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Senior Pass acceptance
"Peter Campbell Smith" wrote in message ... Matt J Forbes wrote in : It seems to take a knowledgeable driver a fraction of a second to press a few buttons, in order enter a destination, fare type, and issue a ticket, when a fare-paying passenger boards a bus. Surely, for accounting purposes, it would be much more accurate for the driver to do the same for LA passes, only issuing the ticket as zero-fare. This way, the company will be able to bill the LA for the journies actually made, rather than just number of journies made - which could be the entire length of a route, or just one or two stops down the road. Pressing the buttons is the relatively easy bit, though at the moment I doubt many ticket machines have the capability to accept the identity of the issuing authority, even supposing the driver can correctly interpret whether its a district operating within a county scheme or a unitary authority doing it for itself. You then need to dump the data at the depot (coping with corrupt data, late data, fraud etc etc), using different software for each of the various types of ticket machines you have, more software to merge the datasets, and probably an arrangement with a clearing house to accept all your data and partition it out to the various issuing authorities. Then you have to invoice them, and track and chase the invoices, deal with questions and audits and so on. It's all doable, but not cheap to buy or maintain. ITSO is also not cheap, but the theory is that if all the bus companies and LAs subscribe to it, there will at least be some economies of scale, uniformity of data and a measure of fraud control. Scotland is making some progress with that. As with many schemes which increase the accuracy of a payment from A to B, one side is likely to gain from the change and one will lose. Unless both sides reckon they will be the winner it may be difficult to get agreement to the change. Peter -- | Peter Campbell Smith | Epsom | UK | Whoa..... If I (with a Somerset County Council pass) travel on a London bus using that pass, who pays? Based on what happened to me when I did it the driver made no attempt to determine where I was from and unless he was Superman I doubt very much if he was able to read the pass given that it was in the bit of my wallet with a little window which obscured the pass enough for him to see it was a pass and the date on it but not much more. Oh and I didn't go out of my way to shove it under his nose I just flashed and he seemed quite happy with that. |
#2
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Senior Pass acceptance
In message , Graham Harrison
writes If I (with a Somerset County Council pass) travel on a London bus using that pass, who pays? The London boroughs. In the same way that if I used my London Freedom pass in Somerset, then Somerset County Council pay (although local authorities get quite a substantial government grant towards the cost). Based on what happened to me when I did it the driver made no attempt to determine where I was from and unless he was Superman I doubt very much if he was able to read the pass given that it was in the bit of my wallet with a little window which obscured the pass enough for him to see it was a pass and the date on it but not much more. Oh and I didn't go out of my way to shove it under his nose I just flashed and he seemed quite happy with that. In London, the London Boroughs agree a lump sum with TfL (£251 million for the current year, of which the bus element is £188.6 million). This payment covers the use of both Freedom passes and National Concessionary Permits throughout the area. I imagine that it is reckoned that use of National bus passes within London roughly balances the use of Freedom passes outside of London, so there is no clearing house system of passing relatively small amounts of money between councils for "out of area" use of passes. I've always assumed that the National Concessionary Permit scheme works similarly outside of London - local councils agree a lump sum with the bus operator(s) concerned. No doubt this is verified by means of sampling, but I doubt that it would be worth collecting data on every individual journey in order to calculate the precise sums involved. -- Paul Terry |
#3
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Senior Pass acceptance
On Jun 15, 6:56*pm, Paul Terry wrote: In message , Graham Harrison writes If I (with a Somerset County Council pass) travel on a London bus using that pass, who pays? The London boroughs. In the same way that if I used my London Freedom pass in Somerset, then Somerset County Council pay (although local authorities get quite a substantial government grant towards the cost). Based on what happened to me when I did it the driver made no attempt to determine where I was from and unless he was Superman I doubt very much if he was able to read the pass given that it was in the bit of my wallet with a little window which obscured the pass enough for him to see it was a pass and the date on it but not much more. * Oh and I didn't go out of my way to shove it under his nose I just flashed and he seemed quite happy with that. In London, the London Boroughs agree a lump sum with TfL (£251 million for the current year, of which the bus element is £188.6 million). This payment covers the use of both Freedom passes and National Concessionary Permits throughout the area. I imagine that it is reckoned that use of National bus passes within London roughly balances the use of Freedom passes outside of London, so there is no clearing house system of passing relatively small amounts of money between councils for "out of area" use of passes. AIUI there isn't any sort of 'clearing house' system in operation anywhere in England - local authorities have to stump up for ENCTS pass usage in their area regardless of where the pass holder comes from and there's no system of recompense from that pass holders own local authority. I'm no expert at all but I understand this led to problems in tourist/ well visited areas, an example that was cited being Blackpool where lots of non-locals were making use of the free concessionary travel, with Blackpool Council being landed with the bill. I think things were tweaked so local authorities in areas where this happened (such as Blackpool) get more money from the DfT to help them out. (Not a clearing house system, more a recognition of need/demand.) Others here will be far more expert on all this. I've always assumed that the National Concessionary Permit scheme works similarly outside of London - local councils agree a lump sum with the bus operator(s) concerned. No doubt this is verified by means of sampling, but I doubt that it would be worth collecting data on every individual journey in order to calculate the precise sums involved. |
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#7
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#8
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Senior Pass acceptance
