Single from Manchester to Reading and vice-versa is £20.00 as of next week it is £21.50 an additional increase of 7.5% and the cheapest 1st advanced single has gone from £47.00 to £50.50 an increase of almost 7.5%. It seems to me that XC allowed a month to go by so they could say that there were no fare changes caused by the Advanced Fare rationalisation (the Saver return issue is something different according to XC staff) and then quietly slipped another 7.5% fare increase which of course has nothing to do with the rationalisation. It seems to me that XC just keep increasing the fares but doing absolutely nothing about the quality of service of timeliness of the trains.
We for me this now means I drive 9 hours every weekend rather than use the train. London Euston - Bangor leaving on a Friday evening returning on the 06:01 has risen 215%! This is due to the saver ticket restrictions being changed. I could turn up on a Friday evening and buy a saver return for £69.80 and use it on a Monday morning. No it costs £219.00!!!!
To take the care the return journey of 540miles cost aproximately £55 in fuel, it is crazy and I’m very angry about this. Especially as this happen as they began engineering works which means taken the train on a Sunday to avoid the new high fares isn’t even an option. Luckily I can drive but I feel very sorry for those that can’t. Base on doing this journey 46 weeks of a year it saves almost £7000.00 compaired with using the train.
What a disgrace these train fairs are!
hey guys, probably time to revisit this now that the fares have come in - *everything* is a lot more expensive. The cheapest ticket I can find on Virgin from London to Wolves now runs to over £40 return - with a fair wind a super advance return fare could cost as little as £25 or so before these changes. Chiltern trains (who do the really cheap walk up fare at Marylebone to Brum) have also doubled in price - used to be £5 each way (seriously!) and is now £10 each way and ticketing now looks to comply with the national rail standards (which is a step backwards in their case - they could previously text you a barcode to your mnobile to be scanned on the train, or you could just print out a simple form - 21st century or what - all gone now - it’s fast ticket machine or nothing)
This fare rationalisation is Just an excuse for rail companies to increase their profits at the expense of all customers - including the savvy ones who used to know how to get cheap fares by using the system to their advantage. We all pay the same price as the thicker end of the consumer spectrum now :\
I have had the pleasure in the last month of not having to travel by rail - my blood pressure is down and i feel humanised again. Last week I travelled from Berlin to Leipzig - the train was comfortable and everyone had plenty of leg space - the food was not just ropey sandwiciche and the price was fait.
I’m currently on the national express train from london KX to Leeds. I’m cramped, feel depressed and have been grunted at several times by what are supposedly customer service (prevention) staff. I’ve also just had to pay full fare as I missed my previous train by 2 mins due to London traffic and my advance ticket is not refundable or redeemable against the full fare. When will train companies get into their thick heads - they run an inferior service but charge way over the top prices and if once in a while they were to try to help people instead of fleecing them at every opportunity they may get a more supportive customer base.
I really am going to do all I can to avoid travelling by train as the service is just getting worse!
Care to comment?