Rail passengers are being forced to pay thousands of pounds more in fares as a result of poor advice from the national telephone helpline and individual stations, a consumer organization reveals today. Research by Which? found that in some cases passengers are being charged almost double the cheapest price because of errors made by staff.

Which? asked 25 questions of both station staff and the National Rail Enquiries (NRES) helpline. Only half of the 50 questions were answered correctly. If customers had followed all the advice given, they would have been ￡1,263.60 worse off.

Bad advice was given for the cheapest fare for a single journey between London and Grantham. For a ticket bought on the day of travel, both NRES and a King’s Cross station clerk quoted GNER’s ￡44.50 fare, ignoring a Hull Trains service which leaves 10 minutes earlier and costs just ￡20.

Some of the most costly misinformation was given for journeys where season tickets should have been recommended. Passengers making a return journey between Swindon and Penzance twice in a week could buy a ticket from one company for ￡70 which would cover all the travel. But both NRES and station staff quoted ￡67 for each journey, making ￡134. However, the NRES website proved to be a much more reliable source of information.

Which? also checked “the earlier you book, the cheaper the ticket” claims by five companies and found this was not always the case. On some services, prices went up and down at random.

Ithiel Mogridge, 52, gave one example of poor advice: “Last Christmas I found my brother a ticket on the thetrainline. com to travel from Blackburn to Yate. While the direct route was ￡51, this one involved a change in Newport and cost just ￡21. I emailed the details to him and his partner. They went to Blackburn station, where the clerk insisted the fare was ￡51.”

Malcolm Coles, editor of which. co. uk, said: “Staff training needs to be improved. In the meantime, we’ve designed a checklist, available at which. co. uk/ railadvice.”

1．According to the passage, “Which?” is a           .

       A．national telephone helpline                     B．department under the British Rail

       C．consumer organization                         D．website under the National Rail Enquiries

2．When the author said that customers “would have been ￡1，263，60 worse off”, he was telling us that customers would have           .

       A．saved ￡1,263,60 if they had followed the advice

       B．spent ￡1,263,60 more than the lowest price

       C．used ￡1,263,60 for the survey of 25 questions

       D．been cheated of ￡1,263,60 from the poor advice

3．The phrase at random in paragraph 5 is closest in meaning to “       ”.

       A．casually               B．purposefully         C．exactly                D．inevitably

4．The passage is mainly concened with the phenomenon that        .

       A．train passengers get bad advice on fares

       B．rail passengers are ill – treated by station staff

       C．booking clerks and the telephone helpline offer reliable information

       D．rail passengers can get cheaper tickets if they book earlier

Translate the following sentences into English, using the words given in the brackets.

1．你擦一下窗好吗？（mind）

2．有困难请向警察求助。（turn to）

3．他一到上海就和我们取得了联系。（contact）

4．演出还没结束，孩子们就睡着了。（before）

5．导演得知自己的影片获奖，感到无比自豪。（award）

6．这些十八世纪的油画保存得这样好，使参观者大为惊叹。（so…that）

Write an English composition in 120 – 150 words according to the instructions given below.

       你班打算组织一次为期两天的旅游。给旅行社写封信，按照你们的预算，提出食、住、行、游等方面的具体要求，请旅行社予以安排。（信的开头和结尾已给出。）

II．Guided writing

Dear Sir/Madam,                                  Dec 15th ,2007

       We are students of East Senior High School……

                                                                                                      Yours sincerely,

Yao Hua

Is ________ possible ________ us to master a foreign language without much memory work?

A．it; of  B．that; of    C．that; for    D．it; for

Hiking is _______ great fun. You will get close to ________ nature and take exercise at the same time.

A．a; the        B．a; /           C．/; the        D．/; /

When caught _______, he was always trying _____________ punishment.

A．cheating, escaping                                       B．cheating, to escape

C．to be cheating, escaping.                             D．to be cheating, to escape

It is __________ that they have agreed on the contract and will sign an agreement soon.

A．certain      B．possibly    C．surely       D．sure

－___________? －What about tomorrow?

A．When do you suggest he leave for Beijing

B．What do you think he should do now

C．When do you think should the meeting take place

D．When do you suppose will they take their holidays

All the villagers ____________ the people who fought against the big flood, both young and old, men and women ___________.

A．joined; included                                          B．joined in; containing

C．joined in; including                                      D．joined; including

When you finish, please put the book back __________ it was.

A．where      B．at which   C．the place   D．the place that