uk.finance.yahoo.com/news/anger-over-massive-train-fare-hikes-002235395.html
Seems the annual rise has happened, reading around it seems alot of the fare rises are cutbacks in subsidies from the government. And this has been going on fo a number of years, I'm not sure why there is such an outcry this year as it's the same every year, or maybe there is but I've not noticed it.
Anyone here likely to be affected by these increases? I only use the train 2 or 3 times a year and then I but well in advance with a discount card so it's not a big deal for me. Have we anybody here that commutes by train?
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Why does clicking the word CARD highlighted as a link in the above thread by Sooty take me to a survey I struggled to get rid of?
Pat
Edit: It's not highlighted anymore...
Last edited by: pda on Tue 14 Aug 12 at 11:20
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the government obviously want us all to drive more.
Too many people on trains so go back to driving.
maybe that's the governments 'joined up' way of thinking these days.
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>>he government obviously want us all to drive more.
Too many people on trains so go back to driving.
And I`m thinking of joining them! - I rarely use the trains as I don`t often go "out of town" now, but on a recent "there and back" trip to Lancaster I suffered:
1x cancellation
3x delays
1x terminatin
1x further 30min wait
1x 45min car journey.
I didn`t know where to start on the complaint form, so I almost cancelled it, but in the end I delayed it 24hrs, - see how you like that! Northern!
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why bother complaining ?
It will not make any difference.
They will file it in their 'bin' department any way.
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>> why bother complaining ?
(Some) money back, if nothing else.
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This is extremely odd as the word SURVEY is now highlighted in my post but wasn't when I first posted it.......has car4play been hijacked?
Pat
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>> has car4play been hijacked?
More likely something local to your PC.
I hope you haven't picked up anything nasty while looking for pdf converters.
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>> This is extremely odd as the word SURVEY is now highlighted in my post but
>> wasn't when I first posted it.......has car4play been hijacked?
>>
>> Pat
>>
Test by writing the words "card" and/or "survey" in a post
1. on another thread to find out if it is only this page,
2. on another forum to find out if it is only car4play website
that the problem "hijack" occurs on.
Last edited by: John H on Tue 14 Aug 12 at 12:59
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>> problem "hijack"
>>
In case you wish to remove any malware/hijacker that has been installed by the free pdf converters, easiest first step is to try to go back to a system restore point from a few days ago:
windows.microsoft.com/en-us/windows-vista/System-Restore-frequently-asked-questions
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Panic over, sorry to alarm anyone but better safe than sorry.
I tried logging on to the PDF forums and it was there as well, so after five minutes of pushing admin buttons behind the scenes I realised it was something I'd downloaded unintentionally!
I shall now go and run a scan, I think even though I have uninstalled it.
Pat
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>> Why does clicking the word CARD highlighted as a link in the above thread by
>> Sooty take me to a survey I struggled to get rid of?
>>
>> Pat
>>
>> Edit: It's not highlighted anymore...
Sounds like IntelliTXT to me.
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/IntelliTXT
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Thatws exactly it Mannatee, but in my case a small programme had been installed as I was downloading other programmes.
I uninstalled it and did a full Avast scan which found and removed four threats, and all has been well since.
Pat
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>> Anyone here likely to be affected by these increases?
Possibly - I commute between Reading and Bath 3 times a week, but most of that is on advance tickets which don't always follow the headline changes.
For example, I'm currently only paying 50p more than I was 2 years ago on £50 per week's worth of advance tickets between Didcot and Bath. However the <£10 on-the-day peak return tickets between Earley/Reading and Didcot probably have gone up more (I don't have records for them).
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I spent around £500 a year on rail so it will have a marginel effect on me. Most likely though it might make me travel less or use the car more.
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A few big journeys or lots of small ones? I think the latter might be more affected.
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As a retired person I am able to plan ahead and buy tickets 12 weeks in advance, as soon as they are released. Wokingham to Weston Supermare for £19 return makes a nonsense of driving. Walk-up tickets for travel on the day are ruinous and in a news item 10 minutes ago a Bedford to London season ticket commuter said he would be seriously considering the car again.
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Usually thrice weekly to Canary Wharf from Twyford - £29.60 daily at present. Car parking is £5.50, so all in all getting to work isn't cheap. I'm on a contract though, so the money isn't bad, and I know it's not forever.
Luckily I have the flexibility to be able to work from home part of the time - which apart from saving me some cost, avoids the 2 hour + each way hike every day.
Bring back the Olympics btw, when the Tube was much emptier... :-)
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This is mostly about regulated fares in metropolitan commuter areas plus seasons. Will certainly affect me if, as seems likley now, my job still exists after January
The devil will be in the detail, particulalry whether the train co is allowed to average the increase across a 'basket' of routes. On London Midland that tends to mean above headline figure increases for the London and Birmingham commuter routes while local and inter-urban services only go up by 4-5%. Nine percent last year so presumably 10% plus this time.
