Countdown to savings for commuters

[Fares_Fair]

Premier
The Honourable Campbell Newman
13/06/2012

Countdown to savings for commuters

Regular go card commuters will soon get free travel after nine journeys each week, ticking off another election promise by the LNP Government.
Speaking on a tour of the soon-to-be opened Northern Busway today, Premier Campbell Newman said in less than two weeks regular SEQ commuters would start feeling real hip pocket relief.
"The LNP made a commitment to reintroduce discounted weekly fares for go card users, and I am pleased to report we've honoured this commitment," Mr Newman said.
"Regular commuters who have used go cards for nine journeys in a Monday to Friday week on buses, trains and ferries in South East Queensland will be rewarded with any additional trips free in that week from June 25.
"This means for a regular commuter you get your trip home on Friday at no cost, and bonus free weekend travel.
"The LNP Government understands that Queensland families are struggling with the rising cost of living and this will be a real saving and incentive for people to use public transport regularly."
Transport and Main Roads Minister Scott Emerson said the LNP's commitment will reward daily commuters, bringing the cost of living down.
"After working all week, your journey home on Friday will be at no charge, and any additional trips you take will be free also," Mr Emerson said.
"Unlike the previous Government, LNP are committed to improving affordability for passengers which will encourage more people back on to transport," he said.
The commitment will save a regular weekday commuter to the CBD from Oxley or Mitchelton up to $220 a year - while commuters travelling from Varsity Lakes or Palmwoods will save up to $642 each year.
The LNP Government has also committed to halving Labor's public transport fare increases on Translink buses, trains and ferries across South East Queensland.
"This is just part of the LNP Government's plan to restore Queenslander's confidence in public transport," Mr Emerson said.
[ENDS]


Media contact:
Premier's Office - (07) 3224 4500
Minister Emerson - Andrew Berkman 0429 128 637

[somebody]

What is the cost of this move?  One has to think, around $30m p.a. (a touch under 10% of annual fare revenue).

[SurfRail]

What is the cost of this move?  One has to think, around $30m p.a. (a touch under 10% of annual fare revenue).

If it means patronage growth is less flat, then probably less than that.

I doubt all of that increase is going 100% into service improvements anyway.  You only need to be increasing above CPI to still get money to do extra things, and the increase is still at least double the likely CPI change between the December 2011 and 2012 quarters.

I've always maintained that TransLink can stand to justify its fare increases much more rigorously than it has previously, and in particular why it can't identify efficiencies to defer part of the price hikes.

[achiruel]

Maybe if we got rid of pointless duplication like the P88 and the everywhere-to-everywhere mentality we could save a bit more money and fares wouldn't have to increase as much.

[somebody]

What is the cost of this move?  One has to think, around $30m p.a. (a touch under 10% of annual fare revenue).

If it means patronage growth is less flat, then probably less than that.

I doubt all of that increase is going 100% into service improvements anyway.  You only need to be increasing above CPI to still get money to do extra things, and the increase is still at least double the likely CPI change between the December 2011 and 2012 quarters.

I've always maintained that TransLink can stand to justify its fare increases much more rigorously than it has previously, and in particular why it can't identify efficiencies to defer part of the price hikes.

I think this would do 1/3, at best, of what adjusting the base fare to achieve the same revenue would.

[techblitz]

Maybe if we got rid of pointless duplication like the P88 and the everywhere-to-everywhere mentality we could save a bit more money and fares wouldn't have to increase as much.

Agreed,some of the high frequency routes that have been affected by introduction of similar routes need to be reworked.Now if you want to talk about wasted money
In the last 10 days i have seen 3 incidents of DCU malfunction including an unrecoverable GCL one today where the driver was told to return the bus to carindale depot.I and a few others could not tag off so we had to wait for the 5.00 charge to appear on our gocard account then ring translink the next day to have it reimbursed. Seriously how many free trips are given away daily because of these dcus. Translink should not be worrying about new routes until they get the core payment facilities up to scratch and make sure they are working 100 PERCENT of the time. 

[somebody]

Seriously how many free trips are given away daily because of these dcus.

Not many.

Translink should not be worrying about new routes until they get the core payment facilities up to scratch and make sure they are working 100 PERCENT of the time.

Death to your feeble plan.  100% reliability can never be achieved.  The network design is appalling!

[techblitz]

feeble responses

whats the point of having a great network if you cant manage the payment system

i think you need to get on the buses more and see how many `low power mode` dcu errors happen each day.

[Fares_Fair]

what does dcu stand for?

something card unit ?

[SurfRail]

what does dcu stand for?

something card unit ?

Driver Control Unit (the driver's console).

[somebody]

what does dcu stand for?

something card unit ?

Drivers Control Unit, I think. (wrote b4 SR's reply)

i think you need to get on the buses more and see how many `low power mode` dcu errors happen each day.

