Page 439 - 360.revista de Alta Velocidad - Nº 6

Low cost in high-speed train in France. Customer-king and the public service guillotine

of low cost has helped sooner or later to undermine public service and the working,
living and job conditions of its personnel. The heart of resistance is attacked through its
periphery.

Both the redefinition of clientele segmentation comprised in those different low cost
initiatives and the progressive but continuous reconfiguration of organization and labor
rules must be seen as going hand in hand.

3.1 Bipolarisation of clientele

SNCF aims at keeping its offer of ordinary TGVs (that it would like to christen InOui), even
if that implies, for the moment, proposing lower prices (like Prem’s) or making billing
modulation thinner.

For the most part (but not exclusively), those lines have a specific clientele, called
“business” or “Pro”. In a hurry, this clientele catches the fastest trains, and travels on
rush hour. Pampered, it is demanding regarding service (high frequency) and flexibility
(possibility to change a reservation at the last moment or – until very recently – after the
departure of the train), service “on site”, comfort (subdued light in order to work or relax).
Rather indifferent to costs, as it is generally taken up by the businesses, this clientele is
very “elastic” (cost is not its first problem). Convenience is also taken into account (being
able to leave from city centers). If we look at the case of the Paris-Bordeaux line, the
finalization of the TGV railway that was operational in July 2017 meant 70 minutes less of
travel, for 10 euros more on the ticket price (due to the financing of the public-private
partnership by Vinci). On this line, iDTGV has at the same time disappeared in the same way
as in 2012, when the Paris Lyon and Paris Strasbourg lines, occupied mostly by managers,
have ceased to offer this option.

On the other side, where it changes the most, starting in the middle of the 2000’s, SNCF
now targets a clientele that is deprived of monetary means and /or for which ticket price
is the main criterion (students, young independents, members of the working class, etc.).
A significant percentage of low cost travelers does not belong to any of those groups, but
the target clientele are the 25 to 59 years-old that travel privately. On total, compared to
a client traveling with ordinary TGV and at equal distance, speed and comfort, the price
would be 30 to 50% less, and sometimes even a lot less if one books early. This clientele
sometimes travels intensely. Oftentimes at ease with the numeric world, it has very few
time constraints, and is very fast in identifying the best prices, and some can be very
competitive, for example 10 to 15 euros for traveling 700 kilometers on OUIGO if one
anticipates his journeys months before and sometimes accepts departing from far-away
stations, which for many travelers implies an elongation of travel times. In the last low cost
formulas, on the same destinations, the mandatory travel times are significantly longer
than those of an ordinary TGV (for example Paris-Bordeaux with OUIGO if one accepts to go
to Massy or Marne-la-Vallée, or Bruxelles-Paris on Izy).

Most of this clientele – that is becoming more and more numerous – is sensitive to price.
According to OUIGO’s CEO on the Paris-Rennes rail, 45% of the clientele (for the most part
comprised of children), wouldn’t without this offer have used the railway. This segmentation
policy redefines the frontiers between social categories that have a comfortable buying
power and working class categories. And, logically, low cost offers always suppose more
work from the consumer (Dujarier 2008), construction of the consumer (Grandclément

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