Leap Card-Dublin Bus

jeffk

After a recent trip on the bus/dart and being overcharged on the bus(around €2 between herself and I, which was covered by a travel 90 ticket in the post)

Am i using the leap card wrong? Should i get on like the old days and say the fare or do i get on and say the street etc? I know the top fare you just scan the leap card

dublinstevie

always state the destination, that way theres no confusion, use the fare calculator on dublin bus app so that you know you are right if overcharged

jeffk

dublinstevie wrote: »

always state the destination, that way theres no confusion, use the fare calculator on dublin bus app so that you know you are right if overcharged

Grand thanks, thats what I do and wanted to be sure.

Yeah I used that to be sure, handy as theres loads of blue pins on the map but they dont mean charged stages

bk

The rule says state your destination.

In practice, most people just tell the driver the amount.

I'd say state your destination if your not sure and once you get to know your route and the price, just state the price in future.

IME drivers themselves often aren't sure what the fare should be when you state a destination, I think often they just guess the fare themselves.

AlekSmart

bk wrote: »

The rule says state your destination.

In practice, most people just tell the driver the amount.

I'd say state your destination if your not sure and once you get to know your route and the price, just state the price in future.

IME drivers themselves often aren't sure what the fare should be when you state a destination, I think often they just guess the fare themselves.

Guessing the fare would have been a vaild point up to the introduction of automatic stage updating.

Currently the system updates automatically via GPS as the journey proceeds.

Where issues do arise,is usually when a passenger boards and/or alights between stage points,as in these cases,the fare is calculated from the preceeding stage to the boarding point and charged to the succeeding (following) stage to the alighting point.

The fare-stage system is a direct throwback to the early days of Public Transport,and eminently suitable for Conductor operation,but it does demand a degree of Passenger Familiarization as to the location of the actual stage (which is ALWAYS an individual stop). This familiarization was rendered impossible by a decision some years back to remove ALL Stage Markings from the relevant Bus Stops.

Effectively operating a Fare-Stage system,where the actual Fare Stages are concealed is Impossible.

No public announcement or reason was forthcoming for this mass deletion,but it led to over a decade of regular (yet TOTALLY avoidable) arguements and ill-feeling.

Under the new,improved Public Transport Regime in Dublin,the introduction of a charging regime based upon the requirements of 21st Century Commuters should have been an absolute No:1 priority,attended to from Day 1,however it continues to be long-fingered,studied and referred back for further consultation whilst all around it the pressures on the 19th Century Fare-Stage system continue to mount.

Keep It Simple,Stupid continues to be a very appropriate piece of advice....:D

jeffk

Well that didn't work

Told driver 2.05,up on machine flat fare 2.60

Be back onto them again, put you using bus

devnull

If you tell the driver your fare you should use the machine on the drivers ticket machine not the machine to the right of the door.

jeffk

devnull wrote:

If you tell the driver your fare you should use the machine on the drivers ticket machine not the machine to the right of the door.

Ah thanks, they never once said to use their machine, the customer care rep never even said did I use the wrong one.

It's years since I used it, so am totally lost, at least I know now

punisher5112

jeffk wrote: »

Ah thanks, they never once said to use their machine, the customer care rep never even said did I use the wrong one.

It's years since I used it, so am totally lost, at least I know now

No matter what even if there are only 2 stops to the terminus you will be charged €2.60 if you use the validator at the door.

If you know the fare is €2.60 use this machine but for shorter distances use the drivers machine.

The travel90 discount is automatically applied(taken off).

You have a daily cap of €7 which is the most any one person will pay no matter how much they use the service.

For to make it easier for you and the driver its much easier if you state destination and fare price once known.

If you use regularly you can also buy rambler product and load it onto the card.
If you have a rambler loaded it will automatically use this when you tag at the door and if you don't want to use it if rambler is loaded you then need to go to drivers machine to use the cash purse.

bk

jeffk wrote: »

Ah thanks, they never once said to use their machine, the customer care rep never even said did I use the wrong one.

