Great Western Coffee Shop

A press article I saw last week suggested that the railways should adopt a similar system to airlines in selling a base product and then charging for extras.   The idea is that people who travel light and easily for the railway get a lower price, with extra then charged for other things that make for more work for staff, slow the train down, or take more space.

Once the base product can be made to work properly - and that should be the immediate priority - providing some sort of 'extra' is a way to recoup lost earnings. However I'd be inclined to think charging for many of these things makes rail less accessible. If we want to encourage public transport use, it needs to be usable for 'real world' purposes - so the base product should include things that are a normal part of travel such as carrying luggage, using the toilet, having a drink etc.

Some paid-for extras are already provided on some routes e.g. on-board catering, first class etc. Perhaps this provision could be reviewed and revised so that it could bring in new income in the current and future market. First class usage would have changed if fewer people are commuting – especially as people in roles in which one would be willing to pay the extra are more/most likely to be working from home (tentative assumption). Perhaps offer a product more akin to Weekend First, with some sort of upgrade option, or with some sort of extras available. Some sort of Family Carriage or Tourist provision might be worth providing – pay extra for a family pack or information pack, and have use of the observation area. Note I'm thinking of extras that don't remove from the base product here. Where these require extra capacity, ensure the capacity provision is up to scratch first. AAUI TfW is to provide first class on the S Wales - Manchester route, but only retrofitting it after the new stock is in place and up to 5 cars.

I find reservations more hassle than they're worth, for a number of reasons, but some people have a greater need for them if they are to have the confidence to use the train. A lot of reservations end up unused. Once basic capacity issues are sorted, perhaps offer paid-for reservations – but only if the system works reliably, and there's plenty of space for non-reservers.

Lumo MD quoted at a rail conference last week

The AAA surcharge for Accompanied Animals and Articles was only recently (2018) abolished as no one was using it.  So when you could have been charged for extras, you weren't.

Hey - here's a way of encouraging more rail use - how's about promoting the fact that all these (where currently provided) attract no extra charge?

I do think that reservations should attract a modest additional charge though  - see - http://www.firstgreatwestern.info/coffeeshop/index.php?topic=27163.0

The reservation system on the IETs failed to work on a significant proportion of my journeys, so imagine the fuss if you have paid for something not provided. On one recent journey out of Paddington, the system only burst into life as we were passing Slough and chaos ensued!

On one journey a short while ago there was a substitution of a 9 carriage for a 5 from memory on the Cotswold line. This was a Sunday late afternoon and reservations consequently weren’t shown as there weren’t the correct number of seats and carriages. The Train manager apologised over the tannoy and explained that if you were in possession of a reservation it wasn’t going to be there. Said they didn’t know why there had been a swap but to please allow those unable to stand for long periods a seat. It was already busy before we got to Oxford and then became like rush hour on the underground used to be afterwards. A woman near me complained to the TM that it was idiotic to run a train service in this way and if she’d paid for a reservation she’d be furious. TM agreed with her.

On another train the system showed a pair of seats as free which were duly occupied by passengers. A couple got on at an intermediate station and found their “reserved” seats occupied. Fortunately the train passengers thinned out a bit at Reading when people got off and the situation resolved itself.

Sadly, it's a little like buying a ticket and hoping the train runs as advertised.  ::)

Perhaps extend "delay repay" to cover any charge, with TMs issued with a satchel of cash to dish out to disappointed would be reserved passengers  ;D

As ever it is probably more important to get the basics right, before trying to fleece the passengers more.

Would an extra charge for wearing a kilt be refundable if the customer's journey ends North of the border?

and I have re-found the press link - in  2 days ago:

 (https://www.standard.co.uk/news/transport/extra-charge-passengers-luggage-rail-boss-lumo-east-coast-mainline-b1062851.htmlThe Standard[/url)

He has a point, but worth bearing in mind that aircraft have holds for suitcases etc, even if you charged rail customers extra, it's still going to take up the extra space, so it's only the TOC that benefits...........luggage vans anyone?

