Crazy Ticketing Prices

[XPTE]

London Liverpool Street-Stansted Airport. £19 single. £28.80 return.

Bristol Temple Meads/Parkway-Stansted Airport. £13 single/£26 return!

[richard222]

One that springs to mind for me is what my Dad told me once.

He was attempted to be charged £60 for Woking - Birmingham return, changing at Guildford and Reading. This is about normal, but a colleague of his brought a ticket from Dorking to Birmingham that cost £25 return. These were both fully fledged 'open' tickets. The only difference between the two journeys is that for Woking, you get off the train to Dorking from Reading and change for a 10 minute hop with SouthWestTrains to Woking. Hardly worth £35!

Richard

[GlennMitchell]

...and change for a 10 minute hop with SouthWestTrains to Woking. Hardly worth £35!

Richard

This is SWT you're talking about!!!

One thing that is crazy (I know advance fares are generally cheaper, but anyway)
(With a railcard)
Sheffield-Newcastle via Doncaster (NXEC) off peak return (travelling on sunday) = About £35
Same journey first class advance (2 singles) = £23.50

Glenn

[arabiandisco]

I'd be surprised if either ticket price was set by SWT. Dorking to Birmingham is probably set by FGW, wheras Woking to Birmingham i'd guess is set by XC (the obvious route I'd take if going from Woking is via Basingstoke, as the Guildford - Reading line is a bit on the slow side). It's the kind of anomoly that's pretty easy to find. An example I probably gave earlier in the thread (before it's 13 month bump) is Bletchley to Birmingham - buy a ticket to Birmingham, and it's price is set by Virgin, and is some outrageous sum. Buy a Bletchley to Gloucester ticket (valid via Birmingham, and there's no compulsion to travel to Gloucester if you choose to break your journey in Birmingham), and the price is set by London Midland, and costs much, much less.

[NiallGray]

Am gutted the 10% online discount on booking NXEC tickets has been withdrawn.

[nwallace]

Here's an example I posted in another forum a few months ago:

Standard Day Single, Aviemore to Stirling is 33.50. But if you book Aviemore to Perth it's 19.50 and Perth to Stirling is 9.30, total 28.80. You can potentially do even better, because Perth to Stirling also has a Cheap Day Single option at 5.90. Same train, same operator: you don't even have to get up out of your seat. Nothing underhand or illegal about it.

I've found similar anomalies all over the country. This is the sort of total nonsense that needs to be exposed.

Tickets for/from Perth are cheaper due to some "Highland Perthsire" thingy that's been in place for years.

[MoonKid47]

Warrington Central/Bank Quay to East Didsbury:

£9.40 day return

£42.00 week

£161.30 month <-- The one I get

[oldrocker]

What time does off peak kick in ?

I went from Wolverhampton to Liverpool on business yesterday, £38.50 on the 08.53.

My two colleagues got on at Penkridge about ten minutes later, paid on the train . . . £25 !

[GlennMitchell]

Am gutted the 10% online discount on booking NXEC tickets has been withdrawn.

Yes me too. I like to go home from uni in Sheffield via Doncaster to Woking as I find that NXEC is 10x the company EMT will ever be, even though it still only costs £15.85 each way, which is still only £1.35 more than EMT via st pancras. It's quite funny when they have the sale on as it means you pay less than EMT to travel further, and the time difference isn't that big.

Glenn

[XPTE]

Why are fares from Bristol to North England and Scotland so ridiculously expensive?

Cheapest fares from Bristol-Edinburgh are £54 single or a staggering £132.30 Off-Peak Return!! Crazy. No way would I pay that sort of money. Yet from London-Edinburgh it's quite easy to get fares for a much more reasonable £16.50 single. Who so expensive from Bristol?

Cheapest fares from Bristol-Manchester on the direct route are £27 single/£54 return. Not cheap. Yet from London-Manchester, fares as low as £8 single are available! Again, why so expensive from Bristol?


A few years ago when travelling from Bristol-Glasgow, I travelled via Salisbury and Basingstoke to London Waterloo, then then GNER from London King's Cross. As it worked out a hell of a lot cheaper than the direct route. Think the total return fare was only around £35. Whilst the direct route was ridicilously overpriced at around £100+ . And no way was I paying that sort of money.