Yeah, totally recognise all these app flaws. In fact I wrote a ranty email to them this morning after having to scrabble about for change for the umpteenth time when the app refused to do anything. It's great when and if it works but it's rather unreliable which is a pity. Should be an incentive for buying your tickets that way too - it's exactly the same price and you are force to bulk buy. I've found the bus drivers to be pretty patient about it, they must see folk having bother a lot.
CityCyclingEdinburgh Forum » General Edinburgh
Lothian Buses launch virtual ticket app
(85 posts)-
Posted 9 years ago #
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"bus drivers to be pretty patient about it, they must see folk having bother a lot"
I wonder if they have given up feeding this back.
Bus passes don't seem to register particularly fast either, so cumulatively it must a significant effect on journey times.
LB might not care much about its current/captive userbase, but if trying to get people out of their cars, journey times matter.
Posted 9 years ago # -
The whole TfE/Lothian outfit needs to embrace contactless - and daily caps. No need for a whole oyster-system now that bank cards can fulfil that function - seasons could stay on separate cards.
They're getting rid of legacy options without actually replacing them with something better. I've used the app but was on the verge of buying another paper book to deal with the expiry and battery life issues. Carrying 2 tokens was zero wallet space.
Posted 9 years ago # -
I just found a new (?) feature on the m-tickets FAQ called "What does “Share Tickets” do?".
Now on my own I don't use 7 singles (7 to make up £10 minimum order) in 180 days, which is why I used paper CitySingles. But together with my wife I probably do. Maybe. So I could just get 7 tickets and give 3 or 4 to her to use in half a year.
Copy paste:
"Our latest feature, “Ticket Sharing” allows you to send one or more of the tickets in your account to somebody else to use instead.
Simply tap “Share Tickets” to be taken to a page listing all your available tickets, and toggle the tickets you want to send. After hitting confirm, your tickets will be immediately transferred out of your account. You can then tap the “share” button on the confirmation page to choose how you want to send the sharing link – email, Bluetooth, NFC it’s up to you! Once your recipient has received the sharing link, they simply need to open it on their device with the m-tickets app installed to claim their tickets.
Each share link can only be used once, so if you send the same link to multiple recipients, the tickets will be transferred to whoever uses the link first. Both you and the recipient will need a good Wi-Fi or cellular data connection to be able to share tickets. An individual ticket can only be sent to another user once – that ticket cannot then be sent to someone else again once it has been claimed.
"
(Disclaimer: I haven't tested it myself, I don't know how/if it actually works.)In fact, why not scale it up and get a group of friends to share with them however many tickets people think they'll use in 6 months. So pool the small orders into one big order and share the tickets out again.
Or even with people on a particular web forum? :-)
Downside: there's going to be one busy person sharing out tickets, emailing links and chasing £1.50 payments.
Posted 9 years ago # -
That sounds useful although I'm sure they could have designed it so that the ticket stays in your account until the recipient actions the request.
The method they have gone with seems to fit with their general ethos to ticketing and payments.
Posted 9 years ago # -
The share ticket system works. wife sent me one the other week. Driver was happy to wait a few seconds until I managed to open it!
Posted 9 years ago # -
"
Each share link can only be used once, so if you send the same link to multiple recipients, the tickets will be transferred to whoever uses the link first. Both you and the recipient will need a good Wi-Fi or cellular data connection to be able to share tickets.
"
"Driver was happy to wait a few seconds until I managed to open it!"
And LB thinks this is the best way to run a ticketing system in the 20th C...
Posted 9 years ago # -
"Driver was happy to wait a few seconds until I managed to open it!"
I guess the drivers are unaware of corporate policy where even removing parking create unacceptable delays.
Posted 9 years ago # -
petition to keep city singles
https://you.38degrees.org.uk/petitions/lothian-buses-to-continue-seling-adult-city-single-books
Posted 9 years ago # -
I don't think we can blame LB for MrsB and me leaving it to the last minute to check we both had eTickets on our phones!
