"Bevan Price" wrote in message
...


On 07/06/2010 21:41, Brian Robertson wrote:
Graham Harrison wrote:
I don't use my Senior Pass a lot (we don't have that many buses
round
here in rural Somerset) but when I do I get issued with a ticket.
I
was in London at the weekend and the drivers there were happy to
have
me simply show it to them - didn't even have to place it on the
Oyster reader. Was that correct? How do London organise the
funding?

Oh God, you'll start that old nutter from Preston off!

Anyway, it runs like this in Manchester at least. In the south of
Greater
Manchester Stagecoach issue a ticket. In the north, First don't.
The
operators seem to have an agrement with the PTE where an average
fare is
agreed for an average number of passengers using the passes. At no
time do
the drivers of either company have to record a boarding or
destination
stage.


For a while, First Manchester did issue tickets, but stopped doing
so - I think someone decided it was causing delays to services by
issuing lots of zero fare tickets.

Practice varies even within the same group. Arriva's Bolton depot
even asks your destination, which the driver enters into his machine
and this is shown on the ticket. Some depots issue tickets, but do
not ask your destination, and certain depots don't issue any tickets
at all - the driver just presses a button on the ticket machine.

To me it seems a waste of money to print lots of zero value tickets
when you also have a bus pass to show to that rarity - a bus ticket
travelling inspector.

Bevan

Depends on the agreement with the local authority???? After all, thay
are picking up the tab (or are supposed to be)....

In Reading, there seems to be two types of OAP free ticket issued -
whether the OAP has a "local" or an "out-of-town" pass.... in
Hampshire, IFAICS, a ticket is issued, and when the drivers module is
downloaded at the end of the day, the bus co has some idea of how many
OAP passes have been carried on each journey. Must help in the
planning, and in the accounting for repayment from LA....

If issuing a "zero value" ticket IS important, from the bus co's point
of view, then they WILL require the Road Inspectors to check that such
tickets are being issued. And RIs DO exist.