THE HAULIERS' INQUIRE WITHIN.
Page 19
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Further 'Consideration is here given to some of the Details of a Small Bus Service. The Ticket System Studied and Explained.
IN MY last week's contribution I outlined the essentials of a ticket system, describing a waybill, and indicating the kind of malpractices to circumvent which such a system was necessary. It is now necessary to show how the complete systemway-bill, tickets, punch and inspectors—combines to ensure what is practically a perfect system.
The way-bill is, in the first instance, a correct record of the tickets issued. Checked against those returned, it affords precise figures of the cash which is due from the conductor. The punch serves as a check against that, as its indicator shows the total number of tickets which have been punched during the day. This total should agree with that shown on. the way-bill. That is one of the functions of the punch ; others will be apparent later. Incidentally, to reduce the necessity for making records, the punch should be set to zero each morning.
It will be obvious that neither punch nor way-bill can prevent reissues of tickets, unless the passenger happens to be vigilant, which, as I pointed out last week, is not to be expected. Nor can the punch and way-bill combined prevent the various misuses which I enumerated last week. Hence the need for an inspector. He is liable to jump on to the bus at any time—I expect it will readily be understood that his visits should be anything but regular. He examines the tickets of all the passengers, assuring himself of three things : that the ticket is the correct one for that particular journey—that is to say, that its number follows that entered on the way-bill for the start of that particular journey; that it is correctly punched and that it is of the correct denomination for the stage which the passenger is covering. The first and second of these point sl are most important. The third one practically follows as a matter of course. The examination and checking of the number of the ticket ensures that tickets used on a previous journey have not be reissued. Checking the correctness of the punching obviates the chance that a ticket already used on an earlier stage of that particular journey has been used a second time. In short, the inspector's duty is to see that every passenger has a ticket, that each ticket is one which has been issued for the first time during that particular journey, and that it has been correctly issued to the passenger and punched according to that particular stage of the journey over which he is travelling. He must, in addition, check the way-bill and zee that it is in order.
Only one misuse is still possible—that is, for the conduct:or to reissue a ticket bought by a passenger and relinquished by him sufficiently early in the stage for it to be handed on to another going over the same journey. The chance of such an occurrence is so remote, and the possible gain to the conductor and loss to the bus owner are so small, that the chance is of no practicable importance whatever from a revenue point of view.
How to Arrange Stages on a gus Route.
The arrangement of the stages along the route is a matter which can only be considered properly on the spot. At the rates we have previously agreed— that is to say, twopence a mile-13 miles affords 26 penny stages. If overlapping stages are advisable over the whole route,, then there' will be 50, and overlapping is generally advisable for the simple reason that it facilitates the one essential thing about a profit-making bus service and that is the buses be kept as well filled with passengers for as much of the time as is possible. If the stages amo such that the occasional passenger feels that he runs the risk of having to pay 2d. for a "pennyworth of ride," or that he may get on the bus and pay a penny only to discover that he is so near the end of the stage that he could just as well have walked, he will naturally be discouraged and the bus will lose revenue accordingly.
Current practice-in regard to tickets seems to point to the advisability of keeping to one size. Rarely now does one get, at any rate in London, the 6-in. or 7-in, strips which used to be so common on longdistance routes. Nowadays 2a ins. or 2.1, ins, seems to be the maximum as well as the minimum. If one side of the ticket of this length is not sufficient to accommodate the enumeration of all the fare stages, both sides are used. This has the disadvantage that it makes it impossible to use the back of the ticket as advertising space, but in general this is a drawback which will only be found to operate in connection with penny tickets.
The Two Styles of Enumerating Stage Points.
There are two alternative styles of enumerating the stages, and these are illustrated by the two examples which are shown on this page. On one the stage termini are quoted in full, and on the other numbers serve. The former is more satisfactory, perhaps, to the passenger who, when in doubt, can, by reference to his ticket, ascertain the limit of his Journey for the fare paid. The other is convenient for two reasons, in that it enables a larger number of fare stages to he accommodated on a given size of ticket, and it is economical in that the tickets for all of a number of different routes may be alike. There is, too, the further advantage. which I should say has been the one which Was weighed most with the concerns that are using this type of ticket in London and that is the bus and conductor may be shifted from one route to another without there being,any necessity for him to lay in afresh stock of tickets. THE SKOTCH.