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Passengers face £2.50 levy for seat on train
Dick Murray12.05.09
Rail passengers are to be charged an extra £2.50 a journey to be sure of a seat on crowded trains.
The move provoked an angry reaction from national watchdog Passenger Focus, which accused rail bosses of a “back-door fares increase”. Unions said passengers were being “mugged” and warned that the elderly and families would be hit hardest.
The charge (an extra £5 for a return ticket) will be levied from 17 May on passengers using East Coast mainline and East Anglia services into King's Cross and Liverpool Street stations operated by National Express.
It means that a family of four wanting to be sure of seats will have to fork out an extra £20 on a weekend return trip to London. Passengers will not have to pay but for those who do not there will be no guarantee of a seat.
Charges will apply to ordinary standard type tickets including peak-time, off-peak, super-offpeak and weekender. The charge will not apply to first class ticket holders, advance fares or season ticket holders.
Season ticket holders on East Anglia services already pay £1 a time to reserve their seats. Rail employees using staff travel facilities will also avoid the charge.
Anthony Smith, chief executive of Passenger Focus, said: “We are very opposed to this. It is a back door price rise and is taking the railways down the route of the bucket shop airlines with the operator piling on the charges at every opportunity.”
TSSA general secretary Gerry Doherty described the new charge as an “outrageous imposition”. He said: “This is simply mugging passengers for an extra fiver. It will hit the elderly and families the hardest.
They cannot risk being forced to stand on long journeys from Newcastle to London and therefore will be forced to pay the extra.”
The charges were confirmed in a confidential memo, seen by the Evening Standard, from Nigel Thompson, pricing manager for National Express East Coast. A National Express spokeswoman said the company wanted to “improve the on-board environment for customers”.
She said: “We do find that people are often reserving multiple seats as they're not sure which train they are going to catch. By asking people to pay for a seat reservation, seats will no longer be left empty with a reserved sign.”
In January peak-time fares rose by an average of six per cent on the East Coast main line and 7.4 per cent off-peak. On East Anglia services they rose by an average of six per cent on both peak and offpeak.
Overcrowding, which is set to increases despite the recession, has been highlighted by the Evening Standard's successful Seat for Every Commuter campaign.
Reader views (54)
get a car.
- Jenny Green, Dalston, London
Graham of St Albans - Great Idea!!
I don't use the train much these days (nowhere to go) but can remember clearly the crowded trains of the late 1980s... Surely reserving seats at a cost of £1 per time has caused the current problem? It must be very frustrating to be standing within sight of empty reserved seats.
Rail ticket prices these days are a true rip-off, and to "vote with our feet" would cause chaos to the already overcrowded road system - as a tory voter I hate to say this but maybe the answer would be to re-nationalise the railways??
- Suzy, London, England
I have a better idea.
You get a refund for the train company not being able to supply a seat.
- Graham, St Albans, Herts, UK
Bet MP'S will be provided with certificates allowing them to sit...they will then no doubt sell them or hire them out daily.
- Ed, london
There have always been seat reservations some companies have levied charges for making a reservation. So what's new?
A larger charge will hopefully deter people from making reservations on trains and then not using them. I wonder how much it actually costs them to provide this addition service.
I have just booked a flight with a budget style airline and they want £15 from each of us so we can sit next to each other plus all the extra charges for taking a bag. So £2.50 seems quite cheap.
- Richard Talbot, Weymouth
Try getting a seat coming in from Kent to Victoria between 7am - 9.30am which is at peak fare rate its almost impossible so how much of a refund can we expect if not able to get a seat?
- Mike, London England
Looks like the government policy of a shift to green forms of transport are in disarray (too busy wondering what to claim for next). I dislike driving intensely but it looks like its hire car for me. Does anybody remember trains being great under state control? Notwork Fail is essentially stated owned and is a disaster with no concept of customer service. Firmer regulation of the TOCs by this spineless administratio is all that is needed not re stalinisation back to Bob Crow Rail Failure
- Nelly, East London
It would be even better if they liquidised the passengers first and pumped them into big tankers for transportation. You could pay a small levy of say £10 to not be turned into liquid pulp.
- Rob Thebrown, doncaster uk
Is it legal to transport anyone in a motorised vehical without a seat and seatbelt?
- Terry Barr, Ilford
Will the charge apply to Pregnant women? The average commuter takes 40 train journeys a month. That's £100 straight out of the paypacket, (£1200 per annum). We've already said goodbye to the annual holiday, due to the uncertain financial times we are in. What is my pregant girlfriend going to have to sacrifice now, in order to guarantee a seat on her commute to work? Lunch?
- Rod, Bromley, England
Disgusting, but unsurprising. My view is they should give you a £2.50 refund if you can't find a seat! I have often had to stand on trains and resent paying the same amount as someone lucky enough to find seating. Of course the real answer is for train companies to put sufficient coaches on their trains, but this is probably too easy!