Could try working at home more but unless I can pre-plan to use advance or offpeak travel there's not much saving short of being whole time at home. Daily fare £45, weekly season £118.
The uncertainty over the job has cost me dear. For yeasrs I had an interest free loan for an annual ticket. We've now been '6 months from shutdown' for a year and a half. Don't want to be left redundant with last months of an annual season to my name - the refund value is next to nil with less than 4 months left. I've been on a mix of weekly and monthly since Feb 2011.
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Mostly long journeys and usually at least 200 miles in terms of distance. However I normally book in a few days in advance so I can get cheaper tickets.
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Why RPI +3% and not just RPI?
Because they can, I guess.
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>> Why RPI +3% and not just RPI?
>> Because they can, I guess.
For a while formula was RPI -1%. Present gov have decided to 're-balance' between farebox and taxpayer support.
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The formula seems to be roughly - Buy today for travel today = £xxx, buy today for travel tomorrow = Divide by two, Buy for next week out to 12 weeks in advance, divide by anything between three and five. Plus the time consuming business of looking at ticket splitting; I don't really think the ticket offices will point one at the cheapest journey from A to B
Last edited by: Meldrew on Tue 14 Aug 12 at 14:38
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Every year, inflation + x% increases. Every year, it's pledged that a wonderful new service will result from this pain. Every year this improvement and the pledged results of the extra investment fails to materialise.
Same crap, new year.
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your brand new infrastructure aint gunna pay for its sen ...as fred would probably have said...you have all been taking a free ride on victorian innovation and its pay back time 'appen
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Whatever it is it is not "Free"!
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Love the train. Use it all the time when I'm in the UK. Up and down from London, and other trips.
Kids love it, I love it, convenient, clean and safe. I think I've failed to get a seat once in about 5 years in rush hour. Pleasant people on the station, flowers and flower baskets, good coffee. Good and reasonable carparking
Mind you, that is the Chiltern Line, quite clearly one of the best train companies on the planet. And they should be given any franchise they apply for.
I did a GWR train a little while ago, not quite so pleasant.
>>he government obviously want us all to drive more.
Oh, of course, I did forget the conspiracy theories.
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Peterborough parking is £13 a day, Good parking but far from reasonable IMO
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Free at Bicester Town, £3.50 a day at Bicester North. (£6.00 a day if from before 9:00am)
Seems fair to me.
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I wasn't suggesting that all parking at stations is bad value. They have a "Captive Customer Pool"
at Peterborough who commute 45 minutes into London on 2 different train lines - they have to park and the price reflects the demand. At Stamford 15 minutes and a £6 fare away the parking is £2 a day and £8 a week
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Sorry, I did understand you. I was trying to say that I thought Chiltern was good value.
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No problem! I don't use Chiltern but it seems that they are a small(ish) efficient company with a small network that they run well. Re parking, Kington on the Welsh Border wants tourists and town centre parking is free. I was in Alnwick at the weekend, it wants tourists so town centre parking £2 an hour, all day £4.
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>> I did a GWR train a little while ago, not quite so pleasant.
FGW? They provide my Reading/Bath commute and seem ok. But that might be because I'm going away from London so the train (or at least the coach I usually get in) is practically empty. I like the Intercity 125s they use as well. Can't afford luxuries like coffee!
Admittedly Reading station doesn't look great at the moment - it's part way through a massive redevelopment:
www.networkrail.co.uk/aspx/6339.aspx
Last edited by: Focus on Tue 14 Aug 12 at 17:50
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FGW indeed. Reading/Paddington. Only one, about 18m ago, and it was dirty and very crowded.
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>> Reading/Paddington. Only one, about 18m ago, and it was dirty and very crowded.
No, I don't envy the people going the other way at all. Looks like standing room only.
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Apart from the London Underground I last used a train in 1989. I couldn't get my head round the way they priced the ticket, £34 one way from Carmarthen to Paddington but only £30 if you bought a return.
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The prices need to go up to pay for our pay rise of 3.5% this year and 3.3% in Jan next year.
Plus to pay the overtime as there's no staff most on sick or booked too many off agin. Happy Railways............
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>> Apart from the London Underground I last used a train in 1989. I couldn't get
>> my head round the way they priced the ticket, £34 one way from Carmarthen to
>> Paddington but only £30 if you bought a return.
