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Colin Rosenstiel · August 28th 05, 02:53 PM posted to uk.transport.london

In article ,
(Paul Corfield) wrote:

On Sat, 27 Aug 2005 21:04 +0100 (BST), (Colin
Rosenstiel) wrote:

In article ,
(Paul Corfield) wrote:

This happened when One upgraded from APTIS (which had a plug in
unit) to new machines which are not compatible. A nonsense but
then the attitude of the TOCs and Rail Settlement Plan to
Prestige always was nonsensical when I was trying to negotiate
with them and convince them that the scheme was going to
happen. Now it has I suspect the attitude has not changed very
much if a recent article in Modern Railways is anything to go by.

That's not all. I discovered recently the new tribute kit can't
do two singles for a return journey, the TOCs' coming way of
doing cheap fares. So I had to do two completely separate
transactions, including the credit card payments.

Hmm - bit odd that. Having read Barry's reply as well I think it
is down to staff training. I recently booked a series of fairly
complex tickets at Kings Cross GNER office (none on GNER trains
either!) and that was all one transaction and very efficiently
done by the chap behind the counter. I asked him if he liked
Tribute compared to APTIS and he said it was OK. He knew I was LU
staff so wasn't completely taken aback by that question.

Kings Cross GNER seemed better equipped than Cambridge last time I made
a ticket purchase. The guy did try to do it in one transaction, stopped
at one point, muttered and started again as two separate single
transactions.

What MR article, BTW?

IIRC Roger Ford did an Informed Sources article on Oyster, the ITSO
standard smartcard and how the TOCs were struggling to integrate
either card into their retail systems. It was published within the
last 2-3 months. It felt as if time had stood still for 5 years -
i.e. no progress since I was dealing with the TOCs on this subject.

Oh that one. Yes, not very impressive. I blame the shambles that is
privatisation and short franchises.

--
Colin Rosenstiel