Train tickets are confusing

[lnr]

I'm sure train ticketing was supposed to have got more easy to understand. This weekend I took a train from Shelford to Harpenden - travelling down the Liverpool Street line to Tottenham Hale, getting the Victoria Line tube to Kings Cross St Pancras, and then getting a train from St Pancras to Harpenden. Apparently the off-peak return for this journey should have been £52.50 - but when I went to buy one from the ticket machine at Shelford station this ticket wasn't available. In fact the machine refused to believe Harpenden even existed - so in a rush not to miss my train I bought the first return I could think of to London - an off-peak return to London Terminals costing £22.60.

So I got to Tottenham Hale - and since I'd thought I would have a cross-London ticket with me I hadn't brought my Oyster Card - and had to pay the full price single fare from Zone 3 to Zone 1 - which is £4.30. At St Pancras I bought my return to Harpenden which was another £22.50. I had an utterly fantastic time at Heather's HenFest (see photos on Facebook) before coming home again on Sunday, and paying another £4.30 on the tube. This took my total fare to £53.70 - amazingly only £1.20 more than the off-peak return should have been. And in fact if I'd had my Oyster with me it would have been *cheaper* to split the tickets this way.

Not being 100% sure I'd actually been supposed to use a London Terminals ticket to Tottenham Hale (though the guys checking tickets on the way in and out just waved me through they did barely glance at it) I figured I'd have a quick check online - and it turns out that though an off-peak return to London Terminals (valid from Shelford to Liverpool Street) is £22.60 the off-peak return to Tottenham Hale (one stop shorter on the same train) is supposed to be £30.20! I'm now completely baffled to say the least!

I do wonder if I should complain to Greater Anglia though, given that their machine failed to sell me a ticket which would have been cheaper than the ones I did get! But I'm also wondering if in future I may be able to find other journeys which are cheaper on two tickets plus Oyster than on the cross-London fare!

(Edit: I've just checked and the zone 1-3 off-peak Oyster fare is £2.60 - which would have reduced the total price to £50.30 - so if the Terminals ticket *is* valid to Tottenham Hale it looks like it really is actually cheaper to buy two returns and use Oyster on the tube than buy a return all the way through).

Comments

[lnr]

Actually I'll mail them:

Dear Greater Anglia,

On Saturday I travelled from Shelford to Harpenden, returning the following day. I understand that there is an off-peak return available for this journey which is priced at £52.50. However when I went to tickets from the machine at Shelford station I was appalled to find that it was not possible to buy a ticket to Harpenden. (I typed H A R and was offered several stations including Harlow Town - but once I added the P there were no destinations available). In the end I bought an off-peak return to London Terminals (£22.60), paid two single tube fares across London at £4.30 each, and bought at off-peak return from St Pancras to Harpenden (£22.50) - in total this cost £53.70.

This means that being unable to buy the ticket I wanted from your machine cost me £1.30 - as well as considerable anxiety and time in buying extra tickets. I'm also concerned I may have accidentally used my London Terminals ticket in a way which was not actually valid since I changed at Tottenham Hale rather than Liverpool Street - and possibly I should have actually bought a more expensive return to Tottenham Hale.

Please could you let me know (preferably by email rather than phone):

- why the ticket was not available at the machine in Shelford
- whether I can re-claim my £1.30 of extra fare
- whether my London Terminals ticket was valid to Tottenham Hale

Many thanks,

Eleanor Blair

[viclet.livejournal.com]

I believe a lot of people split tickets these days, but I suspect that if you miss one of the trains due to a previous one being late/the underground being screwed, they wouldn't have to let you on a later train (if you have reserved seats), whereas if you book it straight through they do. I suspect a lot of journeys will be cheaper though, especially for me as I have an Oyster card through work, so I always tend to book from the train terminal rather than where I start off.

[lnr]

These were all the standard off-peak prices - no reservations involved at all! (And yes, that's exactly why I don't usually split Advance tickets it's not worth the risk).

[cartesiandaemon.livejournal.com]

Is it supposed to have got easier? I don't remember hearing anything except "it's got more and more complicated". I almost hate buying tickets at all :(

[twigletzone.livejournal.com]

What I've heard is that the government (yes, even the Coalition) is actually taking an interest in rail fares because they're so high and so overcomplicated. Which would suggest that it hasn't happened yet...

[lnr]

When they renamed all the tickets (to Anytime, Off-peak and Advance) it was supposed to have got easier. Except of course there's still Super Off-peak - and Advance comes in lots of different flavours.

[lnr]

Have to say I'll believe it when I see it. :)

[cartesiandaemon.livejournal.com]

Ah! I think I don't have good memory of what it was like before that. It's possible that trifectra is simpler than the alternative would have been, but it still seems very complicated.