- Sixtysomething, North Yorkshire
I travelled from London to Glasgow yesterday, albeit at a quiet time, but I did notice a lot of empty reserved seats. Indeed, the one beside me was booked from London to Newcastle, but the occupant didn't turn up.
Surely, instead of charging £2.50 for a seat, a train crewmember could check seat reservations on departure from each station, and remove the reserved sign from unclaimed seats? Ok, it's maybe not practical on crowded trains, but it's a bit more practical than the planned levy.
- Jock, London
Why don't they just rip out all the seats, paint the floors with circles and then charge a levy to stand in the said circular space, they could get loads more people in the carriages, make loads more money and they could even recycle old cattle trains to squeeze a few more in. Isn't privatized rail wonderful! Just think how many car drivers will be tempted out of their cars by rail travel especially now that the private companies have made it so efficient and excellent value for money. Face it the rail industry is a complete utter sham, expensive, useless, a total rip-off and a national scandal. I gave up on trains a long time ago and I doubt I'll ever use one again at the ridiculous prices they charge.
- Ed, Hants
Thats £50 a month!
- Dave Davies, Basingstoke
Nationalisation seems to be in order.
- Max, Tonbridge
How can you guarantee a seat on a crowded train !
- Rosie, watford
Can anyone undestand why the RMT seem to be always at war with Rail bosses, this is how they treat there clients, imagine how they treat there workers !!! if anyone can help the embattled passenger it must be the rail unions, time to hepl Mr Crow, dont just stand up for the workers stand up for the travelling public !!!!
- Brian, Wiltshire
thank God I cycle.......
- Alan, London
£2.50 refund for every passenger unable to find a seat would be more appropriate
- Ross, Brighton, UK
Yet again this is about revenue, pure and simple. How on earth does this improve the passenger experience, sitting there whilst disputes rage? It's bad enough now, but when someone has a flexible travel ticket, the arguments over seat rights will worsen.
I like the idea of a consumer strike but if you don't get a train, there's the coach but then that's probably National Express run too. How did this near monopoly be allowed to happen?
- Ian, London
Perhaps they should bring in standing-only third class carriages as well? They could fit twice as many standing passengers in a carriage without any seats, and it would actually be more comfortable to stand in such a carriage if there were no seats and seated people in the way.
If they also slashed the fare, these might even prove quite popular!
- Nigel, London
It is obvious that there are just not enough trains!!
- Wq (Ex Pat), Frankfurt, Germany
No my friend its that there are to many people in this country and it is going to get worse, much worse.
- Grim Reaper, Hell
Is it April the 1st again, have the railways been taken over by Ryanair. This is laughable the people who come up with these stupid ideas should be dragged of to the tower and fed to the ravens.
- Michael Reeve, london, England
Who exactly is going to police the trains to tell someone without a reservation that they have to stand up in order to let someone else sit down who does have one?
- Alx, Hertford
lol
- T Otoole, ilford
Time for a national passenger strike, where we all stop using the railways and switch to other means of transport until all these franchisees collapse. Then we can have properly run publicly owned railways like they have in the rest of Europe.
- Robert C, London UK
What's next, extra £1 to put your backside on a toilet seat in the loos? It seems that in all walks of life this country is now run by a load of insane morons.
- Sue, Orpington, Kent
At least they arent having services removed to make way for a massively price hiked new service that will take them to the wrong part of London. We in Gravesend willl have to fork out an extra £800 a year on top of our season tickets, for a high speed service to St Pancras.
I note, however, that continental intercity trains also offer a fee for reservations. Quite often they charge a levy to guaruntee a seat.
- Simon, Gravesend, KENT
Purchasing a ticket only gives you the right to travel on a train. It does not give you the right to a seat - even if common sense would dictate otherwise.
I remember that not so long ago, seat reservations were charged for, which given that they prevented other people from occupying the space, was perfectly appropriate. Now that they are free, the system has been abused - seats are reserved on several trains so that the traveller has a pick of trains on which they have a seat.
The train companies are at fault in allowing a single journey to attract multiple seat reservations. But so are we. We have gotten used to the idea that what was once a perk is a right.
- Matthew, london
Are they serious? They expect you to stand from London to Newcastle or pay for the priviledge of sitting? Is that even humane for people to stand that long? I suspect this is just another way of increasing their pay packages as it usually is. Why not more trains and seats for all - surely that's the most logical way of dealing with overcrowding....
- Sarah, Chiswick, London
So will the rail franchises only sell the number of seats available on teh train, ie the number fitted, or will they follow the airline practice of over booking?
If there is no seat available will the paying passenger be able to claim SUBSTAINTIAL compensation.
There is a plus side to this proposal, if a thug is occupiing a seat with his / her boots on another seat we will at least be able to summon the guard who will politly ejecty the bounder, its worth paying just to see the spectacle. Of course if he fails to do so then compensation, damages and loss of his job will ensue !
