Season tickets and price rise

[thelem]

I normally buy a monthly season ticket between Brighton and Burgess Hill. With the forthcoming fare increases, can I buy one for a longer period, say 3 or 6 months, to keep the current lower price, or are you charged the cost on date of travel anyway?

 

[janb]

Buy it now, and you will get the current prices.

 

[thelem]

Great, thanks

 

[yorkie]

I normally buy a monthly season ticket between Brighton and Burgess Hill. With the forthcoming fare increases, can I buy one for a longer period, say 3 or 6 months, to keep the current lower price, or are you charged the cost on date of travel anyway?

Yep. Do you do many longer journeys at weekends? If so, you may be best buying an Annual season. Not only do they give bigger discounts but they also count as a 'Gold Card' - this gives you 34% off off-peak travel and cheap First Class upgrades in the South East, and discounts for other people travelling with you.

 

[hairyhandedfool]

I normally buy a monthly season ticket between Brighton and Burgess Hill. With the forthcoming fare increases, can I buy one for a longer period, say 3 or 6 months, to keep the current lower price, or are you charged the cost on date of travel anyway?

You are charged the price of the ticket as if every day of travel was the day it started. However you will only get a punctuality/reliability discount (if applicable) if you are renewing the season ticket for a period no longer than the last season ticket, to prevent people taking the michael.

 

[furryfeet]

so what are the refund policies on annual season tickets ?

i.e. suppose thelem buys a 12 month ticket and then decides to cancel the contract and get a refund after say 6 months ?

Is there a formula for working out what the refund would be ?

 

[John @ home]

suppose thelem buys a 12 month ticket and then decides to cancel the contract and get a refund after say 6 months ?

Is there a formula for working out what the refund would be ?

Yes.

From what I remember, when I did this a few years ago I was charged at the monthly rate for the months and days used, including both the day of issue and the day of surrender of the ticket. The standard admin fee (currently £10) was then added.

This amount was then subtracted from the amount I had paid and a cheque for the difference arrived in the post a couple of weeks later.

John

 

[Bill Badger]

Yes.

From what I remember, when I did this a few years ago I was charged at the monthly rate for the months and days used, including both the day of issue and the day of surrender of the ticket. The standard admin fee (currently £10) was then added.

This amount was then subtracted from the amount I had paid and a cheque for the difference arrived in the post a couple of weeks later.

John

Earlier in the year a friend of mine who lives in Fleet, had an annual season ticket to London. He finished his job and enquired about refunds.

He was told that he would receive a refund of £849.60 - I forget exactly how long he had left on the ticket.

However he decided to change the ticket to Fleet to Farnborough instead and got refunded £947.20 and got to keep his Gold card privileges too!!

The reason is because if you transfer to a different ticket, the refund is calculated on a pro-rata basis rather than as if you had purchased a series of monthly tickets. So if you're thinking of cashing in an annual season ticket, have a look at the cost of a ticket to your nearest station instead.

 

[John_158]

My Season ticket will go up by 80p but what do we get for our extra money Nothing still crammed in to a 3car unit at peak hour on Mersey rail two carriages on Northern Rail two carriages on EMT etc.

How they can put the prices up and give us the same rubbish is unbelievable especially when such a high increase 50p would be too bad but 80p disgraceful and why not put it up by £1.00 and round it off and may save putting it up so high next year.

 

[P156KWJ]

My Season ticket will go up by 80p but what do we get for our extra money Nothing still crammed in to a 3car unit at peak hour on Mersey rail two carriages on Northern Rail two carriages on EMT etc.

How they can put the prices up and give us the same rubbish is unbelievable especially when such a high increase 50p would be too bad but 80p disgraceful and why not put it up by £1.00 and round it off and may save putting it up so high next year.

your money will go further to maybe improve rolling stock?

 

[devon_metro]

your money will go further to maybe improve rolling stock?

But there are no plans for EMT to get new stock, its just going to the government basically. "Stealth tax"

 

[glynn80]

My Season ticket will go up by 80p but what do we get for our extra money Nothing still crammed in to a 3car unit at peak hour on Mersey rail two carriages on Northern Rail two carriages on EMT etc.

How they can put the prices up and give us the same rubbish is unbelievable especially when such a high increase 50p would be too bad but 80p disgraceful and why not put it up by £1.00 and round it off and may save putting it up so high next year.

Actually your fares haven't risen at all. Merseyrail were the only TOC who decided to increase their fares by the RPI+0% in effect keeping the fares exactly the same. Even though the ticket costs more than it did last year/month/week ago etc. in REAL terms there is no change in price, due to a little thing called inflation.

Inflation is a rise in the general price level and is reported in rates of change. Essentially what this means is that the value of your money is going down and it takes more money to buy things. So if the value of money decreases but the TOCs do not increase their fares at all then they are in effect cutting fares (a profit maximising firm would never do this).

In the past regulators actually did price cap using the RPI-X formula and companies like BT had price caps of the RPI-8% for example, but the the RPI being 5% they actually had to cut prices, this was in a drive to create efficiency from a firm that had a large monopoly. Nowadays regulators rarely price cap (I believe Water and Rail are the only ones left) as competition is stronger in many of these sectors as it has been previously.

 

[jopsuk]

Actually your fares haven't risen at all. Merseyrail were the only TOC who decided to increase their fares by the RPI+0% in effect keeping the fares exactly the same. Even though the ticket costs more than it did last year/month/week ago etc. in REAL terms there is no change in price, due to a little thing called inflation.

Inflation is a rise in the general price level and is reported in rates of change. Essentially what this means is that the value of your money is going down and it takes more money to buy things. So if the value of money decreases but the TOCs do not increase their fares at all then they are in effect cutting fares (a profit maximising firm would never do this).

In the past regulators actually did price cap using the RPI-X formula and companies like BT had price caps of the RPI-8% for example, but the the RPI being 5% they actually had to cut prices, this was in a drive to create efficiency from a firm that had a large monopoly. Nowadays regulators rarely price cap (I believe Water and Rail are the only ones left) as competition is stronger in many of these sectors as it has been previously.

But the ToCs use the RPI as it is in July to set the January price rise, whilst employers are more likely to use a more up-to-date figure when calculating annual salary rises, which means that even Merseyrail's fare increase is likely to be a rise in real terms for commuters.

 

[glynn80]

But the ToCs use the RPI as it is in July to set the January price rise, whilst employers are more likely to use a more up-to-date figure when calculating annual salary rises, which means that even Merseyrail's fare increase is likely to be a rise in real terms for commuters.

Well I think what would be the most sensible price rise would be an average of the RPI's over the 12 months from the last price rise. If this was taken it would lead to an Average RPI of 4.2%, not too far from the July figure of 5%.

Also the cynics who believe that ATOC decided to use the RPI figure of 5.0% as that was the highest of the 12 previous months are mistaken. The DfT, not ATOC, sets the regulatory regime. The July RPI figure is the one that has been used since privitisation when working out price capping.

For the 2008 price rises the July 2007 RPI figure of 3.8% was used. The average over the previous 12 months however had been 4.1%, in fact for the 7 months before the July RPI, the figures had been at least 0.4 percentage points higher but still the July figure of 3.8% was used.

So there are years where the RPI figure used will be higher than the 12 month average and years where the RPI figure will be lower. Its just this year it has been higher than the 12 month average (it happened to be the highest figure of the previous 12 months) and thus the press decided to pick up on that angle this year.