>>
First class, I presume, back then? ;-)
I did the same journey (one way only) a few weeks ago, on the way to pick my motorbike up from France. Booked only a week in advance, paid £39.50. Train was on time, and clean; slight hiatus at Cardiff, where the schedule had been halved due to some deluded soul being selfish enough to end his or her life by standing in from of a train somewhere between there and London. Fortunately I was travelling off-peak so the only problem it caused me was the loss of my reserved seat, but another decent one was free.
One bone of contention for me with rail travel; why is it impossible to book journeys more than twelve weeks in advance on the British domestic network, yet one can do so on Eurostar or any number of airlines, whose flights are in my experience far less predictable than trains in terms of availability and vulnerability to changing conditions?
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>>Mind you, that is the Chiltern Line, quite clearly one of the best train companies on the planet. And they should be given any franchise they apply for.
That franchise has been inherited by Deutsche Bahn, which loses money on it. So far they have behaved more honourably than some other franchisees, who have thrown in the towel having secured franchises with competitive bids and then found they are losing money hand over fist.
It's a classic case of 'privatisation' that gives a profit opportunity to corporate operators that they have repeatedly bailed out of or got massive additional subsidies for their fantastic plans didn't work, making it a heads they win tails we lose deal for the taxpayer.
Rumour apparently is that Virgin will be undercut for the west coast franchise, and Beardy has been moaning that the east coast franchise was twice awarded to operators that got nowhere near delivering what they promised. He didn't remind anybody that Virgin also failed to reach its targets for the west coast franchise too, resulting in 125mph rather than the promised 140mph trains and large bailouts from us. (acknowledgement to Private Eye for reporting the above).
Chiltern isn't bad. I use Wendover-Marylebone in preference to London Midland's Berkhamsted-Euston service if I can. Glad it's not too often though at c. £30 a day with parking and travelcard.
Last edited by: Manatee on Tue 14 Aug 12 at 20:02
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I truly cannot remember the last time I used any form of public transport (budget airlines & cross channel ferries excepted) and I am grateful for my lack of experience.
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I need to go to London regularly but at the times I do, ( and sadly I don't necessarily know when I'll need to go until the 11th hour ) it's stupidly expensive. Equally it's also expensive to take the car but at least there are no "people" in my car.
:-)
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i put the burma railroad as number one , but this shower over here come a close second...with respect to our fallen comrades
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I'm planning a trip to that London on Friday with two of the nippers. I thought it would be nice to introduce them to the concept of train travel, so I looked up the price of a return ticket from Leicester plus a London travelcard for the three of us.
TWO HUNDRED AND NINETY-ONE QUID!
I had to double-check that I hadn't selected a one-week pass or something instead. Not even going to try and search for a lower figure, I'll just take 'em in the car for a tenth of that.
Last edited by: Dave_TDCi on Tue 14 Aug 12 at 23:46
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Ah but!
If you go Leicester to Birmingham, Birmingham to Stoke, Stoke to Manchester, Manchester to Carlisle, carlisle to Edinburgh, Edinburgh to Glasgow, Glasgow to Redcar, Redcar to York, York to Leeds, Leeds to Sheffield, Sheffield to Doncaster, Doncaster to Newark, Newark to Leicester, Leicester to Northampton, Northampton to Welwyn, Welwyn to London.
It will be cheaper.
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www.nationalrail.co.uk
1 Adult, 2 children. Leicester to St. Pancras, Super off-peak return £107.00 total.
Dunno what the london travel cards would cost, but it can't be more than a tenner each, surely?
Not that I think that's a good price, but it is less than £291.00.
Its about 100 miles, 200 return @30mpg is £40quid odd? Plus parking which is about £30, then its about half the price of rail. I'd reckon it was worth it once in a while for a day relaxing with the kids.
Last edited by: No FM2R on Wed 15 Aug 12 at 00:47
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>> Its about 100 miles, 200 return @30mpg is £40quid odd? Plus parking which is about £30
I was hoping for closer to £30 in diesel, and to park for free on a residential street somewhere near Stanmore or Cockfosters tube stations.
The trouble with off-peak tickets is that they get you there, well, off-peak. It's a waste of half the day if we're not walking into the Science Museum until almost 12 noon.
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>>and to park for free on
>> a residential street somewhere near Stanmore or Cockfosters tube stations.
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The locals love folks doing that!!
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...The locals love folks doing that!!...
I'm a bit out of touch, but aren't there 'No parking before 10am' restrictions near some of the tube stations?
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>> aren't there 'No parking before 10am' restrictions near some of the tube stations?
Probably, but I shouldn't have to hunt around for too long to find something that works.
>> The locals love folks doing that!!
My car's got a couple of hundred hailstone dents already, what are they going to do?
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Dave, if you're ever going up the smoke on a weekend for a day out (assuming you approach from the west/south west), I can recommend a brilliant free place to park near the tube - PM me if you're ever doing that.
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>> I'm planning a trip to that London on Friday.....