It's years since I used it, so am totally lost, at least I know now

No need to feel bad. The current system is really badly designed and is customer unfriendly.

As Alek says above, it really needs to be redesigned with "keep it simple" in mind.

Ideally a flat fare or tag-on/tag-off system.

Your experience is a good example of the difficulty many people experience every day, hopefully it will get fixed in future.

ED E

Can we not copy TFL and their system? Flat pricing, accepts VISA etc.

devnull

ED E wrote: »

Can we not copy TFL and their system? Flat pricing, accepts VISA etc.

This has been explained before, but there are operational, technical and financial considerations with the present model of transport in Ireland that mean it's not as straightforward as London.

When these considerations are addressed in the coming years it will allow a more straightforward move to a flat fare system and the user of newer technology.

jeffk

Whats makes me laugh or angry is between journeys and an email exchange, six dublin bus employees never pointed out/suggested i was using the wrong machine

Someone else said to copy london and/or train/luas, tap on and tap off.
But even then the fare structure is a joke , E2.05 ten minutes down the road, extra 55C and i'd get to the other side of dublin

bk

jeffk wrote: »

Someone else said to copy london and/or train/luas, tap on and tap off.
But even then the fare structure is a joke , E2.05 ten minutes down the road, extra 55C and i'd get to the other side of dublin

Well a flat fare lke London would actually make that worse. You would pay the same for a 5 minute journey as you would for a 60 minute journey.

But it does have benefits in making buses much easier to use and reducing dwell time (thus decreasing journey times).

Where it has been tried before it has usually been very successful and lead to increasing number of bus users, despite some people paying more.

A Tag-on/tag-off system could allow for more "fair" pricing. For instance in Amsterdam they do tag-on/tag-off, you pay 80c when you board and then an additional 14c per km travelled. You can also change between buses, trams and metros and you don't pay the 80c boarding fare, instead you just continue to pay the per km fare. So basically you pay for the distance you travel.

This is the other option and it fixes some of the fare box concerns devnull mentions above. But it is also more complicated to implement then flat fare, specially with Dublin Bus still having lots of single door buses. Tag-on/tag-off works best where you tag-on while boarding at the front door, tag-off while exiting via the rear door. Though I have to say, I think even tagging-off at the front door would be better then the current system.

jeffk

bk either of these systems sounds great, but sadly being Ireland makes too much sense and will never happen

Maybe the new bus operators might shake the system up and hopefully in a good way, too long of only one show in town

devnull

The reason for the lack of a tag off is because the ticket machines are built on technology that was seen in personal computers over 20 years ago and were replaced by a newer more modern machine by the manufacturers even before Dublin Bus installed them into it's fleet in 2006. The machines simply do not have the specification to either have a live always on network connection to verify data or to store information necessary to carry out this functionality.

The machines are very much struggling with their workload as it is, which is why if someone uses a leap card and the next person uses cash the driver has to come out of one app and go into another with a little bit of lag, they are being pushed much harder than they were intended for and really are obsolete and not suitable for the role that they are now performing,

The issue with having a flat fare is that all of the companies are dependent on farebox revenue to operate their services and fund their operations. They do not want to switch to a flat fare option in one big bang because there is serious questions on how it will effect their finances, what has happened however over the last number of years is that the number of fare variations has been steadily getting lower, for example there are now 3 core fare bands on Dublin Bus, some years ago there used to be 6 and similar simplificiation has happened on Irish Rail.

