Typical Dutch issues?

[Dreamer128]

I travel a lot with public transport in The Netherlands, and I’ve noticed that quite a large number of people are extremely unhappy with the latest action of our ‘national’ railways. They’ve raised the price of train tickets at normal counters (with 50 eurocents) as opposed to those you pull out of the ticket machines. Apparently, they hope to cut back on personnel costs this way, but also managed to anger groups that have trouble operating the machines. (or just prefer human contact) People such as senior citizens, the handicapped..). Anyway, now that we are so close to the European elections, certain political parties have started crusades against this, closely followed by consumer rights groups. Personally, I feel this is being blown out of proportions. But I also wonder how other people feel about actions such as these?

[philip]

ROFL, if you can tell someone at the counter you want to go to place x, 1st/2nd class, retour and no memberships/cards to make it cheaper, I don't see how you can't get a ticket out of the machine. The only exception would be some handicapped people. I think some have a right to complain if counters helped much but most overdo it now

[johnny]

How about we all stop buying traintickets for starters ? They hardly ever check your tickets anyway. For the last 4 years, i have been travelling between Utrecht and Den Bosch at least once every two months, and in all that time they've asked for my ticket twice. They must be short on personel, or simply don't care.

[philip]

LOL must have had a bad day then. When I went from near Rotterdam to Den Haag for school we got checked in the train. Then we got checked in the tram. On our way back we got checked twice in the train as well, basically 1 walks in asks for tickets walks out and within a minute the next comes in :S

[johnny]

Well, i actually stepped up to a conductor once, asking him why he wasn't doing his job. He came by my seat 3 times without asking for my ticket. I ran into him again when i got off the train, and presented him my ticket, and asked him if he wasn't forgetting anything. He said "nah, it's okay". Makes you wonder why they pay them a salary, doesn't it ?

[philip]

Originally posted by johnny: Well, i actually stepped up to a conductor once, asking him why he wasn't doing his job.

LOL.

I had something similar another time when I wanted to go to school by bus. So I walk in and ask if my card wasn't too old. So he says 'for this time I won't look at it' and wants to stamp it. Yeah right, as soon I get the second bus in the city there's like a 99% chance they're checking it.