I like the phone ticket idea. Its easy and convenient. The biggest downside is the minimum spend part. I should be able to just buy a ticket and thats it.
I did wonder at the expiry date when I first started using it and thought it was a bit iffy. However, even a non frequent bus traveler like myself is yet to come a cropper. The new sharing function will make that even less likely.
It may very well not be the best way to run a ticketing system, but its a way that works, and a way that a low tech bloke like me can use easily and relatively happily!
I'm much more grumpy about the new double deckers LB have bought. Don't like their design one bit. London's new DD's on the other hand are a thing of beauty. IMHO of course.
Posted 9 years ago # -
I can't understand why all transport authorities haven't gone down the contactless card/oyster route. It's tried and tested, very efficient, reduces wait time for buses, and has virtually 100% takeup (because it's good).
Posted 9 years ago # -
Seconded. The mobile phone app is a faff, imo.
Posted 9 years ago # -
I can't understand why all transport authorities haven't gone down the contactless card/oyster route. It's tried and tested, very efficient, reduces wait time for buses, and has virtually 100% takeup (because it's good)."
It may have virtually 100% take up because there is not a cash alternative way of paying, for a single journey in London its a pain, you have to pay £5 for the card, then top it, may end up costing as much as Cab.
It would depend on the types of customer and journeys completed would Edinburgh have a higher percentage of one journey customers compared London for example. For single journey customers is not much good.
Posted 9 years ago # -
I can't understand why all transport authorities haven't gone down the contactless card/oyster route.
I believe there are issues with expense of setting those sort of systems up, data management costs, in-bus equipment requirements, secure storage of personal data, etc. Lothian Buses' app is relatively simple, plus has the added bonus that customers give nice little interest free loan to LB by buying tickets in advance.
There also the transport operators' perennial farebox protection obsession, which puts them off anything that might encourage their passengers to use another operator's service, despite the likelihood that making it easier of passengers would lead to a rising tide that would lift all the boats. Hence the need to force them into a universal smart ticket.
Posted 9 years ago # -
It may have virtually 100% take up because there is not a cash alternative way of paying, for a single journey in London its a pain, you have to pay £5 for the card, then top it, may end up costing as much as Cab.
You did with Oyster, but contactless (bank card/credit card) has removed that need for a prepaid card.
Posted 9 years ago # -
It may have virtually 100% take up because there is not a cash alternative way of paying, for a single journey in London its a pain, you have to pay £5 for the card, then top it, may end up costing as much as Cab.
As PS has said above, no need to buy a card now. Also, you could hand back the oyster card for a refund of your £5 and any credit left at one of the machines in pretty much any station. It's like the dark ages in comparison here.Posted 9 years ago # -
I use the app quite frequently as I cycle infrequently enough that I use the bus enough to use my tickets without them expiring.
It really is not the best app in the world. It's slow, unstable and the £10 minimum is an absolute pain, especially if visiting.
Contactless in London is absolutely excellent. I've gone down for the day, got the DLR in from City airport to my destination in the morning, with 2 changes, and back again in the evening. Paid using contactless at a total cost of £3.60. I needed to expense it but didn't have any physical tickets or receipts - no problem, go onto the TfL website, enter your card number, and bingo - a statement is available for a week after. Had I travelled a bit more, I'd have been capped at a day ticket.
Fast forward to Edinburgh - doing the same, I'd have to pay as I go. Buy a new ticket for changing bus, pulling out £1.50 at a time. Keep paying having spent well over a day ticket's value. The app would be no use as I'd be spending £10 for tickets I won't use.
A reasonable compromise on the app would at least be to have an e-wallet, minimum top up of £10 (if they insist that no transaction under £10 is economical, which I doubt), from which you can then "activate" tickets as you require. Rather than having to buy 7 singles to get to £10, then thinking one day you need a day ticket but can't get that in the app without spending another £10.
The need to select separate bus or tram tickets also flies in the face of a "single ticketing" approach. Ridiculous also that a parent with child can't have an adult and child's ticket active and use that on the bus. It's not exactly user friendly.