The future idea is that the operators will be moved to a model where the fares will go straight to the National Transport Authority and the operators will be paid a set fee to run the routes. This means that rather than having 4-5 companies all of which who are worried about their revenue and arguing about what they can and cannot sustain, the NTA will be able to deal with this directly itself without having to consult many other parties and getting them to agree.

bk

jeffk wrote: »

bk either of these systems sounds great, but sadly being Ireland makes too much sense and will never happen

Maybe the new bus operators might shake the system up and hopefully in a good way, too long of only one show in town

Oh it will happen. Ticketing is now under the control of the NTA and they will likely force one of the above options over the next few years IMO. It has been obvious that they are gradually moving to a flat fare over the last few years with the changes to the fare bands.

tubbs26

devnull wrote: »

The reason for the lack of a tag off is because the ticket machines are built on technology that was seen in personal computers over 20 years ago and were replaced by a newer more modern machine by the manufacturers even before Dublin Bus installed them into it's fleet in 2006. The machines simply do not have the specification to either have a live always on network connection to verify data or to store information necessary to carry out this functionality.

The machines are very much struggling with their workload as it is, which is why if someone uses a leap card and the next person uses cash the driver has to come out of one app and go into another with a little bit of lag, they are being pushed much harder than they were intended for and really are obsolete and not suitable for the role that they are now performing,

The issue with having a flat fare is that all of the companies are dependent on farebox revenue to operate their services and fund their operations. They do not want to switch to a flat fare option in one big bang because there is serious questions on how it will effect their finances, what has happened however over the last number of years is that the number of fare variations has been steadily getting lower, for example there are now 3 core fare bands on Dublin Bus, some years ago there used to be 6 and similar simplificiation has happened on Irish Rail.

The future idea is that the operators will be moved to a model where the fares will go straight to the National Transport Authority and the operators will be paid a set fee to run the routes. This means that rather than having 4-5 companies all of which who are worried about their revenue and arguing about what they can and cannot sustain, the NTA will be able to deal with this directly itself without having to consult many other parties and getting them to agree.

Does anyone know what it would cost to put validators on every bus stop? Tag on and off from there. I presume its prohibitively expensive

Dravokivich

tubbs26 wrote: »

Does anyone know what it would cost to put validators on every bus stop? Tag on and off from there. I presume its prohibitively expensive

There's thousands of stops and there'd be a few hundred in remote location too. Look at how long they are taking to expand the rtpi poles.

You'll also need to maintain them. Luas works because of the limited number of stops, you can use any validator at the stop and are going 1 of 2 directions. Won't be as usefull with an onstreet stop for Dublin bus. Where you can have any number of routes going multiple directions.

bk

tubbs26 wrote: »

Does anyone know what it would cost to put validators on every bus stop? Tag on and off from there. I presume its prohibitively expensive

As Dravokivich says there are literally thousands of stops, and they would require power and connectivity.

If you want to go with that model, probably easier to just put multiple readers throughout the bus, like they do in Poland.

Having said that, they could have done it on the RTPI poles, it would have at least covered the busy stops (where RTPI poles tend to be placed). But then that might have been a bit confusing. Consistency is important for services like this.

In the end, all of the above options are probably more expensive then just moving to a flat fare and yes even subsidising for any loss of fare box revenue as a result.

dfx-

bk wrote: »

The rule says state your destination.

In practice, most people just tell the driver the amount.

I'd say state your destination if your not sure and once you get to know your route and the price, just state the price in future.

IME drivers themselves often aren't sure what the fare should be when you state a destination, I think often they just guess the fare themselves.

From extensive personal experience, tell the driver the fare. There are a lot of drivers who do not common details or every street of their route. Some don't know about Rambler tickets either or how to access that menu. They will often just guess or pick the final stop to cover it if they don't know. Marked in or regular drivers on the route will know, but drivers that will be on different route every day likely won't.

It doesn't affect me as much as I will reach the weekly or daily cap anyway, but it happens a lot.

ED E

Lots of drivers clearly guess a random button, but you can't blame them with the existing stage system.

LXFlyer

ED E wrote: »

Lots of drivers clearly guess a random button, but you can't blame them with the existing stage system.

You do realise that the stages are updated automatically on the ticket machines by the GPS - the machines show the which stops each fare expires at.

So there is very limited scope for "guesswork".

bk

LXFlyer wrote: »

You do realise that the stages are updated automatically on the ticket machines by the GPS - the machines show the which stops each fare expires at.

