Family ticket discount v's lone parents paying full price

[CaramelAndBiscuit]

Locally I see it most of the time. If you are a two parent family, you can get a family ticket, with 10% to 20% knocked off the price. As a lone parent, you get to pay full price.

Or with camping, they charge as a basic price - 1 tent, 1 car, 2 occupants (adults). I then have to pay an adult price for one child as the 2nd occupant, then a child price for my other child. Its not like we are a single occupant where you are charged extra, its a case of 1 adult, 2 children, 2 dogs.

It often feels discriminatory but I'm guessing there are sound business reason's why we often have to pay more? Please say their is because it gets my goat! Let alone when you do get a 1 adult offer, its for 1 adult and 3 children...like all single parents have 3 children?!

Sorry...there

I went to the Black Country museum at the weekend and they had three options of family tickets:
Two adults & up to 4 children
Two adults & up to 2 children
One adult & up to 3 children

Then it's just up to you to work out what's best value for money.

Bear in mind that 2 adults doesn't necessarily mean 2 parents...

I think life isn't perfect. Businesses are obliged to make everything 100% equal for everyone. Otherwise offering ANY kind of discount is discriminatory! It's mildly annoying but not a big deal in the grand scheme of things and businesses are obligated to offer discounts to anyone and certainly can't be dictated to about who they offer to.

*aren't

Meals out deals are often "But one, get one free. ". What about when there's 3 of you?

YANBU

This annoys me too. It's not fair.

Also, it makes bad business sense. In general, offers are usually so that people with more money pay more, people with less money pay less.
So students and pensioners get a discount to encourage them to use your business. Customers with more money need less encouragement.

They should help lone parents out more.

Sometimes we all go out together, 2 adults and 3 children. Sometimes I take the kids out on my own, 1 adult and 2 or 3 children. It is always much cheaper when I am the only adult and usually cheaper when there are only 2 children.
Price per head sometimes decreases with number of people but this is just like encouraging people to bulk buy. The more money you spend the cheaper the unit. The business likes it as they get more money overall the more people they charge through the door whether they offer larger groups a slight discount per head or not.

Isn't the 1 adult 3 children thing a nod to the fact that the businesses are offering a discount based on the number of people paying for tickets as opposed to making a moral judgement about the composition of the group of people. I have two children under 5 and notice that they get in a few places free anyway so the family discount doesn't represent better value for us. I also notice that the family discount doesn't usually represent much of a saving where there is only one child.

I don't think it's unreasonable.

One adult and X children is always going to cost less then 2/3 adults and X children.

It's not done to get at single parents. Group discounts are common in many areas.

Also going on holiday and never getting a free child place because you have to have two adults so my cold effectively counts as an adult. You can see why businesses do it maximise their profit, good point that they do discounts for students and pensioners, I guess it's more difficult to demonstrate you're a lone parent.

It's a double whammy, not only do you not benefit from discounts or someone else to share day to day costs, but you've often got no one else to share the parenting (depending on the other parent, completely hopeless in my case) so you can't work as much or take on higher paid more demanding jobs.

What do you mean it's not fair?

You only pay for one adult. A couple will have 2 pay for 2 - so they pay more.

It adds up, so to encourage people to come, a discount is a good way to do it. For the business, 2 adults with discount tend to pay more than 1. Why should they start giving discount to 1 adult? They might as well lower the price.

Some places give "free" adult entry, others give "free" child entry. It's not discrimination, it's marketing. You are free to vote with your feet and chose the place where you feel you pay the least.

Surely the business just needs to consider what’s best financially for them, so offering discounts on more expensive tickets seems sound?

What's not fair is, for example:

Adult: £45
Child: £37
Family of four: £148

So a single parent with two kids pays £119, or £39.66 per head.
A two parent family with two kids pays £148, or £37 per head.

Why on Earth can't single parents get a little help too?

(This isn't just a random example, by the way, this is Harry Potter studios tour - picked completely at random).

But you can say that about lots of set ups. Most Family tickets are for four 2 adults 2 children. But what about parents with only 1 child or those with more than 2? What about couples with no children why can't they get a discount?

Lifes not fair

but in that example ,£119 is still less than £148?
The 2 parents family still pay £29 more, it still cost more for the 2 parents family to come - and they will on average still spend more on food and so on.

It still is a more pricey outing for them, and the whole point of the business is to attract clients!

Why on Earth can't single parents get a little help too?

Businesses don't do this to 'help' 2 parent families. They do it because at £45 a ticket they need to have some incentive for families to come in the first place.

It's a common business model, offer discount = sell more.

The single parents taking offence at this are ridiculous. It's not about 'you'

@MrsBethall but overall the family of 4 are still paying more because there is more of them. And will also (possibly) spend more in the cafe and souvenir shop. And how are Harry Potter world supposed to know you are a single parent rather than the wife of a billionaire who was working whilst his family were having a jolly?

I have only one child.

In your example above, a 'family' trip - me, DH and DD - would be £127 or £42.33, per person, so more expensive again than you are paying and, added to that, DH is going to cost more to feed/water and transport than a second kid as well.

But it's not relevant.

The family ticket is there in the first place solely because a marketing executive will have identified that there is a psychological sweet spot to the ticket cost for a 'family' being less than £150.00 that means people are more likely to attend in the first place.

The company will roll with that, banking on the greater footfall generated plus the second child causing a greater spend in the gift shop and cafe's etc being worth more than the lost ticket revenue. In fact, it's likely intentional that it does most benefit the already-more-likely-to-be-financially-comfortable, two income families, working to encourage more of them into attending, precisely because they have that extra disposable income that the single parent usually doesn't.

It's so very common because it works. It's not a punishment, and they're not concerned with 'helping'. It's simply a case of them being a business which wants and needs to make money, and so targeting the market they want and which works for that business, and that's all.

Per person isn't how it's worked out though. That poster only used it of an example of how she was hard done by, despite paying less money than more people would. Which is normal.

@MrsBethel the single adult got it £29 cheaper in your example. If a 2 adults had gone it would be more expensive.

@MrsBethel a single parent + 2 DC will still pay less than 2 adults + 1 DC, what is your point?
4 pay more than 3
Adults pay more than children
Some discounts are applied but the two statements above stay true

To all those saying the single parent pays less than 2 adults in the example, you’re missing the point that two adults would presumably both be earning and split the cost between making it more affordable as well as cheaper per head.

You’re right OP and I’ve often thought this too.

How do you propose to verify your single status to gain a discount?

Do I get the discount if I take my children but not my husband?

It often feels very unfair yes, and people saying but two adults pay more and cost more to feed etc are ignoring the fact that they are probably both bringing in an income, or can afford for one of them not to/ have chosen to save the childcare money.

But yes, businesses are there to make money. What really pisses me off is that the tax system could make things more equitable but instead it subsides married couples. More attention should be paid to household income imo.

you’re missing the point that two adults would presumably both be earning

how much of a jump is that!

How would you feel if people wrote that "a single parent would presumably not work and be on benefit", who is going to check?

Most families look at the total cost, they don't price holidays or days out per person. A discount is just an incentive to attract customers. It's only done when it makes financial sense for the business.

Tourist attractions are not charities, they are profit-making businesses.