Great Western Coffee Shop

There has been disquiet about the fares charged during engineering works, where those fares are in excess of the fares that passengers would normally pay.

Would a general easement (sample text here) help clarify the situation?

If the train you intended to take in the public timetable is curtailed, cancelled, retimed, delayed, overloaded or otherwise not running and is not able to convey you to within 15 minutes of that public timetable, you may take a near alternative service for your journey and pay a price not to exceed what you would have paid had trains run to the public timetable. This easement applies to train services altered in advance for planned engineering works as well as for late alterations.  For the purpose of this easement, "train" means a train or series of connecting trains and / or rail replacement bus or buses where the time normally schedued to wait at the connecting station is 5 minutes or more, or a different figure for stations with a different specified minimum connecting time. Alternative trains taken may be scheduled trains and extra public trains run by any train operating company, but passengers may not transfer to special trains or charters under this easement.

Please complete the poll. Utterly unscientific, but it will give an idea of passenger's view.

Should the vote come out in strong favour of chaining the current system, I will forward to GWR and ask for it to be considered. Bearing in mind the mention of "Any TOC", perhaps this is one for the Rail Delivery Group, Transport Focus, ORR, or DfT?  How about for Which? ?

Looking out of concern at the phenomenal amount of changes this summer and the lack of uniformity / clarity in ticket acceptance. Personally, I feel a safety net of the sort I'm suggesting would be useful. 

As I posted in the last week when you quoted the case of Mrs X from Chippenham working in Warminster, refer the matter to Passenger Focus or whatever they call themselves now.

This forum posting is far from the only thread following up on this issue.  The intent of the thread is to provide a positive base of suggestion that can be followed through which is thorough, fair, and I hope would have public support rather than battering various parties with negative "this is unfair" brickbats whilst offering no constructive alternative.

AIUI there are regular temporary amendments to the routeing guide to deal with engineering diversions via intermediate points that would not normally be valid, and wouldn't they then automatically allow the journey planners to use the 'normal' fares temporarily?

Perhaps the basic problem is that the routeing rules are not being changed because they can't be bothered.  Or can't afford the resources to continually amend them back and forth.

ISTM that all the while the online planners work out the route before determining the fares, then this scenario will occur, however if you just go to a TVM on the day the normal ticket (and fare) will usually still be available - because they don't get changed for engineering work.

Paul

I agree with the thread and its aims, looked for the poll 'button' but didn't see any but I'll 'like' after I've posted this.

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f the train you intended to take in the public timetable is curtailed, cancelled, retimed, delayed, overloaded or otherwise not running and able to convey you to within 15 minutes of that public timetable, you may take a near alternative service for your journey and pay a price not to exceed what you would have paid had trains run to the public timetable

I would make it stronger:

f the train you intended to take in the public timetable is curtailed, cancelled, retimed, delayed, overloaded or otherwise not usable for your intended journey and [/font]NOT able to convey you to within 15 minutes of that public timetable, you may take ANY alternative service for your journey and pay a price not to exceed what you would have paid had trains run to the public timetable. Advanced tickets included.

I've changed:

"otherwise not running" to "otherwise not usable for your intended journey"

Made it  "NOT able to convey you to within 15 minutes of that public timetable."

Or take out conditions in orange and just have "NOT able to convey you to within 15 minutes of that public timetable."

I've also changed near to ANY

Added Advanced tickets.

Which means it you can't get from A to B by the normal route within 15 minutes of booked time you can get any train from B and go via Z if necessary.

I have added the words "is not" in the original - in italics to show readers where - as it clarifies the wording without changing meaning or strength.   The other changes suggested ... I will wait for others to comment before altering - I shouldn't alter something after people have started to vote.    Advance tickets are included without the need to specify them explicitly.

Whilst I agree with both grahame and eightf48544, ...... What is the definition of 'the Public Timetable'?

In the case of the Newbury blockade and the shifting of the 1903 PAD-PLY to an 1857 departure and the addition that Super Off-Peaks were not valid on that revised service, the argument would be that the revision had become the public timetable as it had been publicised well inadvance.

Good question - I thought about the wording of that and what I was intending / suggesting.  It's the timetable as published / printed to run regularly from the 10th December to 15th May, 16th May to 9th September, 10th September to December 11th. It's the timetable under which the train operator conforms to their franchise commitment.  It's what runs on a normal day in a week that there are no engineering works or other special changes. 

"Normal timetable for that day of the week at that time of year if there were no engineering, emergency or other changes"?

As an aside, I find myself wondering what effect train changes for Glastonbury and for the Gold Cup have - whether any cheaper timetabled trains are lost as stock is borrowed, leaving other travellers with higher fares?  Not something I've heard of - does it happen?

I agree with the aims but not sure who or how you would what decide 'over loaded' meant? Is it I can't board because its impossible (who says?) or I choose not to because its very overcrowded or because I can't get a seat when I normally do?

"If a train published to run in the biannual public timetable is curtailed, revised, cancelled or re-timed, passengers may board the next nearest scheduled train before or after that train with no change to the restrictions appropriate for the original train and will incur no additional penalty in order to complete their intended journey."

"If a train published to run in the biannual public timetable is curtailed, revised, cancelled or re-timed, passengers may board any scheduled train with no change to the restrictions appropriate for the original train and will incur no additional penalty in order to complete their intended journey within 15 minutes of the original published arrival time."

I would remove any linking to a time limit on the arrival time using an alternative route. Can you travel with the current timetable Westbury - Bath - Chippenham - Melksham and still arrive within 15 minutes of otherwise scheduled time, particularly if one is in a motorised wheelchair.