Ticketing and Concessionary Travel on Public Transport - United ...

Ev 34 Transport Committee: Evidence
Mr Burton: Indeed, which is one reason why we are
not considering in detail accreditation at the
moment. The power we are looking for is the name
<strong>and</strong> address power because we see that as a small
step which may well make our oYcers much more
eYcient.
Q287 Mrs Ellman: Is there any future for people who
do not like electronic systems <strong>and</strong> just want to pay
to travel?
Mr Burton: That is an interesting question.
Q288 Chairman: All our questions are interesting!
Mr Verma: You are asking a crystal-gazing question
here. From the work we have been doing around the
future of technology around ticketing it does appear
that closer integration with the financial payment
system <strong>and</strong> closer integration with mobile phone
systems are things which are likely to happen very
quickly in the near future. Having said that, at this
moment we cannot see a way of eliminating
magnetic stripe ticketing. There will always be a
market for some infrequent users of the system who
do not have the right currency, whether that is an
Oyster card, a credit card or a mobile phone, <strong>and</strong> as
a public organisation we have the obligation to carry
everyone who shows up. In many ways the easiest
way to cater for people of that kind is to cater for
them through magnetic stripe ticketing, which is a
technology that already exists, it is tried <strong>and</strong> tested
<strong>and</strong> it works relatively flawlessly provided it is in
small numbers. If it was in very large numbers it
would be a real problem for us, but in small numbers
it is something which I think is going to be available
for a long time to come.
Q289 Mrs Ellman: What are these numbers? You
make it sound as if in the world of the future
somebody who wants to pay cash for a ticket <strong>and</strong> go
on a journey is going to be seen as some kind of
freak.
Mr Verma: 2% of people on buses <strong>and</strong> 3.7% on the
Underground still buy cash tickets, cash single
tickets. One day travelcards are also available on
paper tickets, which comprise another 9% of
journeys on the Underground.
Q290 Mrs Ellman: What about the impact of the
National <strong>Concessionary</strong> Scheme, which is due to
take eVect next year?
Mr Verma: I think in London, given that we have the
Freedom Pass, which allows pensioners to travel
across all of London, not just within their own local
authority areas, we have had a mini scheme running
for many years. When the English National
<strong>Concessionary</strong> Scheme comes into force there will be
some people from outside London who would want
to travel on our transport services, <strong>and</strong> indeed there
will be pensioners from London who will want to
travel in other parts of the country. We do not think
it is a major problem. There will be some increase in
traYc along that road, but it is not something which
is not manageable.
5 December 2007 Mr Shashi Verma <strong>and</strong> Mr Steve Burton
Q291 Mrs Ellman: Have you made any assessments?
Mr Verma: We have made assessments of the traYc
that we would expect coming from the concession
scheme.
Q292 Mrs Ellman: What have you concluded?
Mr Verma: I cannot recite the numbers oVh<strong>and</strong>, but
I can provide you with the numbers if you are
interested. The numbers are not numbers that we
would get particularly worried about carrying. It
also is important to note that the concession scheme,
whether it is the Freedom Pass or the English
national concession, has a watershed hour, nine
o’clock or half past nine, depending upon the
scheme. The real capacity constraints that we face on
our system are all before half past nine in the
morning, typically between 8.00 <strong>and</strong> 9.00 in the
morning, so we do not expect that this should
provide any capacity problems on the network. They
will result in higher operating costs, there will be
more buses running around in the middle of the day,
but we do not expect this to cause further capacity
problems over what we have got today.
Q293 Clive EVord: How is the cost of the
concessionary travel scheme in London covered?
Mr Verma: It is covered by the London councils
under the London boroughs.
Q294 Clive EVord: So you pass the cost on to local
authorities?
Mr Verma: Absolutely.
Q295 Clive EVord: Is that not why you are a bit
ambivalent about the cost at the moment?
Mr Verma: I did not comment on the cost. I was only
commenting on the fact that carrying these people is
not going to be a problem for us. There is a cost to
it, undoubtedly. As I said, there is an operating cost
of carrying these people <strong>and</strong> we would seek to
recover that. The point I was making was that
people sometimes get exercised about the fact that
this is going to cause capacity problems on the
network, but we do not foresee that happening.
Q296 Clive EVord: So if we have lots of people
travelling to London <strong>and</strong> using their national
concessionary card in the tourist centres of London,
for instance—<strong>and</strong> my local authority, Greenwich, is
one of the biggest tourist destinations outside central
London—will you be calculating where those cards
are used within London <strong>and</strong> then charging those
local authorities, or will that cost be spread across
London?
Mr Verma: We provide information. We have a
common deal with the London councils based on all
the London boroughs. We provide information to
London councils which enables them to apportion
the cost between the London boroughs <strong>and</strong> we will
continue to do that.
Q297 Clive EVord: Based on what?
Mr Verma: Until a few years ago it was based
entirely on surveys. We now combine the
information from surveys with the information