In message , at 22:52:34 on Sun, 3 Nov 2019,
John Levine remarked:
In article ,
Roland Perry wrote:
The fact that they're suddenly providing all these new discounted options
proves that HEx lacks your deep insights into airport express services.

On the contrary, news of these price cuts are unlikely to make their way
through to their main target market, ...

Despite what that article said, HeX has been offering restricted
discount tickets for years. In 2015 I paid £16.10 for a ticket and
last year £14.30. I believe there were some exotic under £10 tix last
year if you knew 90 days ahead that you'd be travelling on a Sunday.

Seems to me that a sensible person books his train tix when he books
his flights, which for vacations and conferences can often be months
ahead. That's what I do and is how I got those (sort of) low fares.

I don't think you are a very typical traveller. Most are very
unadventurous when it comes to foreign countries, and hence the race for
taxis (and HEx's mission to replace taxis).

I wouldn't expect to be able to understand how to pick up pre-booked
train tickets at a random overseas airport, and there's a limit to how
much we can say "trust us, it's easy in the UK".

As a result, and even as a more adventurous traveller (colleagues were
amazed I dared get a bus from Geneva to the airport, and didn't even
consider rail) I think I've only once got a train on first arrival at a
suitably equipped overseas airport.

That was Brisbane, which has the advantage of speaking (approx) English,
and I was going somewhere an hour away which happened to be on the same
line, rather than just the city centre.

Of course, having worked things out, I have a few times taken a train
*back* to the airport, or used one on a second or subsequent visit. I
was a bit put off by the difficulty of collecting a pre-bought TGV
ticket in Paris, though.

It also seems to me that when Crossrail is running through trains, the
HeX time advantage will be a lost for many places Crossrail goes
beyond Paddington. It's not just the fares.

How many of the Crossrail stations will have taxi ranks? I presume
they'll at least all have lifts to avoid having to haul baggage up
escalators.

Perhaps we could have volunteer anti-touts saying "don't buy those silly
express tickets, just tap your credit card and take the cheap train."

Or if it's a family holiday "find 4 credit cards between you, to tap".

And how widespread is contactless outside the UK? The USA is catching up
rapidly, but is probably still in single figure percentages.
--
Roland Perry