Across the network?  There's well over 1000 buses so expect there is a failure somewhere pretty much every day.

[Fares_Fair]

Thank you SR and Simon. 

[HappyTrainGuy]

Seriously how many free trips are given away daily because of these dcus.

Not many.

Must be popular on the 345 route then. This year I've had 1 free trip on the 338, 1 on free trip on the 333 and 5 free trips on the 345. 2 of the 345 trips had a faulty reader at the start but the first one fixed itself around Craigslea HS and the second one had a counting number count before having a beeping fit and displaying insert card/the normal swipe card message then back to a new number count on its way to the normanby hotel. The other 3 the driver just waved me on.

[ozbob]

Sent to all outlets:

14th June 2012

go card,  a journey can be a trip, a journey can be several trips

Greetings,

I hope you take the time to read this and take on board the points raised.

The present fare structure for the go card has all users able to access free travel on a go card after 10  paid JOURNEYS are completed in a Monday to Sunday period.

The LNP have proposed a modification of the present fare structure to free travel on a go card after 9 paid JOURNEYS are completed in a Monday to Sunday period.  This is to be introduced from 25th June 2012.

Now, it is important that the free travel option be reported accurately as 9 paid JOURNEYS respectively,  not trips.

I know it is confusing as in some circumstances one trip can equal one journey, in other circumstance a single journey can consist of up to 4 trips!

   

These are the basic rules:

     You are allowed a maximum of three transfers on a
     journey, therefore you can have a maximum of 4 trips
     (different sequential modes) in one journey, providing you
     meet these conditions (from the go card user guide)
     "Your journey must continue from the same
     zone or adjoining zone.
     There is a 1 hour time limit between transfers.
     That means you must touch on to your trip
     within 60 minutes of touching off at the end of
     your previous trip.
     You must touch on to your final trip within 3.5
     hours of when you started your first trip. You
     have 5 hours to complete the journey.
     You can transfer up to 3 times across all zones."
     http://translink.com.au/resources/tickets-and-fares/go-card/120102-user-guide-part-1.pdf page 12

Also for your interest our SMART GO CARD USER GUIDE can be accessed here -->  http://railbotforum.org/mbs/index.php?topic=5149.0

Best wishes, and don't forget to touch off!

Robert

Robert Dow
Administration
admin@backontrack.org
RAIL Back On Track http://backontrack.org

[techblitz]

Must be popular on the 345 route then. This year I've had 1 free trip on the 338, 1 on free trip on the 333 and 5 free trips on the 345. 2 of the 345 trips had a faulty reader at the start but the first one fixed itself around Craigslea HS and the second one had a counting number count before having a beeping fit and displaying insert card/the normal swipe card message then back to a new number count on its way to the normanby hotel. The other 3 the driver just waved me on.

On my incident (one of many) the driver was getting abused by a passenger when he told her that she will have to call translink due to her lovely 5.00 charge which was about to come the next time she tagged on. I actually commended him for taking the time to explain to all the affected passengers what they will need to do.He as well as other passengers ware clearly getting distressed over this malfunctioning unresponsive dcu.On average it takes about 3 minutes for an ;out of range' dcu to reboot itself but this one was competely gone.

Now back to my point about the faulty DCus as well as gocard readers at train stations (anything else ive missed?)
Translink are great at introducing new services eg: 369 or upping a frequency of a train service
But if they continue on this path and not invest the dollars to fix the payment gateways to 100 PERCENT capability then dont they just increase thier chances of giving away more free trips?? As for the faulty gocard readers.Dont they increase thier chances of disgruntled customers ringing them up for refunds? (they must think that customers get free calls hence the casual attitude)

I could almost guarantee with the new 369 service coming up next week they will lose money in the first week of service through a faulty DCU.

Yes i understand that no payment system is perfect and takes time to implement but gocard problems been going on a decent while now.
I can recall a 222 inbound a couple of weeks ago where a bus load of easily 40 +passengers were given a free trip during peak hour into the city. Easily 3.80 minimum for the majority of them. Equates to around 150 dollars lost for that single trip alone!

Some experts on here say oh well its only 0.5 percent,1 percent of entire trips taken blah blah blah.Who cares...its money lost and money that could have been spent elsewhere eg: duplication of needed railines or spent towards CRR.

[Fares_Fair]

It is abundantly clear that the equipment needs to be more reliable than it is currently.
Money down the gurgler ...

[achiruel]

It is abundantly clear that the equipment needs to be more reliable than it is currently.
Money down the gurgler ...

The question is, say reliability is currently 99% (no idea, just making up numbers here), will it cost more to improve the reliability of the equipment than the revenue that will be made up.

