Fare Increase?

Posted on by

Rail Ten Trip Users Could be Facing a Technical Fare Increase

 

NOTE: Before you continue you must acknowledge the following:

Veolia Transport (the operator of commuter rail services in Auckland) has no control over fares that are charged to passengers. Auckland Transport are the ones who are responsibility for overseeing the fares. Per the legislation, Auckland Transport as a Council Controlled Organisation is overseen by the Auckland Council Accountability and Performance Committee chaired by Councillor Richard Northery 

 

[Note from Admin] A correction has been made here after being alerted to an error in my statements in this particular post. It is the Accountability and Performance Committee chaired by Cllr Richard Northey that “oversees” Auckland Transport as a CCO, NOT the Transport Committee chaired by Cllr Mike Lee. BR:AKL wishes to apologies to Councillor Lee for incorrect reporting in this post and the earlier implications made about the Transport Committee. It is of note that BR:AKL wishes to stress to readers that Councillor Lee is an avid supporter of public transport and strongly opposes fare rises on the public transport system. 

 

IF YOU HAVE ANY QUESTIONS, QUERIES OR COMPLAINTS ON FARE MOVEMENTS WITH AT-HOP THEN CONTACT ANYONE OF THESE AUCKLAND COUNCILLORS ON THE ACCOUNTABILITY AND PERFORMANCE COMMITTEE WITH YOUR CONCERN. THEY ARE THE ONES THAT CAN HELP YOU (or Auckland Transport themselves) WITH YOUR CONCERN – NO ONE ELSE!

 

Accountability and Performance Committee

Membership

Richard Northey (Chairperson)
All councillors (including The Mayor) are members of this committee

Contact details are listed HERE.

 

Right now to the article itself

Are Ten Trip Users About to Pay More?

Yesterday I had posted on bus fares increasing in the Waikato, well feedback after that post came back to me pointing out there is a (as I am putting it) a technical price movement coming up for some rail commuters in Auckland.

Through feedback that comes my way from time to time, a regular rail passenger who uses ten-tip tickets raised a concern that their cost of commuting would rise when the current ten-trip paper tickets used on the trains would be phased out to AT-HOP store valued cards – as part of the roll out for Auckland’s integrated ticketing regime. The passenger concerned uses a 1-stage ten-trip ticket at the cost of $16.00 (so $1.60 per ride) but from October 28th would need to switch to an AT-HOP card and use stored value in order to use the trains. According to Auckland Transport, when using AT-HOP stored value instead of cash for your trip you get up to 10% discount of a standard cash fare. Okay so that means your trip using AT-HOP stored value would be around $1.71 per trip (instead of $1.60 per trip as with the current but phasing out ten-trips).

 

This is the AT site that states the discount (http://www.aucklandtransport.govt.nz/improving-transport/aifs/Pages/default.aspx):

Auckland Integrated Fares System  

The Auckland Integrated Fares System (AIFS) project, branded Auckland Transport HOP (AT HOP), is the creation of an integrated smartcard ticketing system that can be used on all modes of Auckland’s public transport system.

Auckland Transport has been working with Thales to develop the technology that will be required to implement the system. This includes the back-end system, retail and top-up devices and the tag-on/off devices for rail and ferry.

Benefits for AT HOP card holders

  • Travel on Auckland’s buses, rails and ferries by means of a reuseable, prepay smartcard.
  • Once fully implemented, there will be no need to buy different tickets for different operators
  • Can avoid having to carry cash for travel
  • Get up to 10% discount on cash fares
  • Travel for free on city LINK
  • By registering the AT HOP card customers avoid losing money on their card if they lose it. They can call the AT HOP contact centre, cancel the lost card and transfer their funds on to a replacement AT HOP card.
  • Manage their AT HOP card and accounts online. They can watch their employees’ or their children’s travel activity
  • Have multiple convenient locations to top-up including online. AT HOP cards can also be topped up at retailers, service centres, ticket and top-up machines.
  • Can set up an auto-reload option to manage their travel budget. That means you can set your card to top up the balance when it gets down to a certain level.  They can set it and forget it.
  • Faster boarding times as customers simply tag on and off.  Tagging off means paying the lowest fare
  • Benefits for the city and the transport system: more efficient revenue-collection/minimising fraud

Okay we seem to have a slight issue here folks. Now just to make sure everyone is on the same page I am going to embed the current train fare guide for Single and Ten Trips, and the brochure explaining the ticketing regime change (ten trips are mentioned on the top part of the two halves of the brochure)

The Current Ticket Fares

The Brochure giving a short outline of the incoming changes to tickets

 

Now to make this perfectly clear here: THE PRICE OF SINGLE FARES (using Cash as this is the base fare) IS NOT MOVING UP OR DOWN – THEY STAY THE SAME AS PER THE FARE GUIDE. As for Monthly Passes – not sure although note the issue here.

But what is moving is cost per trip for a ten-trip ticket user who transitions over to AT-HOP stored value (like a prepay card).

This PDF chart shows the movement (both up and down) of one’s cost per trip on the rail network as they transition over from a ten-trip paper ticket to an AT-HOP store valued card:

(I would click on the download button or the actual document itself to see the fare movements)

 

The information and calculated has been derived from the Auckland Transport material both paper and websites, as well as the current Fare Guide which is also set by Auckland Transport.

But you can see this 1-stage ten-trip passenger is going to get slugged with a 6.88% MINIMUM increase as they transition over from the old paper system to the new AT-HOP stored value system. However again looking at the chart, some passengers either face no increases or in one case they actually get a DECREASE (as little as it was). But there is another catch, remember I said ‘MINIMUM,’ well that is because of this again from AT:

Get up to 10% discount on cash fares

UP-TO folks, meaning you MIGHT not get the FULL 10% discount which means the cost of your trip increases further.

 

So a technical price movement in the cost per trip for the ten-trip riders is incoming and not much advertising there from AT or Auckland Council

 

Remember though:

IF YOU HAVE ANY QUESTIONS, QUERIES OR COMPLAINTS ON FARE MOVEMENTS WITH AT-HOP THEN CONTACT ANYONE OF THESE AUCKLAND COUNCILLORS ON THE ACCOUNTABILITY AND PERFORMANCE COMMITTEE WITH YOUR CONCERN. THEY ARE THE ONES THAT CAN HELP YOU (or Auckland Transport themselves) WITH YOUR CONCERN – NO ONE ELSE!

About these ads