Being frugal is pretty hard these days. Often there’s either too much information, or not enough – making it difficult to act.
Public transport in Australia is exactly this. Too much information on train platforms, ferry stops and websites, and not enough information for me to figure out exactly how I can cut down my $150+ regular monthly spend.
Why it’s worth the effort to investigate
I’ll use myself as an example. I travel from Wolli Creek (relatively inner surburb in Sydney) to Sydney CBD. A weekly train ticket sets me back $32. A quarterly saves me roughly $8 a week. That’s a huge 25% in savings which racks up to around $400 a year! – enough for a night in a hotel and flights to Fiji at sales time!
What to do?
1. Forget visiting department and transport company websites to figure this out.
2. Next time your buying your weekly ticket at the booth, ask for some prices for monthly, quarterly and even yearly tickets.
3. Write it down and work out how much you could save while you’re on your ferry or train.
4. Then reward yourself, go to Jetstar or Virgin Australia’s mobile website and book that cheap overseas holiday!
Bosco
I used to buy yearly tickets, when I had to travel to the city every day for work. I remember the city rail staff telling me that generally for every month you buy, you get two days free. Also, if you travel on the weekend, its free (since the ticket is valid throughout the whole period). You can also give your ticket to other people to use on the weekend.
The benefit of buying these tickets – yearly or quarterly is that you don’t have to continually line up and waste time.
On another note, I also try to buy return trip tickets where possible, cause its cheaper than buying two singles. If I’m not sure if i’m coming back the same way, i’ll often err on buying it because its only incremental cost and much cheaper than buying another single.
Opal card will fix all of this hopefully!