Of the top of my head, I'm annoyed by very vague guidelines on when advance tickets become available. Very vague guidelines on which trains are off-peak. Very vague guidelines on what tube journeys are covered by a ticket. Special offers for one train line only, several sorts of day return, various sorts of combined travel-card that don't say when they apply. The fact that ticket machines seem to sell subtly different tickets to the website, even when it's not clear why, and that you have to know exactly what ticket to ask for in order to get it...

[mair_in_grenderich]

Tottenham Hale is not a London Terminal (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/London_station_group). (http://www.nationalrail.co.uk/times_fares/ticket_types/crossing_london.html#terminals)

On the other hand you can get a return to St Pancras whereby you change onto a tube at Tottenham Hale, for 28.80 - which doesn't beat the overall return price for Harpenden, of course, but just adds to the confusing price layering.

[catyak]

A lot of return tickets allow you to break the return journey, so getting on at Tottenham Hale doesn't mean you didn't get there from Liverpool Street and change trains. If they're using electronic ticketing then they could probably track that but probably don't. If all else fails, you could continue on to Liverpool Street and take a tube from there, it's still Zone 1 so it would just take you longer.

D

[theinquisitor.livejournal.com]

I think I've heard mention of a website that attempts to suggest split tickets for you, for any given journey. Not, I hasten to add, an officially endorsed one, but I heard it described in positive terms. No names spring to mind, but if it really exists, I daresay it will be easy enough to find.

[lnr]

Liverpool St is indeed zone 1, so would actually be slightly cheaper than Zone 3 Tottenham Hale on the Oyster (same price in cash though) - but as you say it would take longer - mind you given they always allow far too much time for crossing London it might well still be possible to get the same train from St P. It would be useful to be absolutely sure whether I was indeed allowed to get off at TH on the ticket I used. But I'm still most cross that the machine wouldn't/couldn't sell me the ticket I actually wanted.

[lnr]

The last time I tried one of these it entirely failed to find anything for my route - plus as I say usually I think these rely on cheap advance tickets and you're at risk if your first train is delayed of no longer having a valid ticket for the second half of your journey.

But to be honest I'm *much* less interested in the fact that faffing with tickets can sometimes save you money and much *more* interested in the the fact that the simple ticket was simply unavailable - costing me money in practice. I've had no sign of an acknowledgement or reply yet.

[lnr]

Um, £28.80 + £22.50 *is* less than £52.50 - and of course also less than I paid in total. Which would have been useful if I'd thought of it while trying not to panic in front of a ticket machine when my train was due in a few minutes and someone else wanted to use the machine.

[samholloway.livejournal.com]

Even if you split tickets, you are still protected if you miss a later train owing the delay of an earlier train - this is written in the National Rail Conditions of Carriage, and also in the guidance given to rail staff (aka The Manual). (You may however encounter rail staff who are unaware of this, so be prepared to politely stand your ground.)

The only rule with split tickets is that the train must call at the station where you split.

[samholloway.livejournal.com]

http://splitticket.moneysavingexpert.com/ is one - but I find it patchy and if you're really bothered, it's best doing the research yourself!

[sparrowsion]

I've had conflicting advice in this situation: advanced ticket for second train, first train has problems so I miss connection. Train manager on first train says that because I got on the right train and it's not my fault that I'm going to miss the one I have a reservation for my ticket should be honoured. Train manager on second train disagrees, and only through polite arguing that a colleague of his had told me my ticket was valid do I get away with it. Wish I knew who was correct, because it's a journey I do a lot, it's a fragile connection, and the unsplit still advanced ticket is 150% more expensive.

[lnr]

That's the first time I've heard of it with Advance tickets - and it's certainly *not* an argument I'd want to get into when stuck, late, in Peterborough.

[samholloway.livejournal.com]

I agree, I think what the documents say and what happens in practice are very different.

In those cases, I think it's best to accept whatever overpriced ticket they offer to sell you (or even accept a penalty fine) but then write and get a refund after the fact.

TOCs are generally pretty good about replying to complaints (although my experience has been that paper letters elicit the best responses) - please let us know what you get back from GA.

[lnr]

I have enough trouble with the fact that East Coast's webpage keeps trying to sell me a ticket for Shelford to London which is only valid on the Liverpool Street line for a planned journey via Cambridge and the Kings Cross line. So far printing out the email confirmation from East Coast with the train times on it and waving it at FCC staff has always worked in practice (and the ticket lets me through the barriers at KX!) but it's very wearing - so I've got to remember to select the more expensive correct ticket when booking.

I ought to get round to complaining to East Coast to get them to fix their site - but life's too short and it shouldn't have to be my job.

[samholloway.livejournal.com]

I think I can explain why you saw a more expensive ticket from Shelford <-> Tottenham Hale, than for Shelford <-> London Terminals. (My copy of Avantix is a little out-of-date so I can't match exactly the fares you're seeing.)

