Archive for April, 2012

There’s a lot of talk ‘integrated’ and ‘simplified’ ticketing, both of which sound admirable. The truth is, we’ve already got both!

‘Integrated’ ticketing means you can hop on any bus or the Metro anywhere in Tyne and Wear and buy one ticket that will take you from where you are to where you want to go. Regardless of bus company, it can include using Metro or even the Shields Ferry. We’ve had this since well before Metro was introduced. Today, it’s called Network One and Transfares. Both are quite simple.

Need to use more than one bus operator, or a combination of bus, Metro, train and ferry in Tyne and Wear? Network One provides weekly, four weekly and annual tickets that enable you to do just that. Making a one-off journey using one bus and Metro? Buy a Transfare. Simple, easy to use and they’ve been around for decades.

But what if you want to make just local journeys, or commute regularly using just one bus operator? In that case, you’re probably better off with either a Route Saver (regular use on one route or a group of routes) or a Buzz Fare (a day ticket valid in a ‘colour’ zone or group of zones, also available as weekly, four weekly and annual tickets).

‘Simplicity’ sounds good, but in reality it means lack of choice. How would you feel if you went into your local supermarket and found that your favourite tins of beans, breakfast cereals and shower gels had been ‘simplified’ and replaced with the supermarkets own brand ‘white label’ versions? Even if they were cheaper? Customer choice replaced with everyone having to buy the same things. You wouldn’t stand for it, would you?

To be honest, ‘simplicity’ means taking away choice because Nanny Knows Best.

But our customers know a bargain when they see one. That’s why tens of thousands of people use our Route Saver tickets; why hundreds of regular customers have swapped to the ‘Key Lifestyle’, allowing them to get the best value ticket for a simple monthly direct debit payment; and why thousands of people who use more than one operator choose to use Network One tickets.

All our drivers have been carefully trained to make sure that they always offer you the cheapest ticket for your journey. They can sell you everything from an Explorer Ticket that gives a days’ unlimited travel anywhere in an area bounded by Berwick upon Tweed, Carlisle and Scarborough, to a single ticket for a few stops for less than the price of a half of lager. There’s bound to be an individual ticket that’s just right for your journey.

And why? because the customer knows best – not Nanny!

There’s lots of statistics out there that try to inform decision makers about what’s going on in the bus industry. As you can imagine, it’s relatively easy to ‘pick and choose’ which you want to use to tell a particular story.

Although we’ve just passed the end of the public sector financial year, it’ll be another six months or so before new Department for Transport annual figures are released. So I’m going to quote you some figures for the year ending March 2011, which were published in the autumn last year.

Among the Department’s ‘key findings’ last year are these gems:

• There were 4.6 billion bus passenger journeys in England in 2010/11. This is a 0.1 per cent increase from the 2009/10 level.
• Bus fares in England were at the same level in real terms in March 2011 as in March 2010.
• Net public funding support for local bus services in England decreased by 7.3 per cent in real terms between 2009/10 and 2010/11.

These figures mask regional differences. For example, the number of bus journeys made in Tyne and Wear fell dramatically in the year.

But here’s the rub.

Ridership on Go North East buses is increasing! As things stand right now, over the last three years we’ve seen the number of journeys taken on our buses increase from 70 million to almost 73 million. That’s about a million a year on average!

We must be doing something right!