Amex travel voucher

[sam86]

I've got a headache...

 

[doogie004]

went this morning also i asked about the park and ride and it will be £1 per person either purchasing a travel voucher for £25 for the season or paying a pound on the day

 

[Tomnorthi]

Surely it would be much easier just to issue cards to those who have paid, which can then be shown to rail/bus staff within the area allowed?

 

[Yoda]

We went for our presentation this morning and asked lots of questions about the travel voucher.
It is £25 for 25 vouchers. Obviously this works out at £1 per voucher and they are valid within the previously set out region, but what we found out today is that the voucher is actually a discount voucher worth £3.
So if your return ticket to Falmer station is £5, then you will pay £2 + your voucher. Our return ticket from Newhaven is £3.10 so we will have to pay 10p on top. The day saver on the bus is £3.70 so you pay 70p.

I didn't ask about the Park & Ride as we won't be using that but I hope this info helps.

So, if like me, you're travelling from Worthing, you have to get a full return to Shoreham, then another using the voucher from there to Falmer if you want to use them?

 

[Gazwag]

So basically most people will think, sod it and try and park within walking distance as there is no real incentive to use P&R or public transport

 

[Herr Tubthumper]

So it's a discount voucher as opposed to a travelcard...which is what the current voucher effectively is.

 

[West Hoathly Seagull]

Presumably this means that folk travelling by train from Haywards Heath to Falmer and back will pay the following:-

Off Peak Day Return £5.40 - £2.40 to pay with an Albion voucher (net cost after paying for the voucher - £3.40)
Off-Peak Day Return (with Railcard) £3.55 - £0.55 to pay with an Albion voucher (net cost after paying for the voucher - £1.55)
Child Off Peak Day Return £2.70 - free with an Albion voucher (net cost after paying for the voucher - £1.00)

Ed, any idea what the 28 or 29 will cost from Lewes to Falmer? Or what it will cost from the manor of Glynde by train? Really not sure what to do now - may end up catching one of those Stage Door coaches from Forest Row and saving all the hassle. Only annoyance is I shall have to confine any drinking with me china plates to before the game rather than afterwards.

 

[les dynam]

seems unlikely. surely the current system will be retained which works really well. especially as they'll need the majority of people to use bus or train to get there

 

[West Hoathly Seagull]

So, when you're travelling from London, Manchester or somewhere further afield, how's that going to help? Will the discount vouchers be accepted at stations outside of Haywards Heath etc? The current system is perfect.. just buy a ticket from wherever to HH, job done.

Tim, Clapham Gull was trying to gauge at the last Seagulls over London meeting whether there will be demand for a coach from Haywards Heath to Falmer to meet people off the train and then take them back afterwards, to avoid the hassle of travelling via Brighton, especially on weekdays. If you are interested, drop him a PM.

 

[Lord Bracknell]

And what about people with a Railcard, travelling from Glynde? This may be a minority - but it includes ME.

Off-peak day return ticket from Glynde to Falmer (with a railcard) - £2.85.

Using an Albion voucher:-
Off-peak day return ticket from Glynde to Lewes (with a railcard & no voucher discount for this bit of the journey) - £2.05.
Off-peak day return ticket from Lewes to Falmer (with a railcard & an Albion Voucher) - Free (the rail fare is £2.20 return) + £1.00 for the voucher = £1.00.
Total cost - £3.05.

I certainly won't be buying vouchers - since they offer me only the privilege of paying 20p MORE to get to matches.

 

[Lord Bracknell]

Ed, any idea what the 28 or 29 will cost from Lewes to Falmer? Or what it will cost from the manor of Glynde by train? Really not sure what to do now - may end up catching one of those Stage Door coaches from Forest Row and saving all the hassle. Only annoyance is I shall have to confine any drinking with me china plates to before the game rather than afterwards.

Lewes is in the Brighton & Hove City Saver zone. The 28 and 29 buses from Lewes will cost the same as any bus journey starting in the city:- £3.70, without an Albion voucher. 70p with one (plus the £1 you'll have to pay to get one).

From Glynde, without a railcard - the best deal is a straightforward off-peak day return ticket to Falmer at £4.30. Using an Albion voucher will cost you 10 pence more, in total.

 

[West Hoathly Seagull]

And what about people with a Railcard, travelling from Glynde? This may be a minority - but it includes ME.

Off-peak day return ticket from Glynde to Falmer (with a railcard) - £2.85.

