The Ticket Collector

Virgin VIP awayday invitation for 75 sent to 76,000.

An Email from Virgin Trains head office promised a select few a special day: five-star pampering, champagne, golf and feasting, all laid on free at an exclusive country hotel. But the luxurious event on May 28 was sent not to a select few customers as originally planned, but was sent to 76,000 ‘normal’ customers.

Virgin Trains was forced to issue a mass apology yesterday after making the offer, intended for 75 members of its first-class Traveller club, to its general passenger database.

The Email, sent on Tuesday by Virgin Train’s traveller manager, was headlined “Now really cancel everything”.

People who took the email to heart were told they would be transported first-class on May 28 to play golf or relax in the spa at The Grove, near Watford, Hertfordshire.

When TheTicketCollector.co.uk called the hotline we were told the offer could not be honoured, as it had been sent to over 76,000 people. The Virgin Trains employee we spoke to on the hotline said: “The Email was sent out to every single person whose Email we hold, which is around 76,000″. They continued, stating “The invitation had been a “test email” distributed in error by our IT department, and that the mailing had been interrupted before all people could receive it.

TheTicketCollector.co.uk has contacted Virgin Trains and a spokesman has said “It was human error and were sorry for someone pressing the wrong button, however in order to make it up to people we will be entering the name of every person who received the email into a draw and 5 people will win the golf and spa trip”.

FGW Train Maintenance and Cleaning staff to strike

First Great Western staff based at Bristol, Reading, Oxford, Penzance, Exeter, Plymouth, Swansea, and Old Oak Common in London will not book on for shifts that begin after 00:01 on May 18 for 24 hours.

This is due to the company’s refusal to pay an enhanced rate of pay for overtime and or to concede a 35-hour week at the Reading and Exeter depots.

“The vast majority of FGW engineering and cleaning staff are still paid the flat hourly rate for their overtime, rather than the time-and-a-quarter enjoyed by other FGW staff, including train-crew and station staff,” RMT general secretary Bob Crow said today.

“Most FGW staff already work a 35-hour week, but we have some engineering grades at Reading still on 42 hours - effectively working an extra day a week for nothing.

“For months we have tried to get the company to recognise that engineering grades have the right to the same treatment as other grades, but the company has dug in its heels and that is an absolute disgrace.

“The company has now tried to confuse matters by pretending that what is a straightforward case of equal treatment can only now be resolved in wider harmonisation talks, and that is simply not good enough.

“The company’s refusal to budge leaves us with no alternative but to strike, and the RMT executive has today agreed that the members involved will strike for 24 hours on May 18,” Bob Crow said.

NXEC tickets are a rip-off.

On the May 18th many of the UK’s Train Companies tickets will increase in price. We have been looking at the new fares and have noticed that many of National Express East Coast’s (NXEC) advance purchase tickets will just disappear and become just “advance”.

NXEC have 8 advance tickets all charged at different prices. 4 First Class singles and 4 Standard Class singles. Each of these are charged at varying levels and of course there are only so many of each available to buy on each train. Now come the 18th May there will be a ticket name change and of course NXEC are using this as an excuse to reduce the availability of each of the above tickets, forcing you to buy a more expensive ticket.

We have many visitors from Peterborough on this site so we have also compared prices with NXEC’s tickets and First Capital Connect (FCC), and came to a shocking discovery.
In one case a Peak Return from Peterborough to London Kings Cross was £80 with NXEC. It is £40 with FCC. That is 50% cheaper and if you catch the FCC express service from Peterborough there is not a lot of difference in time.

Peterborough to Kings Cross Comparison
Peak Single
NXEC £40.00 FCC £23.20

Peak Return
NXEC £80.00 FCC £40.00

Weekly Season
NXEC £139.00 FCC £112.00

Cheap Day Return
NXEC £24.60 FCC £20.00

Peak Travelcard
NXEC £85.90 FCC £46.00

Off Peak Travelcard
NXEC £27.80 FCC £25.00

Weekly Travelcard
NXEC £151.40 FCC £135.00

NXEC have refused to reply to our various Emails, which based on their past incompetent customer service, seems to be the norm.

Fares ‘revision’ 18th May.

On the 18th May the new revised fares will be coming into effect on the National Network. Some companies have withdrawn some tickets and replaced them with more expensive tickets.

In January 2008 the overall allowable average increase for regulated fares Peak day and Season Tickets was 4.8%, with variations by flow and ticket type up to a maximum 9.8% increase.

Some Train Companies did not use the full yearly increase and therefore will be increasing the tickets to the yearly maximum this time around.

National Express East Coast (NXEC) will be increasing their already expensive tickets some more in May. We have also received reports (from an unnamed travel centre clerk) that they will charge everyone without an advance ticket a seat reservation charge of £1 for each seat reserved. Is this to stop the season ticket holders reserving seats, or is it to pay for for a new seat reservation printer so they can finally put out reservations 07:20 at Peterborough and late night services out of Kings Cross?

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