On Monday March 31 all our single and return tickets increase as does the Day rider. Always a confusing time as many passengers will not have read the notices on the buses which have been there for over two weeks.
Then on Tuesday the National, or should I say English, Concessionary Travel Passes come into operation. These passes, in case you have been on the Moon for the last few weeks allow the over 60s and the eligible disabled free travel after 9:30 on all local buses anywhere in England. Let me start by apologizing to a small group of people I gave incorrect information to.
When the concessionary passes came in they were for use only in the area you lived in and last summer many elderly passengers presented me, and all the other drivers with passes issued outside our area and asked if they could be used, "You will be able to from next April." was the stock reply. Some of the people who asked were from the UK but not from England. Well if you do live in the UK but not in England you can not use your pass in England, sorry but when the scheme was announced two years ago the word National was used to describe it and I assumed, as did most people, that meant the UK but the way devolution is going...........................
I am not sure exactly how many of these English Concessionary passes will be issued but it could be as many as 10 million. So far about 26 actual passes have been issued due to problems at the printers.
None so far in Torbay. To get round this problem we have been told to accept all existing passes issued in Devon and passes issued out side the area provided a cardboard Temporary Pass is also presented. Given that 10 million proper passes should have been printed and only 26 have been printed that means 9 million, nine hundred and ninety nine thousand, nine hundred and seven four temporary passes will have to be printed. Hopefully by a different printer.
I have an Around Torbay Concessionary pass but the cardboard temporary pass hasn't yet arrived and latest estimates are for about ten days. I was planning to go up to Manchester on a family visit at the weekend but the though of having to pay for my bus fares while I am there has put me off. Yes I know Stagecoach are in Manchester but my brother lives in North Manchester which is FirstBus territory.
Just to round of with an observation about ID Cards. The bus passes have the holders name and Photo and the Government have know they would need to issue 10 million of them for two years and haven't managed to get it organised. make no mistake this cock up IS down to Central Government, not local authorities or as I have suggested, the Printers ( sorry printers everywhere). They just didn't seem to understand the numbers involved.
Now ID Cards will hold much more information and 60 Million will need to be issued with safeguards built into the Card to prevent misuse. What chance do they have of issuing all of us here in the UK an ID Card some time this Century? Perhaps they should ask British Airways to run the system for them.
8 comments:
And of course these new passes are supposed to be ITSO compatible, meaning that any of the modern generation of ticket machines can "read" the information stored on the chip built into the card. This would make life easier for drivers and would anable better processing of information in the back office. Do they work? Don't know yet will be trying one out on a ticket machine next week. I don't intend to hold my breath.
Ideally, we should be able to touch on and off buses, as with Oyster Cards.
When you say printers, I can imagine some poor work experience person by the office printer with a stack of card and a guillotine.
Don't be nasty to BA just because everyone else is.
Down here in Thanet we have an extra bit of confusion as up until now concession pass holders have been able to use their passes from 9am - and now it's going back to 9.30am. They're going to be quite a few disappointed passengers over the next few weeks and unsurprisingly it would probably be our fault!!
We accepted passes from two different areas, one started at 9:00 and the other at 9:30. Now all start at 9:30 which will make life easier.
the bus prices have gone up in nottigham i'd thought they were expensive at £1.40 a journey and its still £1.40 if your only going 3 stops down the road,
now the cost of the journey into town or and other place in nottingham will be £1.50 or £3.00 for a all day ticket which was only £2.70 quite a big jump i think plus the nottingham busses dont give change
I used my Oyster this weekend. It was great!
Sorry, Day Rider doesn't go up in this round of fare increases. It is still good value at £4.00.
Post a Comment