Train ticket prices

[Chippy_boy]

The person in the ticket office made a mistake,however,it was your responsibility to check the ticket you were sold.As you didn't,it was your fuck up and you had no entitlement to be sat in First Class.The Conductor was correct,she was perfectly entitled to require you move to a Standard carriage.

Maybe if you had conversed to her in a less arrogant and self entitled manner,her response,and the outcome,may have been different?

Just a thought....

Seriously, I think the above is quite the most ludicrous and frankly pretty insulting post I have seen from a mod. You have absolutely no clue how diplomatic I was (very, actually) so to post what you did is bang out of order.

Technically, yes, every passenger should check every ticket ever issued. That does not change the fact that it was piss poor customer service and if M&S treated their customers like that, they wouldn't have any customers.

It speaks volumes about the way GWR view their "customers" as simply a revenue stream about whom they don't give 2 shits. I'd paid the correct amount of money, and yet GWR put pissing a customer off, higher up their priority list than "doing the right thing". Disgusting.

Imagine a restaurant where you ordered one thing, they served another and then refused to change the order. Or a shop where you bought something and took it back because you've been given the wrong thing and they said tough shit. Is this the sort of service you think is acceptable?

No retailers treat their customers this badly, because guess what, they VALUE their customers.

Even IF it was technically my fault, what possible harm would it have done to allow me to sit where I was, given that I had paid the correct fare to sit there already???

Contrast John Lewis' "the customer is the final arbiter as to whether a product is satisfactory or not", with the "either move or we are calling the police", and you begin to understand why our train companies are so hated.

 

[Grassland Blue]

Competing train companies would want to have the same bit of track at the same time.

BR wouid delay a local train to keep an express on time. Now the local operator wants to know why his train is less important. And every delay generates compensation and an army of lawyers sorts out disputes.

As for chippy's sister, i'd love to know where she worked and doing what to get a shift payment like that.

Where I live TPE and Northern Rail operate the services.
The Northern Rail services are often held to let TPE services take preference.
This is the same situation as under BR.
So there has been no net benefit to train operating.
Fares have increased but the quality of service hasn't.
In BR days there were fewer trains per hour, they were however longer in length which resulted in far fewer standing passengers.
It is my belief that standing passengers should pay less than seated ones.
It is also my belief that people using the train to get to work should not have to pay more than people who are using the train for leisure etc.
Peak and off peak fares should not exist.

 

[Grassland Blue]

You cheeky (and stupid) sod. Come back to me with a cheap Bristol Parkway to London Paddington ticket which gets me into London between say 8 am and 10 am, or failing that, perhaps an apology.

Advance fares, my arse. There are no cheap advance tickets for these peak services. Funny I should know that, having been doing the journey FOR 36 FUCKING YEARS FOR FUCKS SAKE.

Has no one considered changing the time of the meetings?

 

[Chippy_boy]

Has no one considered changing the time of the meetings?

I'm very often not in control of such matters mate. I try to arrange late morning or later meetings for this very reason, but it's not always possible.

 

[Vic]

I think there's some sort of price capping within the Midlands region, at least there used to be, so the trick is to split the journey so one leg is wholly within a single 'zone' and the other starts/ends at the edge of the zone, if that makes sense. Often, you're still on the same train.

Also Chiltern railways have some low prices. I'm travelling back after the Carabao cup Euston to Birmingham New Street on Monday am for £21. The Bham Picc leg costs £50 for about the same distance. The full journey takes about twice as long but the direct train was about £130 for the time I need to be back and there's 3 of us!

I hope if you're using Chiltern Trains you don't try coming back from Euston. Try Marylebone. Or straight back from Wembley Stadium.

 

[Kompany Car]

This won't change with privatisation. If prices come down then investment, and it's needed all the time, will suffer thus dragging us back to the good ol' days of shit trains, surly staff and cancellations by the bucket load.

Completely agree with everything bar the shit trains and as exhibit A, i give you Northern Fails finest.. The Pacer..

The frankenstien train that is a bus body on a rail bogey, built in the 80s and designed to to last for not more than 20yrs.

 

[TheRemainsOfTheDave]

I hope if you're using Chiltern Trains you don't try coming back from Euston. Try Marylebone. Or straight back from Wembley Stadium.

Yes, you're right. It's actually a West Midlands Train, which used to be the London Midland route. For some reason National rail enquiries linked through to Chiltern to pay for it. Same price at £6 each Euston to Bham New Street (7.45am) with the second leg on a cross country at £19 each. The Chiltern train was £7 or £8 but meant changing from Moor St to New St. Neither of these options were offered if you do a basic LON-MCR search via NRE (travelling later but faster, best price is £56ea), you need to know how to work the system.

 

[UUJblue]

i think a lot of transparency needs to be shown on where the money from Fares is spent!

 

[UUJblue]

Completely agree with everything bar the shit trains and as exhibit A, i give you Northern Fails finest.. The Pacer..

The frankenstien train that is a bus body on a rail bogey, built in the 80s and designed to to last for not more than 20yrs.

I always laugh when i see that at Piccadilly...its actually older than time.