Jason Wade

Said the following about Retail Operations Team:

“I would like to nominate this team for its determination and passion to reduce ticketless travel, which in turn makes our business and the wider industry more sustainable in these challenging times as we build back after COVID. The results speak for themselves, with ticketless travel being halved in the last 3 years, and is now at it's lowest level recorded, 4.9%.

In the last 12 months alone, ticketless travel has fallen from 7.5% and this has been achieved through relentless use of data to inform retailing developments and revenue protection deployments.

The team were formed in January 2019 and immediately set about changing how Retail Operations should be approached, which included some key appointments to the team, an overhaul of the data and insight available to the team and creating a performance obsessed culture. 'Know your numbers' was a team mantra as they set about making improvements.

Their driving retailing force is digital, which has seen digital journeys grow significantly from only 18% in 2018 to 61% today. It is the retail channel of choice for customers and supports the team aim to make retailing as frictionless as possible for customers. More products have been made available digitally, but the team aren’t quite finished with that journey as yet, with one or two products still being developed in a digital format.

They have enhanced ticket vending machines (TVM’s) which are located at the vast majority of stations to allow customers to buy nearly all ticket types. The team have developed an App that shows frontline staff the real-time performance of TVM's, which makes the correct Revenue Protection decision much easier for a customer without a ticket and also more customer focused. They are also about to launch a video assistance option, which will transform unstaffed stations by providing customers with a video link to a colleague in the Customer Experience Centre, who can even take control of the TVM to assist the customer if they wish.

The team have worked really hard on culture change amongst customers, so that they are aware of the need to buy a ticket before boarding. An innovative communication campaign ('Play Fare') has different messages tailored from business-wide to station specific and has a messaging transition from highlighting all the great ways to buy a ticket through to the harsh reality of risking a fine. The team have made effective use of the media to help customer education has seen some strong support, with headlines such as ‘Northern clamps down on Doncaster Dodgers’ really grabbing attention.

They have made sure our gatelines are operating at the times required and also made huge improvements in reducing incorrectly rejected tickets, so gateline colleagues can ‘trust the technology’ if it rejects a ticket.

Their data and insight-led approach allows targeted enforcement activity via a ‘boots on the ground’ approach at locations where fare evasion takes place. To tackle digital ticketing fraud, the team includes a digital fraud team who focus on aspects such as Smartcard and refund fraud, ‘Delay Repay’ fraud and unusual purchasing patterns. Back on-board, they have increased the validation of digital tickets on handheld devices from 10% in September 2020 to 70% today, which increases further when gatelines are included.

The team unfortunately have to take action against those who think the rules don’t apply to them and I believe they have an industry leading prosecutions team who own this final part of the Retail Operations model. In an average month, around 1,000 cases are heard in court, with an almost 100% successful conviction rate.

This team have made made a huge difference, the numbers speak for themselves and their passion and commitment to deliver even further makes them stand out in this nomination category.“