Martin Writes..
Proof Positive that East Coast Just Doesn't Get It
By Martin "Oven Gloves" Kelner on Mar 26, 2011 - 5:35:48 PM
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It cost eight quid for a while, then they put it up to a sensible tenner, and then they doubled it to twenty pounds. Fair enough, everything is going up, and even a 100 percent price hike is not unique these days. But wait...
Weekend First is £20 should you get on at Kings Cross and get off at Doncaster, but if you wish to stay in comfort for the remaining half-hour into Leeds or quarter hour into Wakefield, they want another £5 off you. I am not making this up.
The guard, who has to announce all the various tickets that disqualify you from travelling on the train - Apex, SuperApex, Schmapex etc. etc. - then has to make a further announcement that Weekend First is available for £20, but £25 "if you wish to travel beyond Doncaster."
So, presumably, as well as having to charge little old ladies the full single, non-discounted fare if they have got on the train with the wrong ticket, this poor benighted blighter has to parade through First Class with a big broom at Doncaster, pushing anyone without a spare fiver out of the nice seats.
My question is this: at what level of moronic, knuckle-headed, purblind management did some bean counter decide that it would be a good idea to squeeze an extra fiver out of the working classes for the privilege of "travelling beyond Doncaster?"
Did they think the fare structure was getting just a little too simple? Did they at any point ask what it might mean in terms of PR, or customer relations as they would undoubtedly call it? Did they think their guards were underemployed and would welcome the chance of collecting the extra fivers? Did nobody at any point look at this and say, "Do you know what, for the extra few fivers we might collect, this just makes us look like a bunch of arseholes. Let's not bother."
