Incorporating rail content

Such levelling-up moves at a European and national level will come not a moment too soon for TMCs trying to bring rail content into their online booking platforms.

Silverrail’s vice president, commercial, Brett Ring, says that for countries in which there is a single national rail carrier, it can be relatively straightforward for TMCs to offer rail by building their own connection.

“Where it’s becoming challenging for TMCs is when there are new players coming to the market. It is brilliant for consumers and travellers because it drives competition and drives costs down but it brings complication for the TMC,” says Ring.

Agiito’s proposition manager for rail and ground transport, Jake Swithenbank, says fragmentation is a real problem. “There is a lot of bureaucracy, licensing requirements are really complex and bonding is prohibitive. What the rail industry is lacking on the global level is an organisation like IATA. It’s hard enough in this country alone not having that one unified voice,” he says.

Liz Emmott, director of global distribution at Trainline Partner Solutions (TPS), says, “We’ve developed a global API offering integration to 13 different European carriers through a single portal, but even so TMCs still require separate contractual and licensing agreements from individual carriers.”

The answer, believes Emmott, is for aggregators like TPS and others to be granted sub-licences so that TMCs could simply book through a one-stop shop.

If TMCs and technology providers can solve these problems, there is certainly demand for more sustainable travel and rail, in particular, from business travellers.

A 2023 TPS survey found that seven out of ten respondents said they are prepared to travel by rail even if it took significantly longer than air travel. However, the survey also found that 56 per cent of respondents said their company currently doesn’t have a specific policy to support lower carbon modes of travel.

Some corporates are taking action, however. Emmott adds: “A lot of corporates… are creating carbon budgets as well as financial budgets for business travel, banning flights within the UK, and even banning cross-border flights for journeys of less than four hours.”

The latter echoes French government rules which came into force in May that bans air travel on routes which have rail alternatives where the journey time is less than two and a half hours. This has affected flights between Paris and regional hubs such as Nantes, Lyon and Bordeaux.

Sustainable appetite

But there are plenty of elephants in the sustainability (waiting) room too. Gray Dawes’ chief operating officer, David Bishop, says, “We don’t see a lot of evidence of companies making CO2-based travel decisions, particularly where there’s either a time or a cost differential. If a trip is going to take twice as long and your people are going to be half as productive, would you still choose rail? After all, we have just seen air fare inflation of 27 or 28 per cent and people have just worn that.”

SilverRail’s Brett Ring says there should be less focus on sustainability. “If rail services were on time and they were cost efficient and comfortable, then people would travel by train anyway. They don’t need to be constantly told that they need to get on a train because it’s greener,” he says.

Agiito’s Swithenbank adds, “Nothing is more sustainable than not travelling at all. You need to balance sustainability with the other benefits you get out of meeting in person, whether that’s a wellbeing or a relationship benefit.”

The Swedish buyers’ rail trip to GBTA may be a one-off but Fredrik Hermelin believes things are starting to change: “I do believe there is corporate interest but it will only happen when you can rely on the departure and arrival time, when you don’t need to get up in the middle of night to do passport checks, and when you can book it all in one transaction. I think it is a still a few years off.”