More ideas for Frequent User schemes

[Derwan]

The current FU (Frequent User) scheme targets the majority of full-time workers, which probably make up the majority of all commuters. If these commuters follow their regular weekly routine, the cost would be no different under the Go Card.

However, there are many situations (as pointed out) where commuters would be worse off under the Go Card, including full-time workers who do a trip on the weekend (or days off).

I've mentioned before that I think this is a method to slow the roll-out of the Go Card.  Those who would be worse off would continue to use paper tickets until additional FU options became available.

But what will these options be?  As well as telling TransLink that more options are needed, perhaps we could come up with suggestions as to what those options should be.

I personally don't agree with the suggestion of an across-the-board reduction to make tickets equivalent to the ten-trip saver.  This was never an option for trains and would severely reduce revenue.  I also do not believe that commuters who travel once a week should be entitled to any "frequent user" discount.  It defeats the purpose of it.

I have come up with a couple of suggestions (attached), including an irregular saver (comparable to the ten-trip saver) and a high-zone option. 

The Irregular Saver assumes no more than 5 days travel per week.  A card holder who elects this scheme would start receiving a discount earlier but the discount would be lower - even after 10 trips.

With high zones, I noticed that zone 11 weeklies are equivalent to 3.75 dailies.  Zone 12 weeklies are equivalent to 3.5 dailies.  Zone 13 and above are equivalent to 3.25 dailies.  I have based my calculation on zone 13 and above.  I set trips 9 and 10 to 25% of the usual cost to get the weekly the same as a paper weekly.  It may be simpler to leave it at 50%, but this would mean an increase compared to paper weeklies.  High-zone schemes depend on zones travelled so may not be an option for the simple programmers at Cubic.

Without having stats on ticket purchases, it is impossible to determine whether the introduction of these schemes would be cost-neutral or swayed in either direction for TransLink.

What do people think?  What changes would you make?

[ozbob]

Thanks for your thoughts Derwan and the attached document.  Food for thought, will think about it.

There are good reasons why smart card travel should be at a discount to cash fares.
You are paying in advance and there are reduced ticketing costs as no paper tickets and sales.
It also acts as incentive to up take and then the system accrues the benefits.

The Perth Smart rider offers a 15 or 25% discount (depending on how card is charged) compared to the standard rates in recognition of this fact for example.  I think if a person obtains a smart card they have to effectively charge it.  No different in a broad sense to advance purchase of 10 trippers.  Most smart card ticketing systems do discount relative to the base single paper ticket fare rates eg. London and Beijing.

Brisbane commuters are missing out.

The obvious answer is to have daily fare cap on the card (again this is the case in Perth, and will be in Melbourne too, Melbourne will also have a weekly cap).

By making the Go Card attractive to all we can help reduce congestion and pollution!

Some ideas we put forward previously.

?An occasional trip option would mimic the present Ten Trip Fare Saver ticketing.  There would be no time limit and fares could be charged at a flat rate less 20% as for the present ten trippers.

?Another option would be to have pre-purchase of travel at weekly or monthly blocks.  This could then entitle the holder to unrestricted travel in the zones purchased.  It would be pay as you go until the respective weekly or monthly fare cap is reached, and at which point travel would be free in their zones for the remainder of the week or month as the case may be.  This would be very beneficial to students and workers who need to do multiple trips during the day and would also allow economical travel on all days of the week.

From http://backontrack.org/mbs/index.php?topic=335.msg1217#msg1217

Cheers
Ozbob

[ozbob]

I think the Go Card should users should have 'off peak' fares.  At the moment all fares are based on standard single fares.  A further incentive would be to have the present off peak discounts available for those trips that meet the off peak requirements.  A requirement to facilitate this would be daily caps.

Another incentive would be to reduce weekend fares as for the discounted (off peak) daily week fares.

The present integrated paper ticketing details may be reviewed here Translink ticketing - ticket types