The consumer magazine “Which?” have been accused of being masters of the art of confusion with each operator deciding “what is peak time travel”. The dfact is every operator in the UK has their own definition of “peak time” (both in the morning and the evening)
For example, peak time on the core trunks of the West Coast and East Coast Mainlines (Operated by Virgin Trains and East Coast Trains) start about 15:30, and last for the next four hours – or more), whilst in some regions, it’s defined after 16:30 to 18:00, and some lines don’t have peak evening times
Throw in the quite frankly amazing amount of variations of tickets, restrictions and everything else that makes some of the UK network a nonsesne, and it’s confusing.
The Assiociation of Train Operators say “Most people are happy and 4 out of 5 are doing fine”, and that “You can’t compare operators side by side due to local demands”.
Which doesn’t help when you’re trying to buy a train ticket – For example, off the top of my head (not counting all permutations) there are at least 10 different types of standard class tickets between Birmingham and London.
By resdesignating trains as peak trains, operators can also get away with charging lunatic fares without asking permission from the regulator. In other words – an easy way for an operator to print money, charge penalty fares and moan “we need more trains to provide a service” whilst squeezing the cheaper end of the market.
Yes there is more demand out there. Because people are sick of traveling in cars to cities. However if you price them off the rails and don’t invest you’re stuck in a bit of a black hole
And to me – it doesn’t wash. Least of all with trains trying to merge to a Yield pricing model akin to airlines, they are NOT the same service or offer the same standards of service.
Which brings us to interesting questions – when was the last time members working high on the rail industry 1) travel on a train and 2) paid out of their own pocket without a PA to help them plan the trip?
I wouldn’t lay money on them being recent.
So sorry ATOC, this doesn’t wash with me. Prehaps you should be buying emergency tickets from London to Birmingham out of your own pockets before understanding how much it hurts the consumer eh?