Made me reflect and might be a good read:

https://www.altexsoft.com/blog/railway-reservation-system/

The issue that 'The railway doesn't know its customers' in particular, might be one to reflect on and does some of this feed into the 'Chargeable extras' conversation?

Mark

Thanks Mark for the link.

However, I am not sure that the comparison with air travel is helpful. The railway system has a whole range of customers - daily (perhaps more now not 5 days a week) commuters to work and study; those who live in areas of frequent local rail services who use trains in the same way they might use a bus - turn up and pay, no need for booking, definitely do not want to be tied to a particular outward or return train; those who use it for travel for business, who might want to aim for a particular outward service, but who do not want to be tied to a return one as they do not know when their meeting will end; and those using for casual leisure trips for whom flexibility is important.

Mixing all these into the passenger flow on our rail system means a lot of what they advocate as technology the railways should adopt in simply irrelevant.

It is also wrong/ill informed to witter on about problems with ticketing connecting services. It seems much easier to buy an internal UK rail ticket between two places served by different TOCs than it was on the only recent experience I have had combining an international and an internal flight overseas.- the problem is not an inability to buy tickets that cross rail operating company boundaries, it is obscure rules that can sometimes mean some convenient alternative routes between the starting point and destination are not permitted on the through "cross-border" ticket (or indeed on journeys within an individual train operator's network). And I have had no difficulty on the few occasions I wanted to buy a ticket to St Pancras (or in earlier days) Waterloo to catch a Eurostar in doing so at the same time - ditto onward trains in the country of destination.

I am not sure that the assumption that the unavailability of train tickets on some travel sites is a problem either. I expect most people who book on-line are used to visiting different websites for different elements of a trip. On the other hand some rail companies offer as much on their sites as some of the internet travel agencies.  If you book with Eurostar, you can get your hotel, hire car and travel insurance at the same time. Even GWR can offer you BusPlus, and you can book some tourist destination or day-out activities through their website. I have booked train tickets across Belgium and the Netherlands when booking Eurostar tickets via SNCB (Belgian railways).

I think that the author is just looking at rail as an alternative to international leisure travel, and (dare I say it) may not have done all their research. There is also an assumption that with the internet, people now just go to Expedia and their rivals instead of going into their local travel agents, browsing the brochures  then sitting at a desk with the shop staff to make the booking. I may not be typical, but I quite like booking a break in the internet age. It enables you to book elements with different suppliers via different websites to get what you want at a price that fits your budget. While I am not a great air traveller, none of the factors he (or she) mentions have ever been a material consideration to me in deciding if I should chose rail or air, and I have found airline (and booking sites) web interfaces as variable in quality and ease of use as those for rail. I have not used Ryanair for many years, but I recall that one of the many problems was that their website was one of those dreadful ones on which if you tried to change anything as you went through it went right back to the beginning of the process and you had to re-enter everything again!

Getting back to the subject matter of the thread, it may be that the UK rail industry should enhance its IT systems so that the provision of extra help for disabled passengers works better and more reliably, and also to devise a workable system to cope with the booking of spaces bikes (and surfboards?). However, Frank Gardner's recurring problems with wheelchair assistance on planes indicates that this is another area the airlines' IT systems have not delivered the optimum solution. Apart from this, introducing extra charges for many of the facilities we have taken for granted as what you always get when you travel by train looks like a disincentive to rail travel.

Not to you maybe - but AltexSoft are promoting themselves to rail sector. Their line of business is stitching together other peoples' software, and a bit of their own:

They seem to have no railway customers yet, so that is a logical next step. I doubt if any of us is a marketing target for them.

Surprisingly, perhaps, they started out, and still have their headquarters, in Ukraine.

If a passenger wears a kilt with a bowler hat, do they pay two charges or does the one cancel out the other?

The hand baggage only fares on planes are cheaper, because the space not used for luggage in the aircraft hold can be used for freight. That freight is generating money for the airline which usually is far greater than than the reduction in fare.