North Yorkshire Moors Railway General Discussion

But it did employ the TR’s General Manager and Finance Manager* in similar roles and the TR was an early advocate of the Gift Aid model.
*Apologies if the job titles aren’t exactly correct.

 

Now on the NYMR website, and available from 16th June until September 24th: kids now travel free on Standard Services this summer, and in addition the NYMR has extended the 10% online discount off tickets booked more than 4 days in advance, to 20% if booked between 8 and 13 days in advance and 30% if 14 or more days (available for travel up-to the 2nd November).

 

That’s not an encouraging sign.

 

This was hinted at at the recent open forum. A realisation that the basic fare was too expensive.

 

There has been much trumpeting of the Gift Aid bonus of £400k. It's very welcome, but it only represents around 55 passengers per day.
Around one carriage full.

If the fare is too high then it may deter more than 55 a day.

The reductions now brought in seem to be an attempt to rescue the situation.

From the start it was clear that changing from £49.50 for 12 months in 2024 to £49.50 for one day in 2025 was an insult to customers intelligence. The fact that the board didn't spot this should lead people to question just what on earth they were doing.
They've got a lot wrong and will any resign?

 

It would be interesting to see how you arrive at those figures? The £450k annual benefit results from the incremental Gift Aid recovery per head on the standard fare of £49.50 That was the non- Gift Aided fare for a single all line journey last year. It's not been increased this year, despite a substantial increase in costs, and is around 70% of the fare charged for a similar mileage on a well known narrow gauge line. The asumption being made is that if fares were much lower so many more people would travel that overall income would be higher.... the pile it high sell it cheap philosophy. However, decisions on fares should be made on available data which doesn't support that contention.

 

The problem is that the issue of an offer of deep discounts like this also doesn’t support the hypothesis that there is sustainable demand for the fares being charged. There’s a reasonable question about pile it high sell it cheap (though it can often be overstated), but my sense is that the railway is also in danger of having gone over the “p*ss off point” in pricing, where it just seems dear - an effect also achieved for me in North Wales.

 

The reality is that last year's pricing model was seen by many people as an annual pass. It may not have been, there may be all sorts of legal nuances about what it actually meant, but in terms of customer perception, customers saw it as an annual pass. You even used that exact phrase in your 2024 Trusteees annual report (when trumpeting the success of the scheme):

"In 2022 we piloted arrangements agreed with HMRC allowing visitors to link gift-aided contributions to their train ticket purchases. Building on that experience, gift aid contributions grew strongly in 2023 and our belief that the ‘annual pass’ model was the right one for the railway has been vindicated."​

Pretending that you haven't moved from an annual pass model to a single journey model is just pinhead dancing worthy of St Thomas Aquinas.

In terms of perceived value, last year the calculation for many users was £49.50 - "that's a lot of money, but I get free admission through the year, so worth the money" (even if for many passengers, they would be unlikely to use the concession). This year, the calculation is "£49.50 - that's a lot of money". You can profess all you like that £49.50 was for a "single all line journey" last year and this year nothing has changed - but just go and read your TripAdvisor reviews. What is seen as a massive price hike is a frequent point of contention. In particular, it seems to have massively pissed off many local users who hitherto would have been repeat visitors.

Comparisons with other lines or comparing per mile fares might be interesting management information, but is irrelevant to most passengers. If I choose to go to Yorkshire on holiday and turn up at Pickering wanting a train ride, what I am confronted with is a fare of £49.50 which I'll judge on its own merits of perceived value: I'm not going to be thinking "well, it may be expensive but it is less per mile than another railway 250 miles away." In that situation, had I wanted to travel on the Ffestiniog, I wouldn't be taking a holiday in North Yorkshire ...

You go on to write:

And yet the railway has just implemented a very significant series of cost reductions (albeit with conditions about advance booking). Now, at one level, it is welcome that the company has clearly picked up on an issue with passenger numbers and is trying something to address that. But you have been adamant over many months on this thread that the railway must set its prices at a level that recovers the costs of running, and cutting fares risks the railway becoming "busy fools". Yet here you are cutting fares in order to drive volume - the "pile it high and sell it cheap" philosophy! So there is something of a mismatch here: on the one hand, everything you have written previously has given the impression that if a service can't load to a level that enables it to make a profit at the full fare it shouldn't run, and yet here you are experimenting with reduced fares to try and drive up passenger numbers.

The charge made by others is that over several years, the NYMR has had an incoherent fares policy, lurching from one scheme to another without really understanding either its passengers or what service it is actually providing. (A living museum? A scenic ride through splendid scenery? Or a park and ride for a seaside town?) These recent moves seem only to vindicate that perception.

Tom

 

I assume that's a rhetorical question! I think that post #6486 hints at the likely answer!

 

.... and another question might be whether the Trust is actually doing a good job of fulfilling its charitable objectives by acting primarily as a Whitby Park & Ride provider? Colour me sceptical, but my opinion is that it isn't.

 

The reported policy from HMRC that Gift Aid can be recovered on fares for the whole distance to Whitby but not for fares between Pickering and Grosmont seems utterly crazy. Could it have resulted from a misunderstanding on the part of someone at HMRC about the Railway's operations? I accept that an attempt to challenge it might backfire, but how about a request for clarification? On other lines, Gift Aid is allowed on condition that the ride is primarily for the experience and not as transport from A to B, exactly the opposite of what seems to apply for rides to Whitby.

 

Possibly, or perhaps account was taken of the charitable objectives effectively including the operation of heritage trains over that section so they would be part of “ the work of the charity” that the admission charge gives access to.

 

If "operation of heritage trains" was the primary, overwhelming, objective of the Trust that might indeed be a reasonable case, but in reality that isn't the case, I suggest.

 

We'd only know that if we knew precisely what question was asked.

Sent from my SM-S926B using Tapatalk

 

On the subject of ‘annual passes’ I see the Bluebell is offering a summer (July-September) season ticket at £60 adult or £100 family. Seems good value.

 

It's better than that - one adult plus up to 3 children for £60, or two adults plus up to 3 children for £100. An adult day rover in advance is £27 plus kids for a quid, so a couple of visits and you've made your money back.

Valid for the entirety of the school holidays - "Our Summer Holiday Season Ticket offers unlimited travel on all regular railway services between 23rd July and 4th September. Freedom to hop on and off at any station and enjoy all there is to see & do along the way!"

 

An interesting piece in today’s Sunday Times about the pricing of concerts, the costs of promoting the, the role of Live Nation in setting them. It finishes with the following quote from one of the interviewees:

“Do you want a thriving music industry where somebody can see a gig a month? Or do you want to charge such eye-watering prices that people can only afford a gig a year?”

It struck me as relevant to heritage rail.

 

There is room for both kinds of heritage rail perhaps, but the offer from the expensive ones will have to be spectacular and justify the cost.

 

I think the other challenge will be maintaining charitable status as well. If your offer is essentially "we deliver a scenic ride to an attractive destination for a couple of hours layover" then how are you different from the mainline charter companies, which typically make no claims about heritage status and instead just run as commercial businesses?

Tom

 

This offer is very well hidden. Just spent 10 minutes on the Bluebell Site trying to find it. Could only find day rovers