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>> TWO HUNDRED AND NINETY-ONE QUID!
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>>Not even going to try and search for a lower figure, I'll just take 'em in the car for a tenth of that.
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From £22 plus your tube/bus tickets according to East coast trains.
tickets.eastcoast.co.uk/ec/en/JourneyPlanning/MixingDeck
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>> I truly cannot remember the last time I used any form of public transport
>>
I can. We usually managed to get a compartment to ourselves, the steward came along the corridor announcing first call for lunch in the dining car, there was a cheery coal fire burning in the station waiting room, and a porter would appear to carry the cases on a trolley and go and find a taxi.
We moaned about stale BR sandwiches, but ate with proper cutlery, the table had a cloth and ironed napkins, and the rather scratchy seats had dainty little reading lamps and old pictures of Weymouth and the Cornish Riviera Express.
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Seems the Eye was right about Virgin losing west coast www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-19264614
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... and they are replaced by FirstGroup! From frying pan to the fire!
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Everything's going up, except my pension.
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+1 - although the OAP went up a little more this April.
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But pensioners get free travel pass :-)
On a serious note, UK is probably the only country in the world where travelling by train is more expensive than travelling by car - especially if more than 1 person travelling together.
Last edited by: movilogo on Wed 15 Aug 12 at 09:45
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Free bus pass is useful but only works on UK local buses. Can't be used on anything meaningful like National Express intercity routes. Not grumbling, I use mine quite often, and it works on Park and Ride buses too.
Last edited by: Meldrew on Wed 15 Aug 12 at 10:09
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>> On a serious note, UK is probably the only country in the world where travelling
>> by train is more expensive than travelling by car
Not for my commute (peak times, advance tickets).
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I go to London via train around two to three times a year. Even at fairly last minute I can get cheap train deals but the trick is to travel at unpopular times, e.g a 11:30am train and coming back at say 9:30pm.
I went to Brighton a few weeks back at very short notice, train tickets cost me £75 return including first class on the way back! That would be over 500 miles in the car for the return journey, there is no way I could do that via the car.
With train travel you have to know some basic tricks:-
* If you are not too fussy about the times you travel you can get it so much cheaper, often saving enough to even pay for a hotel over night!.
*On longer journeys single fairs are often cheaper than returns especially if booked in advance.
*First class can sometimes be cheaper if the cheap standard class tickets have sold out.
*If you hate the general public, try and get a quiet carriage, no phones allowed etc.
*This is not strictly within the rules and people have got into trouble for it, but if you have to change it may work. Sometimes further destinations are cheaper. For example Manchester to Brighton can be cheaper in the winter than Manchester to London, even though you have to get the same train to London Euston, get a tube to Victoria then get the Brighton train there. The trick is simply don't bother with the connecting train to Brighton and you're in London :). Worked for a few times.
However if you have to stay on the same train it could get you into trouble as the ticket is only valid for that destination not the prior stops. One of the maddest rules of train travel!.
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Sad to read that Virgin Trains have lost their franchise for the West Coast Main-line!
First Groups political palm-crossing sweetener must have been bigger!
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>> But pensioners get free travel pass :-)
I just wish we had buses.
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>> I just wish we had buses.
You must have some sort of bus service in rural Lincolnshire, surely?
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We have some excellent off peak deals, particularly from Milton Keynes where Virgin and London Midland compete. Groupsave offers add another gain.
Last week four of us, all adults, went to London for the day £40 all in including travelcard. Available on all arrivals in London after 10:00 and with a 16:30 to 19:00 bar in the eve.
The Lad went again on Sunday to meet his G/F and see Marathon. £13 with his U26 railcard again including tube/bus.
Last edited by: Bromptonaut on Thu 16 Aug 12 at 07:54
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>> >> I just wish we had buses.
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>> You must have some sort of bus service in rural Lincolnshire, surely?
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The nearest town (and bus stop) is two miles away, and even then there are only about three buses a day to any one particular place. I once asked my neighbour which he thought usually came first ~ not being able to drive, or death. His reply was that, by living on our road, if and when you got to the stage of not being able to drive you would very soon be dead anyway!
Last edited by: L'escargot on Thu 16 Aug 12 at 08:56
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I would hate to live in a place with no facilities and no transport and be totally reliant on my car. Each to is own I suppose.
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>> The nearest town (and bus stop) is two miles away, and even then there are
>> only about three buses a day to any one particular place. I once asked my
>> neighbour which he thought usually came first ~ not being able to drive, or death.
>
Why did you choose that spot to live?
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>> Why did you choose that spot to live?
>>
The bungalow itself has everything we could ever wish for, and I was assuming I would always be able to drive. Time will tell.
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Train fares on the up - Pat