Using an Albion voucher:-
Off-peak day return ticket from Glynde to Lewes (with a railcard & no voucher discount for this bit of the journey) - £2.05.
Off-peak day return ticket from Lewes to Falmer (with a railcard & an Albion Voucher) - Free (the rail fare is £2.20 return) + £1.00 for the voucher = £1.00.
Total cost - £3.05.

I certainly won't be buying vouchers - since they offer me only the privilege of paying 20p MORE to get to matches.

Gold Card it is then. Buses not much good unless there is plentiful free parking near Lewes Prison (do Southdown Avenue, etc, have parking restrictions? Not sure if the residents will be too happy with football fans parking there anyway). I suppose the Nevill Estate isn't too far to walk from.

 

[Lord Bracknell]

Just a warning ... the rail prices I'm quoting are the prices quoted on the Southern website for on-line purchases. Cash fares paid on the day may be slightly more expensive.

 

[Easy 10]

Do you think they'd even factored in people using their Railcards in conjunction with this travel voucher scheme ? Strikes me as being a horrendously complicated transaction now.

Obviously something had to be intrroduced as we will no longer have a book of paper tickets as season tickets with the voucher attached. But I can't BELIEVE its not being kept nice n easy like the current system. If they had to hike up the price beyond £25 to discount it then fine, but this system seems totally arse-about-face.

 

[Lord Bracknell]

Gold Card it is then. Buses not much good unless there is plentiful free parking near Lewes Prison (do Southdown Avenue, etc, have parking restrictions? Not sure if the residents will be too happy with football fans parking there anyway). I suppose the Nevill Estate isn't too far to walk from.

Check out the maps ...

http://www.eastsussex.gov.uk/NR/rdonlyres/7126AAEB-E14C-495B-8C05-6E7A1D7C0CBB/0/lewes_parking_sub_zones.pdf

http://www.eastsussex.gov.uk/NR/rdonlyres/32677BFF-9665-4F7A-8E23-6FA444C3207B/0/parkinglinesamendedwithprices.pdf

Some of the on-street parking restrictions don't apply in the evenings and on Saturdays.

 

[Easy 10]

From the clubs point of view, I guess this method "insulates" them from rising travel costs and possible demands for rises from the bus/rail companies for this subisised travel, removing the possibility of in future having to increase their match/season ticket prices to accomodate the travel voucher aspect of it.

This way, for £1, they're just offering a flat rate £3 off whatever the cost of your travel is to the game, whatever price rises occur in future on the trains and buses.

I suppose looking at it that way it makes sense for them to do this, but its going to cause a lot of headaches working out what you're actually going to be stumping up.

 

[clippedgull]

So how would this work if you got the bus to the Amex but wanted to jump on the train back into Brighton? Unless the train / bus company come up with a football special ticket on match days I guess. I was at the presentation this morning also, and Ken Brown said that on match days and evenings the train company would be running extra services after the matches.

 

[Lord Bracknell]

So how would this work if you got the bus to the Amex but wanted to jump on the train back into Brighton? Unless the train / bus company come up with a football special ticket on match days I guess. I was at the presentation this morning also, and Ken Brown said that on match days and evenings the train company would be running extra services after the matches.

As the scheme has been described so far ... you'd have to use two vouchers.

 

[Lord Bracknell]

From the clubs point of view, I guess this method "insulates" them from rising travel costs and possible demands for rises from the bus/rail companies for this subisised travel, removing the possibility of in future having to increase their match/season ticket prices to accomodate the travel voucher aspect of it.

This way, for £1, they're just offering a flat rate £3 off whatever the cost of your travel is to the game, whatever price rises occur in future on the trains and buses.

I suppose looking at it that way it makes sense for them to do this, but its going to cause a lot of headaches working out what you're actually going to be stumping up.

I don't think that was the reasoning. The main issue that lay behind separating the travel voucher from the match day ticket was a VAT issue. VAT is payable on match tickets. Public transport fares are zero rated. Combined match tickets and public transport fares - VAT is chargeable on the cost of the whole package.

 

[Easy 10]

Ahh, I didn't know about the VAT aspect.

But it also makes sense to divorce the subsidised travel cost from the price of the match ticket itself instead of having it all lumped in, as it currently is. I've seen a lot of grumbles in the past from people who never use the travel vouchers but still have to pay the extra on their Withdean season ticket to have them.