(26 Jun 2023, 7:59 pm)RobinHood wrote It's a Durham County Council tender, so Stagecoach do not set the fares or ticket products.
They may accept Hartlepool Megariders locally, but I suspect Durham CC will likely focus on single and return fares, plus potential acceptance of local Arriva zonal tickets instead.
Accept all that but hasn’t it always been a case that the large operators used to accept their usual ticket products? So I don’t see why Stagecoach couldn’t decide to tweak a ticketing option?
It’s raises a wider point though for instance the 71 Seaham to Chester, has just went from a DCC contract under GNE, whereby I imagine a great deal of fare-paying passengers were using GNE day/week tickets etc. so the income from fares wouldn’t be that high, whereas now I understand they’re no longer accepted so the amount of income from singles and returns will be higher. Does that make the route look more profitable?
Do DCC get the income from fares? If so, how does it work if a passenger boards and uses an operator day ticket?
The whole system of Council contracts seems flawed to me. The discussion has been had before though, but I do think bus operations are now entirely depleted and the system needs major overhaul.