An 'any permitted' ticket from Shelford to Tottenham Hale is valid via the following routes:
Shelford direct to Tottenham Hale (going through Bishop's Stortford, Harlow etc)
Shelford - Cambridge - King's Cross (or Moorgate) - Liverpool St (?) - Tottenham Hale (? because I'm not sure whether you can just go straight to Tottenham Hale rather than via Liverpool St)

There is also a 'Not London' Shelford to Tottenham Hale, which is only valid via the first of those routes.

A Shelford to London Terminals ticket 'any permitted' is also valid both ways, but as soon as you reach a London Terminal, you have to stop.

So in theory, the 'any permitted' Shelford to Tottenham Hale allows for some cross London travel, and is hence more expensive.

The rules however are STUPIDLY COMPLICATED and I may have entirely misinterpreted them.

[lnr]

I was interested to note that when I was catching trains through Leeds and Manchester the other week the train managers were making *very* strict announcements before the train left about Advance tickets *only* being available for the booked train. I'd not want to try and argue it on one of those.

[lnr]

If there exists a cheaper "Not London" Shelford to Tottenham Hale ticket the National Rail webpage definitely doesn't know about it, because it thinks the one it tried to sell me was the cheapest available ticket. But yes, someone on Facebook had also noted that the Tottenham Hale ticket allows more possible routes - though possibly not KX - they thought you had to change at Finsbury Park. I think that would be pretty much guaranteed to be slower than just getting the direct train though, so wouldn't be very useful (and certainly not in my case, since KX was actually the bit of London I was going to anyway rather than TH!)

From Finsbury Park or KX you'd just get the Victoria Line to Tottenham Hale - going via Liverpool Street would be a very long way round - but I guess since we've already gone a long way round via Cambridge who knows whether it's actually valid or not...

[samholloway.livejournal.com]

Oooh, and there's a special ticket that's cheaper still and valid as follows:

Shelford - Cambridge - Hatfield - (bus to St Albans) - Harpenden

[samholloway.livejournal.com]

Well, I've just ordered myself the latest copy of Avantix (the electronic version of the National Fares Manual) which came in at the start of September, so that will bring me up to date again when playing rail-ticketing geek on any future queries. :-)

[lnr]

:)

[bjh21.livejournal.com]

One thing that no-one else seems to have noted: most stations have notices saying that if the ticket machine won't sell you the ticket you want, you should buy either a ticket for part of your journey or a Permit to Travel, and then exchange this for the correct ticket (paying only the difference in price) when you finally reach a staffed station. I've done this once: going Elsenham → Broxbourne → Hertford East → Hertford North → Stevenage → Cambridge on a Permit to Travel and then swapping it for a Cambridge ↔ Hertford return when I got to Cambridge.

[bjh21.livejournal.com]

The official line on breaks of journey on Off Peak tickets (http://www.nationalrail.co.uk/times_fares/offpeak_conditions.html) is that you have to phone National Rail Enquiries and ask them whether it's allowed on a specific ticket. They also mention "restriction codes", which suggests that Avantix might have all the details too.

Personally, I think that charging for this kind of information is wrong, so I just treat all Off Peak tickets as allowing break of journey.

[lnr]

I'll check the machine at Shelford next time I'm there, but I didn't see a note about permits to travel, and it certainly wasn't an obvious option. It's certainly one to be aware of for next time though.

[bjh21.livejournal.com]

My memory's a bit hazy, but I think this instruction is usually on the "station information" poster that also tells you such helpful things as which manager is responsible for the station. I suspect that's the poster just to the left of the blue door in this photo (http://www.chiark.greenend.org.uk/~owend/interests/rail/stnpages/shelfordbldg.jpg). It's possible that Shelford no longer has a Permit to Travel machine. I can't see one in Owen's photos from April.

[mair_in_grenderich]

oh yes. I added them up and got 60.something, but of course it's 50.something!

[lnr]

Ian (on irc) mentioned a possible permit-to-travel-machine too - I don't remember ever having seen such a thing. Certainly the Northbound platform only has one machine on it - and it's pretty easy to be stuck that side with your train due and the machine busted - thankfully when that happened to me I've explained to the people in Cambridge station and they happily sold me a ticket rather than trying to charge me a penalty fare.

I have to admit it wouldn't occur to me to go and read that poster when trying to buy a ticket! It's not exactly in line of sight of the machine.

[lnr]

I mentioned this to Mike - he uses the train quite often and doesn't remember Shelford having had one at all in the last 4 years. Apparently Whittlesford used to but doesn't any more - because people were spending 5p on a permit rather than buying a ticket, and then *only* paying the fare if stopped - so it essentially becomes a fare dodger's get-out-jail-free card.