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A proper greeting from your Bern office fails. Instead, the price monitor asks a question. Stefan Meierhans (52) wants to know immediately if the train from Zurich to Bern was busy during the morning rush hour. Despite rush hour, only a third of the seats were taken according to an estimate from VIEW.
Meierhans is very concerned about the low capacity utilization since the closure. Especially now when the winter months with flu and corona are approaching and many employees are left in the home office. SBB & Co. urgently needs to present more flexible offers and contemporary rate models, he says. If even more passengers switch to the car and give up public transportation because a GA travel card is no longer worth it, revenue will decline further. The result: the price increases.
Meierhans wants to avoid that. Of course, you have some ideas and demands ready on how you can make public transport win back customers while solving the problem of capacity utilization.
VISTA: The Federal Council wants to support public transport with around 300 million francs. Parliament will decide on this next week. What do you make of that?
Stefan Meierhans: It amazes me that you simply want to spend hundreds of millions. Why not associate that with an expectation? The large amount of tax money that is being talked about must be conditioned. Public transport, for example, could be forced to adapt to the changing realities of life and create new flexible offerings.
Isn’t that the case yet?
The opposite is true. With the schedule change at the end of the year, the minimum duration of the GA travel card will be increased from four to six months. This means that you can only cancel the GA two months later. The minimum financial obligation increases accordingly. This will captivate customers. This strategy does not benefit the customer.
Have an example of useful flex offers?
The winter months with Corona are just around the corner. GA owners who work more from home wonder if the GA is worth renovating. For example, a home office GA with two or three days of free travel per week is essential.
What makes you so sure that the behavior changes won’t go away in a year?
Before the Corona crisis, it was believed that a spacious home office was not possible. Most of the executives refused. But once you’ve been forced to do it, it suddenly works. Experts don’t expect these new habits to be broken again. Of course, we are likely not all in the home office every day.
Rather?
Instead of commuting every day, employees may work more and more from home in the future. The public transport sector should adapt to these new realities and offer flexible offers. Today, the public transportation industry is not ready for the post-Corona world.
Are public transport companies technically suitable for such offers?
The current technical possibilities exceed the will to create the industry. The fee system should work like when you go to the butcher shop: you order something and you get what you want, and in the end you pay for it. When using public transport, you have to pay for services in advance, especially if you have a subscription. Customers take risks and are unlucky when services are canceled, as is the case now due to a lack of drivers.
Is it as easy with public transport as with a butcher?
Ask Fairtiq, the market leader for digital solutions. The Bern-based company offers postpaid solutions worldwide, which means you pay as you go. Choosing the lowest prices, the best price and adding a subscription limit (up to this point you pay, you don’t owe more) is not a question of technology today, but of the will of the industry.
Do more flexible offers also solve the problem of utilization in the public transport sector?
If you win more customers with attractive offers, that helps cover the fixed costs that are incurred anyway. Today, the average use of trains is around 30 percent. If you can spread the costs over more shoulders, that will help make the prices attractive. That’s why low-threshold offers, such as leisure traffic savings fines and occasional drivers, are so interesting. They lead to increased traffic at the right time. For this reason, they should also be available within transport associations, at least on long-distance routes.
Not you?
No. Unfortunately, many associations, especially the ZVV of Zurich, still do not see the advantages of this offer.
With what argument?
The ZVV says super saver tickets would be sold at a discount of up to 70 percent, but without noticeable effect. I, on the other hand, see a notable effect on everything: more utilization.
Lead flexible subscriptions to reduce those that are otherwise already underutilized Connections in the valleys, etc.?
The cantons order regional transport and there is a shortfall guarantee. If there is political will, only a small percentage of the covered rack railway will be financed, as in my hometown in Altstätten SG. But you have to fundamentally think about what will happen to public transport when autonomous electric cars offer inexpensive point-to-point connections to remote regions in the future.
What are you waiting for?
Many things in public transportation are slowly but surely becoming obsolete. In the age of GPS, no one needs to know the name of the stop where it is located. Zones have been a useful construction for years because they simplified the complex system. Whether this simplification is still necessary in an automated ticketing world is a question that must be asked. Bottom line: if public transport doesn’t start offering contemporary fare and subscription models, it will be overtaken by new flexible competitors.
Can flexible pricing models prevent increases in the price of tickets or subscriptions?
If public transport becomes so attractive that capacity utilization increases and costs are borne by more customers, then the public transport sector has more revenue and the individual customer pays less. But, of course, more structural improvements are needed.
What are you thinking about
The question arises as to whether 200 public transport companies, 200 boards of directors, 200 personnel departments, etc. are needed in Switzerland. The railways could also jointly purchase trains. There could be more potential for synergy there. It doesn’t matter if I get to my destination on a yellow or blue train.
Can you really smooth out passenger spikes in Switzerland with price incentives?
We still have a low average occupancy rate of less than 30 percent on public transportation. Therefore, breaking tips is an important goal. I consider attractive products to be more suitable for driving than, for example, “penalty prices” in times of rush hour traffic. A saleswoman who has to commute to work during peak hours cannot be financially punished for this. Rather, financial incentives should be created for those who are flexible in terms of time.
The Federal Council wants to support public transport (PT) and the transport of goods by rail in the crisis of the Crown with more than 700 million francs. According to the message that Parliament will address next week, the deficits in regional passenger transport will be covered for the current year. The planned federal contribution is about 290 million Swiss francs.
The Transportation Commission of the National Council recommends that the tourist transport routes on which the GA travel card is valid also benefit. In addition, companies receiving contributions should not be able to distribute dividends in fiscal years 2020 and 2021. Car transport will also be supported by a contribution from A-fonds-perdu.
The Federal Council justified the cash injection with the Federal Council’s recommendation to stay home during the crown lockdown if possible. As a result, the demand for public transportation fell by as much as 80 percent. The objective of the support is to avoid that the supply of transport has to be restricted as a direct consequence of the crisis. Claudia gnehm
