Pointless train ticket rant.

[MitchT]

Disclaimer: Reading this is will consume 1m 15s of your life that you won't be able to get back. You've been warned!

Went to my local train station (Bingley) at about 15:45 today to buy a return to Leeds. On the home page of the ticket machine in the station the option for Leeds was an off peak day return, even though the next train to Leeds was at 16:07 - six minutes after peak time kicks in. Being quite train savvy I knew that if I boarded the 16:07 to Leeds with an off peak ticket the ticket inspector on the train could make me buy a peak ticket, so I tapped the "popular destinations" button on the screen and selected "Leeds" whereby I was then able to select "peak day return". After selecting this a pop-up window appeared telling me that there was a cheaper option than the peak ticket I had chosen. Yes, the cheaper option was the off peak ticket that the ticket machine would allow me to buy right now, but wouldn't be valid by the time the next train to Leeds arrived at the station, so I persevered and bought the peak ticket.

Totally pointless rant, I know, but I wonder how many people less train savvy than myself have been caught out by this? Surely the ticket machine at Bingley shouldn't let you buy an off peak ticket to Leeds after the last train on which such a ticket would be valid has left the station. Instead, it initially provides "off peak" as the only option and then encourages you to revert to "off peak" if you've navigated your way through to the "peak" ticket option. The machine doesn't switch to prioritising peak tickets until 16:01 when peak time kicks in, even though the last train to Leeds which you could board with an off peak ticket leaves at 15:37.

As a person who has studied user experience this makes my piss boil!

[davepoth]

You might want a ticket for after 7pm. But yes, it's stupid. The sooner we can have an oyster style system where we are automatically charged for the cheapest possible ticket the better.

[steve-5snwi]

I know when traveling out of London off peak are valid after 9.30am, super off peak are not valid between 4 and 7.

[Rich1973]

In parts of Europe, tickets are charged by the kilometer. One rate for express trains and another for the slower service.
What a simple and clear way of doing it. The ticketing in this country is an utter farce that seemingly nobody wants to do anything about.

[Chrisgr31]

In the meantime there is an article on Facebook and Twitter about the cheapest ticket for a Southern jourmey being on the last page of all the options.

[xjay1337]

Trains are stupid - That is all.

My local station has a touch screen machine.
There is a staffed desk but often has a huge queue and also the desk shuts at 12/1pm.

The touch screen machine doesn't work at all in the rain.

The only reason I go by train is for London and I have a motorcycle instead that I use.

[Simpo Two]

When I could ring my local station and find out what train I needed to catch to get to London by X o'clock I could make sense of it. All bloody Greek to me now; no idea how it works.

[RemyMartin81D]

xjay1337 said:

Trains are stupid - That is all.

My local station has a touch screen machine.
There is a staffed desk but often has a huge queue and also the desk shuts at 12/1pm.

The touch screen machine doesn't work at all in the rain.

The only reason I go by train is for London and I have a motorcycle instead that I use.

Trains aren't stupid. Sadly alot of infrastructure is and the good stuff that there is everywhere on the network is hidden by mismanagement. This is what you get when you have multiple TOCs all with their own interpretation of what is good for the customer, whilst sysmatically also tying up to a UK wide rail management in the form of network rail. It gets confusing to a member of staff nevermind the public.