On Jun 15, 6:10 pm, "Graham Harrison" wrote: [snip] Whoa..... If I (with a Somerset County Council pass) travel on a London bus using that pass, who pays? [...] The underlying principle of ENCTS is that the local authority in which the journey takes place (or at least starts in) pays. The arrangements in London are a bit different to the rest of England, as (pretty much all) local bus are regulated and operate under contract to TfL. The London Boroughs collectively (all 32 of them, plus the City of London Corporation) - pay TfL a sum for concessionary travel, whilst this has always covered concessionary travel for Londoners (under the London Freedom Pass scheme) my understanding is that this payment now also covers concessionary travel for ENCTS pass holders from outwith London, as per the principle I outlined above. (This collective payment from the Boroughs to TfL is actually made through "London Councils", which is the local government association for London, who manage the concessionary travel scheme on behalf of the Boroughs.) Based on what happened to me when I did it the driver made no attempt to determine where I was from and unless he was Superman I doubt very much if he was able to read the pass given that it was in the bit of my wallet with a little window which obscured the pass enough for him to see it was a pass and the date on it but not much more. Oh and I didn't go out of my way to shove it under his nose I just flashed and he seemed quite happy with that. My understanding is that at present the amount of concessionary travel that happens on London's bus network is actually assessed by surveys done by TfL in association with London Councils, rather than as a result of feedback from button presses on the bus ticket machine. Indeed I don't think (though couldn't say for certain) there's a specific button that gets pressed to register an ENCTS pass is presented - I *think* it's just the generic 'TfL pass' button. (If you're quick you might be able to see what is shown on the ticket machine's LCD display - "LRT pass" is I think still the generic description associated with this.) As and when the smartcard readers on London's buses are upgraded to be ITSO compatible (as at present they can only read 'Oyster-type' cards), then TfL will be able to require ENCTS pass holders to 'touch- in' just like Oyster card users, and with London Councils will be able to analyse data for concessionary travel usage and patterns far more precisely. But we're not there yet. With regards to the contractual payments made to the actual bus operator by TfL for running the service, then this won't have anything to do with how many passengers were travelling using concessionary passes. TfL pays bus operators on a broadly gross cost basis under a scheme called "Quality Incentive Contracts", under which TfL takes the full revenue risk and operators don't keep any of the farebox takings. As you can see, this element is very different to the deregulated bus world outside London. Incidentally, if you wish to know more about how things operate in London, then TfL produced this primer document entitled "London"s Bus Contracting and Tendering Process" which outlines it all - see (PDF): http://www.tfl.gov.uk/tfl/businessan...ing-feb-09.pdf or via http://tinyurl.com/a7ar39 |
#9
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Senior Pass acceptance
"Mizter T" wrote in message ... On Jun 15, 6:10 pm, "Graham Harrison" wrote: [snip] Whoa..... If I (with a Somerset County Council pass) travel on a London bus using that pass, who pays? [...] The underlying principle of ENCTS is that the local authority in which the journey takes place (or at least starts in) pays. The arrangements in London are a bit different to the rest of England, as (pretty much all) local bus are regulated and operate under contract to TfL. The London Boroughs collectively (all 32 of them, plus the City of London Corporation) - pay TfL a sum for concessionary travel, whilst this has always covered concessionary travel for Londoners (under the London Freedom Pass scheme) my understanding is that this payment now also covers concessionary travel for ENCTS pass holders from outwith London, as per the principle I outlined above. (This collective payment from the Boroughs to TfL is actually made through "London Councils", which is the local government association for London, who manage the concessionary travel scheme on behalf of the Boroughs.) Based on what happened to me when I did it the driver made no attempt to determine where I was from and unless he was Superman I doubt very much if he was able to read the pass given that it was in the bit of my wallet with a little window which obscured the pass enough for him to see it was a pass and the date on it but not much more. Oh and I didn't go out of my way to shove it under his nose I just flashed and he seemed quite happy with that. My understanding is that at present the amount of concessionary travel that happens on London's bus network is actually assessed by surveys done by TfL in association with London Councils, rather than as a result of feedback from button presses on the bus ticket machine. Indeed I don't think (though couldn't say for certain) there's a specific button that gets pressed to register an ENCTS pass is presented - I *think* it's just the generic 'TfL pass' button. (If you're quick you might be able to see what is shown on the ticket machine's LCD display - "LRT pass" is I think still the generic description associated with this.) As and when the smartcard readers on London's buses are upgraded to be ITSO compatible (as at present they can only read 'Oyster-type' cards), then TfL will be able to require ENCTS pass holders to 'touch- in' just like Oyster card users, and with London Councils will be able to analyse data for concessionary travel usage and patterns far more precisely. But we're not there yet. With regards to the contractual payments made to the actual bus operator by TfL for running the service, then this won't have anything to do with how many passengers were travelling using concessionary passes. TfL pays bus operators on a broadly gross cost basis under a scheme called "Quality Incentive Contracts", under which TfL takes the full revenue risk and operators don't keep any of the farebox takings. As you can see, this element is very different to the deregulated bus world outside London. Incidentally, if you wish to know more about how things operate in London, then TfL produced this primer document entitled "London"s Bus Contracting and Tendering Process" which outlines it all - see (PDF): http://www.tfl.gov.uk/tfl/businessan...ing-feb-09.pdf or via http://tinyurl.com/a7ar39 Thank you one and all. |
#10
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Senior Pass acceptance
The House of Commons Library published a paper last month describing
bus concessionary fare schemes in the UK. http://www.parliament.uk/briefingpap...snbt-01499.pdf Yesterday, they published another paper describing a proposal in 2002 to limit bus concessions for older and disabled people to a half fare. I wonder why? http://www.parliament.uk/briefingpap...snbt-02009.pdf |
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