It's like Internet services, they go down occasionally.  You can buy a service that guarantees 99.99% uptime but it will cost a packet of money.

[Fares_Fair]

It is abundantly clear that the equipment needs to be more reliable than it is currently.
Money down the gurgler ...

The question is, say reliability is currently 99% (no idea, just making up numbers here), will it cost more to improve the reliability of the equipment than the revenue that will be made up.

It's like Internet services, they go down occasionally.  You can buy a service that guarantees 99.99% uptime but it will cost a packet of money.

The question is, is it all about the 'customer' and providing a reasonably reliable service?
I am fairly certain, given the numbers of reports received in RBoT here over these, that the figure is nowhere near 99% so this scenario may not be applicable.
It should not come down to the total dollars argument when determining levels of customer service.
It's an overhead to be borne.

[achiruel]

The question is, is it all about the 'customer' and providing a reasonably reliable service?
I am fairly certain, given the numbers of reports received in RBoT here over these, that the figure is nowhere near 99% so this scenario may not be applicable.
It should not come down to the total dollars argument when determining levels of customer service.
It's an overhead to be borne.

Well if it's indeed true that we're not even getting 99% there is definitely room for improvement.  It's over that figure that reliability tends to get very expensive.  I remember reading somewhere that in IT systems the difference between 99% and 99.5% was often double the cost and double again (i.e. 4×) to get to 99.9%.

[ozbob]

Just to confirm, Seniors:

- Free travel after two paid journeys in one day AND

- Free travel after nine paid journeys in a Monday to Sunday week.

[ozbob]

Last week for the 10 paid journey cap ....

[Fares_Fair]

 

all helps.

[p858snake]

i think you need to get on the buses more and see how many `low power mode` dcu errors happen each day.

There used to be issues almost daily back when I caught the 330 from chermy to TAFE.

[Fares_Fair]

i think you need to get on the buses more and see how many `low power mode` dcu errors happen each day.

There used to be issues almost daily back when I caught the 330 from chermy to TAFE.

Seems somewhat systemic to me ... given the feedback here.

[ozbob]

Some say they never have issues, others frequent.  I wonder if it is a route specific thing, that is, some routes the GPS system etc. is more problematical due to outside influences?

[Fares_Fair]

Some say they never have issues, others frequent.  I wonder if it is a route specific thing, that is, some routes the GPS system etc. is more problematical due to outside influences?

Certainly possible, I'm sure (maybe not) TransLink or Cubic must collect the statistics for these issues.
I assume there must be some kind of reporting system for these issues.

[somebody]

This has been an episode of poor form, from both sides of politics.  The ALP had a fare structure which was equitable to most parties, other than a too high flag fall, but put up the price beyond what they were willing to pay.  To appease the electorate they increased the frequent user discount to 100% but continued the fare increases.  The LNP went for an even worse policy - still put up the base fare (but by half) ensuring that it would deter patronage, keep the far too high flag fall, but say no to a large chunk of the fare revenue.

[Fares_Fair]

This has been an episode of poor form, from both sides of politics.  The ALP had a fare structure which was equitable to most parties, other than a too high flag fall, but put up the price beyond what they were willing to pay.  To appease the electorate they increased the frequent user discount to 100% but continued the fare increases.  The LNP went for an even worse policy - still put up the base fare (but by half) ensuring that it would deter patronage, keep the far too high flag fall, but say no to a large chunk of the fare revenue.

To be fair to the LNP, and the ALP for that matter, there has been NO public debate about flag fall, has there? (aside from the one here at RBoT)

[somebody]

So what?  They should do a proper job without being hammered in the media first.  I find this attitude of QLD'ers quite bizarre.

[kazzac]

Last week for the 10 paid journey cap ....

I cant wait!! I do 10 JOURNEYS a week then, 2 trains mornings then bus/train in arvo ,weeks when I dont have use of car,I am sharing car atm so I still have to use PT somedays unfortunately!!

[somebody]

Some say they never have issues, others frequent.  I wonder if it is a route specific thing, that is, some routes the GPS system etc. is more problematical due to outside influences?

Well I frequently use buses from W, T, S and used to use a number from G and R.  Sometimes I use A, less often V, least often C.

I think you can almost rule out specific BT depots.

[Golliwog]

Some say they never have issues, others frequent.  I wonder if it is a route specific thing, that is, some routes the GPS system etc. is more problematical due to outside influences?

Well I frequently use buses from W, T, S and used to use a number from G and R.  Sometimes I use A, less often V, least often C.

I think you can almost rule out specific BT depots.

On the topic of ruleing factors in/out, does anyone know if there are different versions of the DCU's? I know they all look roughly the same, but do the newer buses have 'better' DCU's? Are some of the older buses still going around with the 2008 model DCU while the new ones have the 2012 model?