So there is very limited scope for "guesswork".

The GPS only shows them their current location and stage. Unless the driver is very familiar with the route (marked in on that route), then s/he may only have a basic knowledge of where the stages are ahead of them and when a passenger states a destination*, they have to try and figure out what stage that stop lies on and then do the maths on how many stages that is compared to the current stage and then figure out which fare band that falls under!

* and the destination stated maybe a road that has multiple stops and stages on it. If someone just says Drumcondra Road, which stage/stop do you as a driver pick.

Poor drivers having to do that sort of mental gymnastics while also having to operate a bus safely!

IME most of them just shrug and guess and I totally don't blame them for that. It is a broken system.

LXFlyer

bk wrote: »

The GPS only shows them their current location and stage. Unless the driver is very familiar with the route (marked in on that route), then s/he may only have a basic knowledge of where the stages are ahead of them and when a passenger states a destination*, they have to try and figure out what stage that stop lies on and then do the maths on how many stages that is compared to the current stage and then figure out which fare band that falls under!

* and the destination stated maybe a road that has multiple stops and stages on it. If someone just says Drumcondra Road, which stage/stop do you as a driver pick.

Poor drivers having to do that sort of mental gymnastics while also having to operate a bus safely!

IME most of them just shrug and guess and I totally don't blame them for that. It is a broken system.

The ticket machine screen shows the driver the name of each stop where each fare expires on a live basis as they progress along the route.

They don't do any maths or adding stages etc. That is nonsense to be honest.

All they need to know is where the stop actually is.

bk

LXFlyer wrote: »

The ticket machine screen shows the driver the name of each stop where each fare expires on a live basis as they progress along the route.

They don't do any maths or adding stages etc. That is nonsense to be honest.

All they need to know is where the stop actually is.

I know, but that totally ignores the fact that you might have multiple stops/stages on a particular road. If someone just asks for Drumcondra Road, most drivers aren't going to bother to interrogate the person on which stop exactly on Drumcondra Road. IME they will shrug their shoulders and guess.

LXFlyer

bk wrote: »

I know, but that totally ignores the fact that you might have multiple stops/stages on a particular road. If someone just asks for Drumcondra Road, most drivers aren't going to bother to interrogate the person on which stop exactly on Drumcondra Road. IME they will shrug their shoulders and guess.

You know???

Well then why are you posting drivel about drivers adding up stages and inaccurate information about their machine displays that has no bearing with the reality?

In the case of your example above, don't you think it might be more sensible for the passenger to tell the driver where they're going with a tad more precision in the case of a long road like that?

bk

LXFlyer wrote: »

In the case of your example above, don't you think it might be more sensible for the passenger to tell the driver where they're going with a tad more precision in the case of a long road like that?

That is the point, most don't, it is all much of a muchness to most passengers. In their mind they are going to Drumcondra road, not stop number 1234.

IME most passengers don't care (and they shouldn't have to) and neither do most drivers (completely understandable as they have more important things to deal with).

I don't know why you are attacking me on this! The changes I'd suggest to fix this, either flat fare or tag-on/tag-off, would both make life far easier for drivers and allow them to just focus on driving the bus.

LXFlyer

bk wrote: »

That is the point, most don't, it is all much of a muchness to most passengers. In their mind they are going to Drumcondra road, not stop number 1234.

IME most passengers don't care (and they shouldn't have to) and neither do most drivers (completely understandable as they have more important things to deal with).

I don't know why you are attacking me on this! The changes I'd suggest to fix this, either flat fare or tag-on/tag-off, would both make life far easier for drivers and allow them to just focus on driving the bus.

bk I'm not attacking you, I want to be quite clear about that.

But, it is incredibly frustrating to read nonsense that you posted in the first paragraph of post #24 about drivers adding up stages, guessing where fares expire etc, that is totally incorrect.

If we are going to have an intelligent discussion about it, it would be nice if the facts of the situation were presented correctly.

