Fares - Sydney vs Melbourne

[Robert Harvey <rharvey@brendantours.com>]

Original Message
No - if there are no facilities to validate his ticket, then it is not > 
unethical to travel with it unvalidated. Travelling with an unvalidated 
MetCard on a service that has not converted to MetCard is against the 
rules, as quite clearly stated in the MetCard literature. You'd think the 
NBC drivers would know this - or perhaps they just don't care.

Well yes that was the rule but now that 99% of the transport system has 
been converted to Metcard National is left out on a limb. In September 98 
National drivers were instructed to accept ALL metcards weather validated 
or not. I spoke to a customer service representative and asked what the 
policy was on unvalidated cards and she said all drivers had to accept 
them.  The reason that National hasnt got the validators has something to 
do the contractual agreement allowing national to have its own ticket 
system complementing the met system. The validators were suppose to be 
installed in december 98 but as to this day problems with the national 
ticket machines have caused the problems.
Now that national Express now runs national we may see some action but who 
knows i was travlling into the city on a $2.20 ticket for 4 months on 
national...a damn good bargain in my view

rob