Author: simon
Reduce Ferry Prices: UPDATED
Friday, 28th September, 2007 at 11:31 pm, Isle of Wight
Central Wight, East Wight, Island-wide, North Wight, Politics, South Wight, Travel, West Wight
There’s probably not more than a handful of people on the Island that don’t want to see the price of the ferries come down a notch or twenty.
Andrew Turner, the Islands MP, has taken up the cause to try and get something actually done about it.
UPDATE: Andrew’s building on the great work that we covered back in Feb this year put in by a group of Islanders, who have to date collected an amazing 2,700+ signatures on their online petition.
You may well remember that he’s been terrier like in his pursuit for over a year, despite a bout of illness.
The approach that he’s taking is to pursue it with the Office Of Fair Trading (OFT) and has been advised is to collect as many representations from Islander as possible.
We happened to be chatting to his office a couple of days ago and they told of their frustration of trying to get attention for the campaign.
Pretty much straight after launch, Andy Sutton resigned, somewhat taking the news agenda with him, so it’s all got a little lost.
We’ve also been contacted by a friend of the blog, and by BigEars on the forum drawing more attention to it.
Action is Simple
If you want a chance of your ferry fare coming down, there’s something really easy that you can do now.
Pop yourself over to get things moving. If you have the inclination, it’d be lovely if you’d mention that VB sent you too.
If you want some more background on how he’s tackling it.
Related posts:
- OFT IW Ferry Report: Provisional No: UPDATED
There's a provisional No from the OFT for further investigations... - OFT Deleted Email From Public On Ferry Consultation UPDATED
Shocking discovery that OFT deleted emails from the public after... - Cancellations on Portsmouth-Fishbourne Car Ferry Service Today (updated)
More cancellations from WightLink on the Portsmouth-Fishbourne route.... - Andy Sutton Resigns As Leader of IW Council: David Pugh Takes Over [Updated]
Wow, shock news … just checking out the new look... - Ferry Fares Fair?
Grass roots councils across the Island are adding momentum to...
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Dear VB (and Big Ears),
Many thanks for your help with promoting this campaign.
Kind Regards,
Andrew Turner
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Wouldn’t it great if us Islanders created our ‘own’ ferry company with quality, service, and value at the heart of operating it? You certainly can’t find any of these with the current services offered. (apart from Hovertravel).
I propose we all club together and buy the Yarmouth to Lymington route and operate it ourselves. :)
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@Garth
Like it – By the Island, For the Island.
How much would it cost each to buy it?
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A new ferry would cost four to five million, Simon.
Have a look at
http://www.directferries.co.uk/news/2006june.htm#L10
So that would be about £40 each if every man woman and child on the Island contributed. Then you’d need somewhere to berth it plus a captain and crew to run it etc, etc, etc.
On a more serious note:
According to the above site, Wightlink are having two new ferries built for the Lymington-Yarmouth route which they hope will be ready about Easter 2008. Hopefully then they’ll think about refitting the older ferries on the Portsmouth-Fishbourne route, the seats of which are rather tatty. Rome wasn’t built in a day – more’s the pity.
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Reading this thread, I did a little digging and found a similar thread dated 23 August 2006.
Simon said on there that in 2000 “A standard return valid for one year was £48.50″
Not true! That price was for a day return.
The actual price for a standard return was £59.60 in 2000.
The dearest price for a standard return at 2007 prices is
Saturdays 21 Jul – 25 Aug 0755-1825 ex-Fishbourne & Portsmouth, 0955-1625 ex-Yarmouth & Lymington (copied and pasted from wightlink website)
£65.00
Still, don’t let the facts get in the way of a good story!
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@oldie – thanks for the research on that. While the £40 sounds bearable, I suspect your right, that the docking and running costs would add up, possibly being higher that the cost of the boats.
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@Freddie – Glad to see people putting effort into this. It’s something that requires energy.
Yes, you right the price mentioned was a day return, not a standard return. A difference of £10.40 – clearly that makes me a terrible, horrible person when we’re talking about the equivalent fare being £106.40.
Thanks for putting all of that effort in to clearing that up.
Regarding the more recent pricing – if you look again, you’ll notice that it was a note posted to the VB Forum on the 23 Aug 2006, which is in high season.
The prices listed on the site that you’ve found (sadly you didn’t link, so we can’t reference them ourselves), will be the starting price, not the dearest, otherwise how would you explain people paying up to £149 or that the quote I’ve just got from the WightLink site says that sailing out Portsmouth Gunwharf – Fishbourne (Sun 30/09/2007 16:30), back on Fishbourne – Portsmouth Gunwharf (Sat 10/11/2007 09:30) – rather more off-season that my initial August example – is £84.
What were you saying about facts and a good story?
Perhaps in your haste to prove to everyone how very clever you are, you didn’t notice those details?
To help you understand the variability in pricing, I’ve copied the following text, taken from the ‘Getting the best fares’ section of the Wightlink site.
As it appears that you are a pendant (don’t get me wrong, I’m all for the pedantic), it’s worth pointing out that something posted to the forum isn’t a story. Stories are published to the blog.
Here’s an idea, why don’t you redirect your efforts into doing something more positive?
Here’s one you could add to your list – I’ve heard that there’s plenty of ducks in the park that need feeding.
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Simon, don’t let people wind you up – it’s not worth it. Let’s get back to the point that the ferry prices are very expensive and the service is inflexible once you are booked unless you have multilinks. I think most Islanders and a lot of tourists will agree with that. Our MP needs all the evidence we can supply. Let’s hope lots of people email him with the facts.
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It is a shame that the fares to the Island are so high. Many people could probably afford to have a holiday on the island but the fare is the last straw.I also found the prices very high also the car parking charges.
I have spoken to many visitors to the island and they all feel the same, with the end result being you have a lovely Island but the visitors no longer arrive
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@Fred – worrying to hear that the price of the ferries are putting you off taking a holiday on the Island.
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@Simon it is worrying, it is not me that is being put of,it is those with a low income
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It was quite a struggle this year to come to the island of wight. we are a family of four 2 of them are 10 and 13 years old.
next year we must look elsewhere
alexis
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would like to know why a trip to this beautiful island costs more than a trip to france?
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I did some reserach on the Monopolies commissiion report and found that the entire solent coast landing rights are owned by British Ports and Harbours company which I tracked back to Lloyds Bank. Since the same people also own the bulk of the ferry companies. It is very unlikely they are going to allow reasonabloe landing rights to competition. Needless to say the MMC didnt say anything about that. The only place to run a ferry seems to be from Hayling Island to Sandown or Bembridge ( Hovercraft)
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Just to add a bit of information. Do you know that hoteliers who have ” trade rates” are offered differing rates from each other ( variable) and our contract specifies that we are not to divulge our rates to anyone!! Secrecy in ferry rates within businesses as well. Divide and rule seems to be the name of the game with the ferry guys or some kind of preferential rates for long time customers. Not very transparent.
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