Ideal solution would be contactless card, or an oyster card type system. I believe the argument against goes that there isn't sufficient signal strength in the city for all buses to be connected to the central database and be able to read cards then make the appropriate connection for payment. Instead the data is held on the card, with the reader making the appropriate changes to the card data rather than having to use the card as a means to access a database.
I would have thought that now, the roll out of 4G etc would have made it more likely to work. Issues may be with some of the out of the way locations like Pencaitland...
Posted 9 years ago # -
It was also a long time before the cash option was removed, by which time it had virtually 100% take up. Something about it must have been right.
Posted 9 years ago # -
Contactless doesn't have to be online ie the payment isn't authorised until later, in fact most of the time the card makes the decision not the bank so data connection is hardly an excuse.
Posted 9 years ago # -
Before banning cash on London buses there was still the ticket machines near the bus stop where could buy a ticket (like the tram), Edinburgh does not have the street ticket machines either. It may be nice if there was a card for the tram, would use that as I use the tram at least once a week. So many times I have got to the tram on time but not enough time to buy a ticket and have to wait till next one. Almost never use the bus as use my bike or bike on tram. Would also be good if had one for the train.
Posted 9 years ago # -
"The need to select separate bus or tram tickets also flies in the face of a "single ticketing" approach. Ridiculous also that a parent with child can't have an adult and child's ticket active and use that on the bus. It's not exactly user friendly."
Err, you can. Or do you mean there is no strict 1 adult 1 child ticket available.
The family day ticket is transferable between bus and tram, as is a n adult day ticket and a child day ticket.
It makes no real sense (to me) that you can select bus tickets or tram tickets on the app - because they are in effect one and the same.
Posted 9 years ago # -
"Fast forward to Edinburgh - doing the same, I'd have to pay as I go. Buy a new ticket for changing bus, pulling out £1.50 at a time. Keep paying having spent well over a day ticket's value. The app would be no use as I'd be spending £10 for tickets I won't use."
You just buy a day ticket if you'll use more than two buses in total. Much cheaper, £4 for unlimited travel, except to the airport.
Posted 9 years ago # -
"You just buy a day ticket if you'll use more than two buses in total. Much cheaper, £4 for unlimited travel, except to the airport."
But the point is, if you don't know what you're going to do then the beauty of the London system is no matter what, you pay for a day ticket. In Edinburgh you just keep paying... The beauty of a good, frequent bus service is the ability to go where you want without the need to plan every step of your journey in advance. That should extend to ticketing.
@Bikeability - I thought you couldn't get kids tickets on the app? Certainly looks like it, unless you do a family day ticket? I was also under the impression you can't use one phone to activate tickets for two people...
Are bus and tram tickets not different in the app? Tram tickets I think have a QR code that you scan on the stop to activate them, whereas bus tickets have a screen which flashes for 5 mins before expiring.
Posted 9 years ago # -
"But the point is, if you don't know what you're going to do then the beauty of the London system is no matter what, you pay for a day ticket. In Edinburgh you just keep paying... "
That's all very well if you have the kind of budget TfL have at their disposal. If Edinburgh had the same per capita budget, maybe we'd have a sophisticated system like that. Not that this excuses Lothian Buses from not integrating its tickets properly or making the system more user friendly. Many European cities manage it.
Also they really should not get rid of the carnets of printed day single tickets: a retrograde step.
Posted 9 years ago # -
The London bus ticketing system is specified, owned and operated by the public sector (TfL), which can act in the public interest. London buses are massively subsidised (around £800m per year) and provided on a franchised basis. TfL pays for the operator a set fee to provide the service and gets to keep any fares income.
Lothian, although publicly owned, has to act as a commercial company. There is no inventive to introduce daily capping, as it would reduce income. There is a real commercial dis-incentive in getting together with other operators to develop a joint ticketing system. Until the Scottish Government acts, we will be stuck with whatever the operators can afford, or consider is in their interests, to provide.
Posted 9 years ago #
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