By Simon Calder

Copyright independent

Passengers on the line between Leeds and Harrogate can now opt to pay for travel by having their mobile phone tracked.

The 18-mile stretch of line, operated by Northern, is the latest to be calibrated for the new digital pay-as-you-go (PAYG) ticketing system.

Rather than buying a ticket, passengers enlist with the new experimental scheme and use an app on their mobile phone. At the start of their journey, they tap to signal that they are about to travel. Their trip is tracked by GPS. At the end of the trip, they tap to end the journey.

Passengers are provided with a bar code to let them in and out of the gateline at stations, but these entries and exits are not used for tracking. The same code is used to pass on-board ticket inspections.

The fare is calculated only at the end of the day, when the system works out the lowest charge applicable to journeys made.

The rail minister, Lord Peter Hendy, said: “We’re bringing ticketing into the 21st century. These trials are modernising fares and ticketing, making it simpler and easier for people to choose rail.”

To encourage passengers to sign up, a limited £15 credit offer is being made – so that the first couple of journeys are free.

The mayor of West Yorkshire, Tracy Brabin, said: “Introducing smart, location-based ticketing will remove barriers to rail travel and make it easier to get the best value fares without the need to plan ahead.

“Innovative approaches like this will help us create a better-connected region and encourage more people to choose sustainable transport as a way to travel.” The roll-out to a stretch of route served by Northern comes after a trial was launched in the East Midlands earlier this month – connecting Leicester with Nottingham and Derby.

Unlike the current options for paper tickets bought through booking offices or ticket machines, or mobile tickets purchased online, no pre-planning is required. Neither is there any need for the passenger to decide in advance whether or not they will be making a return journey on the same day in order to avail of the lowest fare.

Tickets are priced on a per-leg basis, irrespective of other journeys.

The calculation is based on “walk-up” fares, whether off-peak or anytime, rather than advance prices. At present for a one-way journey between Harrogate and Leeds, the pricing is:

Northern offers a range of advance tickets as little as 10 minutes before a train’s departure, so it is expected fares will be pitched at a level where the digital PAYG remains attractive.

On East Midlands Railway between Nottingham and Derby, the one-way fare digital PAYG peak fare is £5, compared with £9.80 for an anytime journey, and £4.80 for an off-peak (normally £9.50 for an off-peak). The daily cap is £23 for any number of journeys. There is also a weekly cap of £73.

On a test run made by The Independent between the two East Midlands cities, the system worked flawlessly. Stations and trains have charging facilities for smartphones that are running short of power. The digital PAYG system also enables passengers using unstaffed stations to be charged the right amount.

More trials will launch on the Sheffield-Doncaster and Sheffield-Barnsley routes run by Northern, on 27 October and 24 November respectively.

The Department for Transport hopes that the initiative can be rolled out for commuter journeys in and out of big cities – to cut costs and increase the appeal of rail. Taxpayers are currently subsidising the railway by £12.5bn annually.

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