Consultation on changes to ticket offices

A key benefit of these changes is that they greatly improve our ability to make staff available at the right place and time to help customers face-to-face, rather than being restricted to just selling tickets from behind a glass window.

Our plans would move staff to a new role, based on the principles of the station multi-skilled role – in place at GWR since 2007. This would allow staff to help more customers with a wider range of issues, including helping them to buy tickets, wherever they are on the station.

The changes also ensure a more visible staff presence around the station during staffed hours, on ticket concourses and on platforms where staff can also help deter anti-social behaviour.

Our main focus is moving under-used staff from ticket offices to other places on the station where they can be closer to customers and better able to help. As these changes take place across our network, we expect some ticket offices to eventually close.

Two-thirds – 60% – of GWR stations don’t have staff or a ticket office, with 48% of stations staffed on a part-time basis.

No final decisions about any individual ticket offices can be taken until the completion of public consultation. The consultations will be coordinated by Transport Focus and London TravelWatch.

In line with current trends, we expect customers will continue to switch to buying tickets digitally, through apps or online, and will use contactless or smartcards where they are available.

However, we remain committed to maintaining appropriate facilities to allow customers to buy tickets in person at the station.

Staff will be trained to help you buy tickets at the station from self-service machines, or through your phone. If needed customers can buy their ticket onboard the train, or at their destination station.

At GWR 86% of ticket office transactions already take place outside the ticket office. An estimated 99% of all transactions made at ticket offices nationally last year can be made at self-service machines or online. Those arrangements will remain for customers who prefer to buy tickets in person.

No. No station is closing, and station operating times remain unaffected by these proposals. Train services would be unaffected by the changes.

Our commitment to providing the right ticket at the right price has not changed.

New, multi-skilled roles would mean more colleagues would be trained and able to give the best possible advice elsewhere on the station, where they would be closer to customers.

At GWR, 86% of customer transactions already happen outside a ticket office.

Two-thirds of GWR stations already operate without staff, and well-established arrangements allow customers to travel if things go wrong, including allowing customers to buy tickets on board their trains or when they reach their destination.

Our Passenger Assist programme – which helps disabled and mobility-impaired customers navigate stations and board trains – will not be affected by the changes.

Train operators will carry out a full Equality Impact Assessment for each individual station, which will be shared with the Department for Transport as part of the Public Consultation process.

We encourage customers with specific concerns to raise them as part of the consultation process.

There will be more staff with more training on platforms and station concourses, helping passengers to plan journeys and use digital and self-service ticketing.

Two-thirds of GWR stations already operate without ticket offices, which means we have well-established arrangements that allow customers to travel without a ticket before buying on board trains or at their destination station if there is no other option.

We’re not. The Disabled Person’s Railcard, 16-17 Saver, 26-30 Railcard, and Veterans Railcard are available online, with some also available to buy via post or phone. These have proved a practical, convenient and efficient way for customers to buy and renew without making unnecessary journeys to renew in person.

The proposed changes will mean the 16-25 Railcard, Senior Railcard,  Two Together Railcard, Family and Friends Railcard, and Network Railcard can be accessed in the same way.

Cash will continue to be accepted across the network at self-service ticket machines, onboard and where tickets office facilities operate at busy stations and interchanges.