[SurfRail]

I'm sure there are isolated cases everywhere.  For my own part, I don't personally have any issues, and I don't notice any down here when I am out and about, but I've no doubt they happen from time to time. 

[techblitz]

A few of the drivers i have spoken to seem to think the operating system is becoming buggy and flawed. Even with an `out of range` error they dont think it is a depot transmission problem and they dont believe  the non solid-state hard drives to be an issue either. So the question remains why do these things fail...wear and tear?

[ozbob]

Sent to all outlets:

22nd June 2012

Avoid single paper ticket ripoff

Greetings,

From Monday 25th June 2012 the free travel after 9 paid JOURNEYS in the Monday to Sunday week will be introduced on the go card ( http://jp.translink.com.au/travel-information/service-updates/details/1338251778 ).

Note Seniors and some other DVA pensioners who presently have a two journey daily cap then free, will also receive absolute free travel after 9 paid journeys in a week.

The cost of single paper ticket fares relative to the go card is excessive.  It is in  the best interests of all public transport users to move to a go card, even if they are not doing 9 journeys or more a week.  By moving to a go card they also assist in improving considerably running times for buses.

Paper tickets are at least 30% dearer for the equivalent go card trip.  There is a time limit on paper single tickets.  For passengers travelling through 10 zones or less this time period is 2 hours from time of purchase,  travelling 11 zones or more 3 hours 30 minutes ( http://translink.com.au/tickets-and-fares/other-tickets/paper-tickets ).  The fact there are time limits on the paper tickets is not well understood by many users and could lead to a fare evasion offence in ignorance.

Off peak discounts (presently 20%) are only available to go card users.

Go card users can transfer up three times within one hour for each transfer, this can make travel even more affordable.

We have compiled some tips for go card users.  See  the 'Smart GO CARD User Guide' --> http://railbotforum.org/mbs/index.php?topic=5149.0

Official go card information at TransLink -->  http://translink.com.au/tickets-and-fares/go-card

Best wishes
Robert

Contact:

Robert Dow
Administration
admin@backontrack.org
RAIL Back On Track http://backontrack.org

[ozbob]

Oh dear .... lol

From the Queensland Times 23rd June 2012 page 15

Nine trips - then free

[STB]

I should just quickly mention that I'm still seeing quite a few buying paper tickets around my area (Redlands), particularly on the weekends with mothers and their prams and high school aged kids.  I doubt this might change much under the new fare system without more education to the paper ticket users, and I think it has to be far more direct in your face style from the drivers to get those on paper tickets onto the Go Cards.

[somebody]

Yes, there is a need for Go Cards to be sold on buses, BT and non-BT.

[#Metro]

Yes, there is a need for Go Cards to be sold on buses, BT and non-BT.

Go Cards need to be sold on bus but with at least $10 or $20 blocks - otherwise we are just swapping paper for plastic, and that would have little point.

Paper ticketing should be GONE by now. People have had more than enough time now.
Paper should also be withdrawn from ticket AVVM machines as well.

[ozbob]

Sent to all outlets:

24th June 2012

Go! - Avoid single paper ticket ripoff

Greetings,

From Monday 25th June 2012 the free travel after 9 paid JOURNEYS in the Monday to Sunday week will be introduced on the go card ( http://jp.translink.com.au/travel-information/service-updates/details/1338251778 ).

Note Seniors and some other DVA pensioners who presently have a two journey daily cap then free, will also receive absolute free travel after 9 paid journeys in a week.

The cost of single paper ticket fares relative to the go card is excessive.  It is in  the best interests of all public transport users to move to a go card, even if they are not doing 9 journeys or more a week.  By moving to a go card they also assist in improving considerably running times for buses.

Paper tickets are at least 30% dearer for the equivalent go card trip.  There is a time limit on paper single tickets.  For passengers travelling through 10 zones or less this time period is 2 hours from time of purchase,  travelling 11 zones or more 3 hours 30 minutes ( http://translink.com.au/tickets-and-fares/other-tickets/paper-tickets ).  The fact there are time limits on the paper tickets is not well understood by many users and could lead to a fare evasion offence in ignorance.

Off peak discounts (presently 20%) are only available to go card users.

Go card users can transfer up three times within one hour for each transfer, this can make travel even more affordable.

The online facilities for management of a go card - e.g. auto top up, transaction history is good.  Users should be encouraged to register go cards, by doing that should the card be lost any funds on the go card can be recovered.

We have compiled some tips for go card users.  See  the 'Smart GO CARD User Guide' --> http://railbotforum.org/mbs/index.php?topic=5149.0

Official go card information at TransLink -->  http://translink.com.au/tickets-and-fares/go-card

Best wishes
Robert

Contact:

Robert Dow
Administration
admin@backontrack.org
RAIL Back On Track http://backontrack.org