Rail Travel: Tips on Cheap Tickets

Gurj73

Hi looking for a bit of help please.

Going to be travelling to London on Fri Aug 22nd, ideally via Marylebone but could do Euston but definitely prefer the former, travelling from either my local station Rowley Regis or via Birm New Street.

I appreciate the Advance tickets wont go on sale for some time yet but realistically with a departure time of approx. 7 to 7.30am what will I be looking at price wise ? I know Chiltern do £6 tickets at times but I guess those go near enough hours after they go on sale, whenever that is. Thanks for any help you can provide.

dzug1

Gurj73 wrote: »

Hi looking for a bit of help please.

Going to be travelling to London on Fri Aug 22nd, ideally via Marylebone but could do Euston but definitely prefer the former, travelling from either my local station Rowley Regis or via Birm New Street.

I appreciate the Advance tickets wont go on sale for some time yet but realistically with a departure time of approx. 7 to 7.30am what will I be looking at price wise ? I know Chiltern do £6 tickets at times but I guess those go near enough hours after they go on sale, whenever that is. Thanks for any help you can provide.

Best way to check is to look at advance fares on sale now for dates where they have only recently been released. My guess is that at that time in the morning you are looking at £30 ish one way - the £6 or whatever will not be available that early in the day regardless of how quickly you book


Are you coming back - same day or later and at what time? That could affect the optimum fare.

miller

This has already been posted on the main thread, but is worth reposting as there is some decent availability (even for travel at short notice), but only today and tomorrow to book.

e.g.
Friday 16 May £9.50 one way on the 1820 London Euston to Manchester Piccadilly was available when I checked.

Notes:
Does not appear to be available on "& Connections" fares. Travel must be entirely on Virgin Trains, so split as needed (e.g. London, Birmingham, Manchester, Glasgow etc.).
Only appears to be available via www.virgintrains.co.uk (which is mentioned in the T&Cs).

Virgin_Trains_Email wrote:

Promotional tickets are available for booking between 29 April and 1 May 2014 inclusive. For travel between 14 May and 21 June 2014. Fares are available on selected Virgin Trains services only, exclusions apply. Discounted fares available on virgintrains.com only. Child discounts apply. Other discounts including Railcards and Group discounts do not apply. Promotional tickets are subject to availability and requested journeys cannot be guaranteed.

miller

Just noticed the deal above is in the MSE email this week.

Steve_xx

miller wrote: »

Just noticed the deal above is in the MSE email this week.

Yes it is. Also I tried to search for these Virgin fares on RedSpottedHanky but they don't seem to show on there which is a nuissance becasue I have some of their vouchers to use.

miller

Hopefully you still have some validity on your RSH eVouchers and could use them for another journey or maybe for the connecting part of this journey (if needed, depends where you are starting from, of course).

It's been mentioned in the past, but this highlights why it is always worth consulting the website of the relevant train operating company first. e.g. East Midlands Trains offer £1 off their advance fares via their website.

With the journey I mentioned above someone could end up spending £60.50 more than necessary if they did not visit the Virgin Trains' website.

Steve_xx

miller wrote: »

Hopefully you still have some validity on your RSH eVouchers and could use them for another journey or maybe for the connecting part of this journey (if needed, depends where you are starting from, of course).

It's been mentioned in the past, but this highlights why it is always worth consulting the website of the relevant train operating company first. e.g. East Midlands Trains offer £1 off their advance fares via their website.

With the journey I mentioned above someone could end up spending £60.50 more than necessary if they did not visit the Virgin Trains' website.

Yes it's true, sometimes low fares simply don't show on RedSpottedHanky. I thought they were supposed to show all availabilities.

dzug1

Steve_xx wrote: »

Yes it's true, sometimes low fares simply don't show on RedSpottedHanky. I thought they were supposed to show all availabilities.

They are not a TOC so I don't think so.


In any case if (and it's a big if) you know what you are doing and what you are looking for it can usually be persuaded to show them, TOC discounts aside.

Steve_xx

dzug1 wrote: »

They are not a TOC so I don't think so.


In any case if (and it's a big if) you know what you are doing and what you are looking for it can usually be persuaded to show them, TOC discounts aside.

That's interesting. How does one persuade the site to show these £9.50 Virgin tickets?

wealdroam

Steve_xx wrote: »

That's interesting. How does one persuade the site to show these £9.50 Virgin tickets?

I guess you didn't see the quote in Miller's earlier post:

Discounted fares available on virgintrains.com only.