- Off The Rails, London
The fact that seats can be reserved on trains at all used to rile me as a daily commuter. Seats can only be reserved when booking tickets in advance, not on turn-up-and-pay tickets or season tickets. This means anyone using the railway to make the same journey pretty much every day (surely the passengers that are most important to rail operators in terms of making the most money out of, no?) is left to search the length of the train for any seats designated as 'not reserved' whilst the one-journey-a-month types get their own seat hassle-free. Scrap reservations altogether, or at least on peak time trains!
- Chris Hughes, Wigan, UK
Does that mean passengers willing to stand will get a dis-count?
- Melvyn Windebank, Canvey Island, Essex
Answer is simple - restrict reservations to one per ticket paid for, based on the booking number. If someone needs to change plans, they cancel and reserve again.
I hate to think what the next money-making idea might be? a £2.50 surcharge for using the loo, perhaps?
- Jools, London
National Express are just dire. How did they ever get the franchise? They've made a complete hash of it. Get rid of National Express ASAP
- Max, london uk
It is obvious that there are just not enough trains!!
- Wq (Ex Pat), Frankfurt, Germany
I don't know what you're all moaning about - just get cabs everywhere - charge them to your expenses! No, wait a minute...
- Jim, London
Sadly Jim, not all of us are members of Parliament!
- Napoleon Blownaparte, London
Another day, another UK rip-off.
MP's expenses will not be affected.
- Reuben Camara, Morecambe UK
Lets be clear about this: The train companies are going to charge for seat reservations that are already available for free. The motivation is to avoid empty seats, not to make more passengers stand. Why has this been so horribly misunderstood? Do people REALLY need to book more than one seat per ticket? (If you want a seat, most people know that its difficult during rush hour. The solution is really quite simple...)
- Tony, Lancaster
So I have not really been buying a ticket for the train all this time, which would imply I was buying a seat on the train, or a chance for a seat. I have been buying something that perhaps should henceforth be known as a "boarding pass"? Glad that's been cleared up. I don't know if I can stretch to the extra fiver. Can I pay just a little extra to be guaranteed enough oxygen to breathe to complete my journey? What about the hire of a protective girdle to prevent my private parts being damaged?
- Bloke, London
Unless the rules have been changed recently the National Express spokeswoman is talking rubbish. Reserved seat tickets clearly state from which station the seat is reserved. If a seat is not occupied after the train has left the station anyone may use it.
- James, London England
Aarrrgghhhh !!! [tears hair out and bangs head against wall] I endured 15 years of London public transport and my heartfelt commiserations to the poor unfortunate commuters who continue to have insult heaped on injury.
- Marianne, SW France/London
I don't know what you're all moaning about - just get cabs everywhere - charge them to your expenses! No, wait a minute...
- Jim, London
It is time for the transport services to be renationalised.
- Damian, London
So you get on a packed train having paid your £ 2.50 only to find that there is a old lady sitting in your seat.You ask her to get up.Yes this is realy going to work then you have the other side.Having paid over £3.000 for your ticket you can not afford to pay the £2.50 so do we have everyone standing while seats are empty
- Dave Smith, Croydon
''Scandalous''
Again the poor will suffer
- C Cusano, Bedford
I pay £3200.00 a year for my season ticket and seldom get a seat on the overland or underground train, how about they charge me £1600.00 a year for a standing only ticket?
- Howard, London, UK
We are witnessing the last dying gasps of a railway franchise.
- Paul B, London
This really does stink. So the system of booking seating at the moment isn't serving the public so let's just charge them extra to guarantee a seat.
Where's the extra revenue going? How's much extra cash do they expect to raise.
This is unaccepable. Surely this is an abuse of a power.
- Jamoco, Old st, London
How's this for an alternative: on the online booking seats, make seat reservations an 'opt in' option.
At present with many companies it is not possible to opt out of a seat reservation, even if you know that you may not be using it. It would be a cheaper way of solving the problem of 'unused' reserved seats. Although, of course, it wouldn't generate as much revenue for the train company...
- Mark Lee, Vauxhall
Didn't know seat reservations were free (our TA always charges). Why not just limit (still-free?) reservations to just one per ticket?
- Steve, London, England
National Express trains are already extremely overpriced for a less than acceptable service most of the time.
- Cat, Essex
Only in Britain.How about a 50% reduction if you have to stand,after-all you are already paying for a seat.
- David, london
The argument about "seats with reservation label but left empty" is the biggest load of codswallop that I've ever read. Most people getting on long distance trains and finding that there is an empty seat simply ASK the adjacent passenger if the seat is already taken, or READ the label to see if it is actually reserved on the segment of the journey that they are at.
No - what we have is a company in dire financial straits desperately trying to make a few extra quid before the Department of Transport pulls the plug on their franchise.
- Kevin Steele, Blairgowrie, Scotland
