Cheap Rail Tickets To St Pancras For Eurostar Connections

Claire_W_4

Official MSE Insert:

If you've arrived from Google, our fully researched Cheap Train Tickets guide may be helpful.

Back to the original post...

Having booked a package trip for our family of 4 over easter to Brussels by Eurostar, I had a shock when I realised that I had to fork out another £114 to get to St Pancras from our local station, a journey of only 45 minutes.

By phoning Eurostar direct to book the same trains the cost was £48 return for 2 adults & 2 kids. A saving of £66. The tickets are valid for any time of day. The number to call is 01233 617913, the staff were incredibly helpful.

Apparantly, if you book direct with Eurostar (which we didn't) your entire journey can be combined in one ticket. Also, if your outgoing train is delayed and you miss you connection, providing you have written confirmation from the ticket office, Eurostar should let you travel on the next train for no extra charge.

What I heard as a rumour has turned out to be great, it has taken me about 3 hours to find the information, but only 2 minutes on the phone to make the booking.

Well worth the saving and happy to share with you.

[threadbanner]box[/threadbanner]

alanrowell

http://www.nationalexpresseastcoast.com/Special-offers/

Mids_Costcutter

Claire - well done on mentioning this ticket which is issued to a destination called London International CIV. This means you are covered by the European international conditions of carriage (Convention Internationale pour le transport des Voyageurs' or 'CIV') rather than UK domestic conditions of carriage. Also as you point out it means that you're covered if a connecting train is delayed / cancelled. Your experience demonstrates that information on this ticket is very hard to find and it doesn't seem to be publicised at all. Why is this? Anything to do with privatisation and the fragmented organisation of passenger rail in Britain?

There is a full guide to buying these tickets at:

http://www.seat61.com/UKconnections.htm#Option%202

Through tickets from British stations to Eurostar destinations are available from some train operating companies now, but not from all stations. So tickets to London International CIV are useful and of course save money. You can enter 'London International' as a destination when buying a ticket online, for example on Virgin Trains' web site.

carbonmonoxide

Great tip - wish I had known about this last year when using the eurostar. We got the national express fun fares from Cardiff to London to save on cost and then took the underground to St. Pancras. On the way home the eurostar and underground service were both delayed so we ended up missing our coach and had to pay full whack for the next one. This was after travelling on the train overnight from Barcelona!

Thanks for the tip I'll be sure to remember it next time we go anywhere on the eurostar.

ps: we used nectar points to pay for the eurostar - saved us a fortune!

dzug1

It doesn't work from all stations - I can get a ticket to London International from my local station, but it's the same price as a normal ticket to London plus tube fare so is no real help

But worth knowing nevertheless

Mids_Costcutter

Thanks for the info. Dzug1. Does it make a difference if you try from your nearest mainline station?

duracell

Thanks for the tip. Mr Man was absolutely great and came up with several options for me and was able to advise me as to which was best based on the fact that we are travelling on Easter Sunday and there are engineering works going on.

Thanks again!:T

ticketcollector

dzug1 wrote: »

It doesn't work from all stations - I can get a ticket to London International from my local station, but it's the same price as a normal ticket to London plus tube fare so is no real help

But worth knowing nevertheless

There are two codes for London International, and there is also a big price difference in them as well. I think what your saying in that its the same price plus tube, means that the fare hasn't been updated for a while.



Some stations cannot issue London International (CIV) tickets because the system hasn't had the fare downloaded to it.

I have had one of my family members have this problem at their local station, the station were adamant that the fare didn't exist. However on the online staff version the fare clearly was valid.
Printed it out for them and the station couldn't dispute it. They had to wait for a forced update.
The station then discovered the fare!

If you are having a problem at a local station with them not knowing the codes:
LONDON INTL(CIV) has a CRS code of LNE and a NLC of 5470
LNDON ESTAR CIV has a CRS code of LOE and a NLC of 9934

All depends on which route your on, as to which code you use.

TimothyEBaldwin

Mids_Costcutter wrote: »

You can enter 'London International' as a destination when buying a ticket online, for example on Virgin Trains' web site.

Which doesn't work, it just lists the standard domestic fares. at least that is the case for Virgin Trains' web site and a single journey from York to London Intentional.

RichyRich

Is it possible to book a ticket to London Intl CIV without a Eurostar ticket or would you need your Eurostar ticket for your London Intl CIV ticket to be valid?

zx2011

Eurostar has joined with 9 train operating companies:

Chiltern Railways, East Midlands Trains, First Capital Connect, First Great Western, Hull Trains, London Midland, National Express East Anglia, National Express East Coast and Virgin Trains.

Full details at http://www.eurostar.com/UK/uk/leisure/travel_information/interlining.jsp

East Midlands Trains(ex Midland Mainline and Central Trains)
http://www.eastmidlandstrains.co.uk/EMTrains/YourDestinations/Eurostar/default.htm

National Express East Coast(ex GNER)
http://www.nationalexpresseastcoast.com/Special-offers/European-travel/

National Express East Anglia(ex WAGN/Anglia Railways and First Great Eastern)
http://www.nationalexpresseastanglia.com/leisure_offers/international_travel

Chiltern Railways
http://www.chilternrailways.co.uk/tickets-and-fares/eurostar-through-tickets/

Virgin Trains
http://www.virgintrains.co.uk/eurostar/default.aspx

First Great Western
http://www.firstgreatwestern.co.uk/Eurostar.aspx

First Capital Connect(ex Thameslink and WAGN)
http://www.firstcapitalconnect.co.uk/Main.php?iCmsPageId=18