Fares & Ticketing
It doesn't matter how good your service looks, fares and ticketing will always be important in driving growth. It has to be straightforward.
Of course even free travel doesn't necessarily mean unlimited demand as our many concessions schemes prove.
Fares Review
Working with your sales data we can identify the most efficient ways to grow your fares revenue.
You could be considering a competitors actions, time for an annual increase, a simplification process or investigating the impact of flat fares.
Products
Is your advance off peak school holiday period return really selling that many tickets? How many tickets do your customers and front line staff need to trawl through to buy or sell one?
Product reviews can be undertaken, based on your sales data, that allow for simplification and evolution of your product range.
Multi Operator
With experience of setting up a multi operator bus ticketing scheme and having Board experience of a multi modal ticketing company we can advise you on founding agreements, revenue splits, ongoing management, sales and marketing.
We can also advise where a scheme might succeed and where demand is unlikely to be generated by a new scheme.
Concessions
We can advise on changes to concessionary schemes and investigate means to mitigate any financial impacts. Reviewing your usage data alongside your commercial fares data.
With experience of the Scottish national Under 22 scheme's introduction we can also advise other areas on potential scheme design, consultation and maximising uptake.
Case Study #3
Fares Simplification
Having a complex fares system is great if it means there's a specific product and price for individual passengers however it becomes very difficult to promote use to potential customers who cannot assess what meets their needs or offers best value.
Working through sales data we significantly simplified our product range from 80 single fares to 17, 28 zones to 17 and 16 price points for zonal fares down to 3.
Front line staff were involved in the process to ensure the simplification worked and was understood from a onboard sales point.
This was not designed to be a fares increase, this was to provide us with a sellable proposition for customers and stakeholders alike.
Post change analysis saw we increased patronage, improved customer satisfaction, increased sales through simplified digital channels and improved staff engagement.
Case Study #4
Multi Operator Ticketing
With involvement in the creation of a smart card based multi operator ticketing scheme in one Scottish city, and the subsequent roll out to a neighbouring rural area we have worked with large and small operators to deliver agreements, revenue splits and marketing plans.
Simply having a multi operator product does not mean demand will follow. Particularly where smaller operators cover only contracted networks with a high proportion of concessionary passengers being carried. The costs of maintaining back office systems, products and marketing may be greater than the revenue generated.
There are of course areas that do well from multi operator schemes where a real choice of operators or modes exists.