The problem is that when, you (as a mod) post stuff like that (or like the claim about DART drivers being paid off elsewhere), people believe it.

We've had multiple people post urban myths here as facts, and it would be nice to have the discussion without having to correct someone who I'd like to think is better than that, given your interest in the area.

bk

LXFlyer first of all, you know perfectly well that I'm right about people rarely specifying a particular stop number and that most people just specify a road or general area, that may well have multiple stops/stages and that most drivers will just give it an honest guess.

And I genuinely have no problem with that.

However I do think that the whole stage system and how ticketing works on DB is badly broken and it would be much better and less confusing for passengers and drivers alike if it was changed to a flat fare or tag-on/off system. Freeing up drivers so that they don't have to deal with ticketing and just focus on driving a bus safely. It really would be better all round.

As for me being a mod, just a reminder that mods aren't anything special. Their normal posts don't carry any more weight then any other users. We are all just regular users and unpaid volunteers at that. As a mod, all we do differently is enforce the rules of boards to the best of our ability.

MOD bk: Now enough talking about moding, if you want to talk further about it, I'm happy to do so via PM.

LXFlyer

I still think the amount of "guessing" by drivers is far less than you're implying, particularly since the auto-update of stages happened.

Changes to the ticketing system aren't going to happen overnight - the NTA have made that clear.

It will be a process of gradual change.

Carawaystick

Does the auto updating of stops for fares use the same system as on the 33, 33x where the display and announcer tell you where the stop we passed was, rather then the next stop?

bk

But those changes definitely need to happen. The OP's poor experience clearly shows how poor the current system is. The GPS stages might have slightly improved things and of course that is welcome. But it really doesn't fix the core issue that only flat fare tag-on/tag-off will fix.

LXFlyer

Carawaystick wrote: »

Does the auto updating of stops for fares use the same system as on the 33, 33x where the display and announcer tell you where the stop we passed was, rather then the next stop?

Yes - but it does rely on the data being correct in the first place.

There is a stop missing from those routes between Rush & Rush station which causes the names to be allocated to the wrong stops as far as Turvey Avenue.. Don't ask me why that hasn't been fixed.

But the fare stages are (as far as I can tell) assigned to the locations rather than the stop names.

Carawaystick

The 33's arent passing that stop anymore, yet the incorrect stop issue is still there, so I suspect it's something else causing the glitch.

no fare stages out here though, but there are non stage points where the fares change.

dfx-

LXFlyer wrote: »

You do realise that the stages are updated automatically on the ticket machines by the GPS - the machines show the which stops each fare expires at.

So there is very limited scope for "guesswork".

If you don't know where the stop is, how are you supposed to know which stage to put through?

LXFlyer

Carawaystick wrote: »

The 33's arent passing that stop anymore, yet the incorrect stop issue is still there, so I suspect it's something else causing the glitch.

no fare stages out here though, but there are non stage points where the fares change.

Just because the buses are on diversion, doesn't mean that the software isn't still reading from the same database. The displays just go blank while the bus is "off route" and resume normal service when the bus reverts to the normal route and the GPS kicks in again.

As I said above the stops simply have the wrong names assigned to them in the stop database from just before Rush & Lusk Station until Turvey Avenue inbound due to that missing stop. They corrected the names at that point.

As for the fare stages on the 33, you're incorrect I am afraid. There are fare stages along the entire route.

Every Dublin Bus route is fully staged in their entirety. That's how the fare system operates, and how it operated even back in the day of outer suburban fares.

Here's the full list of fare stages for the 33:
http://dublinbus.ie/PageFiles/11940/Route%2033%202017.pdf

LXFlyer

dfx- wrote: »

If you don't know where the stop is, how are you supposed to know which stage to put through?

Do you think that there are that many general locations along a route that a driver isn't going to know whereabouts of?

Within the bounds of reason, I don't think that this issue (apart from circumstances of a non-specific destination along a long road) is anywhere near as big as you and bk are making out.