LNER Launches International Website Making Travel Simpler For Overseas Tourists
The title of this post, is the same as that of this press release on LNER.
These four paragraphs describe the new website.
The new website coincides with the removal of pre-departure testing and quarantine rules for vaccinated people arriving in England or Scotland from 11 February 2022.
In a move that expands LNER’s global market, customers in 10 countries, including China, Japan, Spain, South Korea and Italy, are among the first to benefit when booking directly online.
LNER’s new search and booking engine offers international customers in those countries an option to purchase train tickets using their language and currency. The LNER.co.uk website will automatically detect those customers who are searching outside of the UK and will redirect them to the customised site to improve their online booking experience. The website launch comes as LNER reintroduces its full timetable, excluding pre-planned engineering works, meaning customers can discover destinations across the full 956-miles of East Coast route.
LNER has been working with travel tech company and rail retailer, Omio, to develop the site, which has the capability to operate in up to 20 languages and 26 currencies, including Euros, Korean Won and Japanese Yen or by using a payment method recognised in the home country.
Surely, if you run a travel company, your web site must be accessible to buy tickets from everywhere.
The Anonymous Widower 
The reality is, it probably can. If there is no local language option then users can choose one of the available ones. And likewise, users can select to pay (probably GBP,) by default.
Comment by Andrew Bruton | February 21, 2022 |
I don’t know about you, but in the last few months, I’ve been getting lots of adverts from train companies in web sites like The Times, FT and non-rail web sites. Perhaps, they’ve found it works to attract punters.
Comment by AnonW | February 21, 2022 |
According to the man at Seat61…”There’s no need to find the ‘right’ train operator website, or to compare prices on different sites as all train operator websites …… sell all tickets for all British trains at exactly the same prices from exactly the same National Rail fares database.”
Seeing as he once ran the team that regulates fares and ticketing, I’m inclined to believe him.
Omio’s skill, it seems to me is that they have provided the features of their own website for the branding benefits of LNER, after all their software automatically identifies the language and country best fitted to the enquirer and offers them a suitable version of the website. If I were visiting the UK though, I’d be as keen to use Omio’s website for much of my planning as they incorporate all the other facets that I as a visitor might want to take advantage of.
I can’t crticise LNER for their enterprise though, it may help them to sell some tickets that may have gone to Lumo.
Comment by fammorris | February 21, 2022 |
One point on the Omio web site, implies that they nudge passengers to change from plane to train.
Does it do the A to B thing?
Omio could be good for train companies and LNER et al, won’t complain about that. Neither will Lumo.
Suppose you wanted to go from Zagreb to Newcastle, it might be more interesting, cheapest and fastest to go British Airways to Heathrow, Crossrail to Tottenham Court Road, lunch at a decent restaurant in Soho, taxi to Kings Cross and evening Lumo to Newcastle.
Comment by AnonW | February 21, 2022 |
I don’t believe that’s true because I know for a fact that the TOC’s offer cheaper tickets in some circumstances that are not available on competitor sites. SWT specific fares are routinely available that are cheaper and not available on other sites. I’m not sure if this situation also applies to the Open Access operators as haven’t yet used one. Well, except for the former Wrexham & Shropshire, but even then I used their own website.
Comment by Andrew Bruton | February 21, 2022