Cheap Train Fares guide discussion

KittaKatta

AirlieBird wrote: »

There is no requirement to touch out if your journey takes you outside the London Zonal area. Your partner should buy a Boundary Zone 5 - Horsham return although frustratingly Boundary Zone tickets can only be bought at the ticket office.

Thank you for this! It took Southern Railways about 2 months to give us an answer which was more or less what you had posted straight-away! I must have contacted them (and tfl, who were a bit more co-operative) about 10 times and they kept on giving non committing replies! Really frustrating!

Anyhow, since we had no official answer from them by the time my partner had to travel, we sorted the problem by simply buying tickets from Croydon to Horsham rather than boundary zone 5 to Horsham, and although my partner's tickets have been checked, no-one has said anything against this; after all he is covered for the whole journey.

We however buy full returns to Victoria as, astonishingly, they are not more expensive than Horsham-Croydon.

THANK YOU so much for taking the time to reply to my original post :T:T

adrian_bond

Hi Guys,

Sorry to hijack the thread but you lot are the best in the know! here goes;

Im due to start a new job in Stowmarket (i live in norwich) on the 14/11/2011.
I will be leaving norwich monday to thursday on the 07:05am train arriving in stowmarket @ 07:34. I will be returning to Norwich on the 17:19pm train arriving in norwich @ 17:53.

On the friday I will leave norwich normal time, but will return on the 12:50 pm train from stowmarket to Norwich (half day woo woo).

I have looked at season tickets and would consider an annual ticket (its £2300!!!!). I am also expecting to be doing an occasional bit of travelling away from the country on a fairly regular basis so i think a monthly ticket is probably a better bet (i will have the possibility of 46 days holiday over the course of a year so that would take back the saving between 12 x monthly season tickets (£2649.60) if i only used 11 (with correct planning of course

Now does anyone know of a way to reduce this cost at all? I have looked into splitting my journey at Diss (inbetween norwich and stowmarket) but this has worked out more expensive when i have tried.
Im a 30 year old single guy with no disabilities so i dont think im elligble for any of the fantastic rail cards either!

does anyone have any ideas as to how i could save some money as its horrendously expensive at the moment. thanks everyone

Adrian

yorkie2

adrian_bond wrote: »

Hi Guys,

Sorry to hijack the thread but you lot are the best in the know!

The best people 'in the know' here post more regularly in a dedicated Fares, Tickets & Routeing forum, so better answers can often be found there (and less chance of being given incorrect information by a minority of unknowledgeable people on this site who go unchecked).

adrian_bond wrote: »

here goes;

Im due to start a new job in Stowmarket (i live in norwich) on the 14/11/2011.
I will be leaving norwich monday to thursday on the 07:05am train arriving in stowmarket @ 07:34. I will be returning to Norwich on the 17:19pm train arriving in norwich @ 17:53.

On the friday I will leave norwich normal time, but will return on the 12:50 pm train from stowmarket to Norwich (half day woo woo).

I have looked at season tickets and would consider an annual ticket (its £2300!!!!).

Yes, sadly £2300 is right, it has gone up by £240 in the past 4 years.

adrian_bond wrote: »

I am also expecting to be doing an occasional bit of travelling away from the country on a fairly regular basis so i think a monthly ticket is probably a better bet (i will have the possibility of 46 days holiday over the course of a year so that would take back the saving between 12 x monthly season tickets (£2649.60) if i only used 11 (with correct planning of course

Yes, with careful planning you can extend monthly tickets to last 5 weeks (01 month & 02 days if the month has 31 days) and also considering annual leave, bank holidays etc.

adrian_bond wrote: »

Now does anyone know of a way to reduce this cost at all? I have looked into splitting my journey at Diss (inbetween norwich and stowmarket) but this has worked out more expensive when i have tried.
Im a 30 year old single guy with no disabilities so i dont think im elligble for any of the fantastic rail cards either!

does anyone have any ideas as to how i could save some money as its horrendously expensive at the moment. thanks everyone

Adrian

Railcards don't give discounts off Season tickets anyway, but you're right that splitting at Diss doesn't work.

Stowmarket - Diss £1220
Diss - Norwich £1516

Both fares are set by the same Train Company, NXEA, both are ex-InterCity fares, and there isn't any prospect of taking advantages of anomalies in the Routeing Guide for a journey like this.

Splitting doesn't always work, it generally works where you have multiple operators, or a web of possible routes, or PTE boundaries, or various other scenarios, none of which apply here.

spacekitty30

Hiya all! Newbie here and very very stressed about xmas travel!!! my ex is having me boys for xmas and new years but cannot afford the railfares in between these dates (am cheesed off about this!) so i need help finding tickets between london and peterborough (will put the details below!) i could only manage to find a return fare for them at 45 quid! i couldnt afford that as my budget is 60 quid for the lot! so can i get you lovely people to help me if you can? websites or such...i tried thetrainline, raileasy, virgin and eastcoast and they were pretty much the same! no railcard either as mine has my name and not his sadly! the trips need are:-

27th december, from peterborough to london kings cross arriving before 12 or 1pm, 1 adult and 2 kids, then a return from london to peterborough for one adult.

29th december, from peterborough to london, arriving 10 or 11am, 1 adult, returning before 1pm with 1 adult and 2 kids!

tried various different routes, but wish i could add all the journeys together! life would be easier that way! lol again thanks for any help you can give me! (oh and tried coach too, and that was just as expensive for a longer journey! so will stick to trains! lol) :eek:

dzug1

spacekitty30 wrote: »

Hiya all! Newbie here and very very stressed about xmas travel!!! my ex is having me boys for xmas and new years but cannot afford the railfares in between these dates (am cheesed off about this!) so i need help finding tickets between london and peterborough (will put the details below!) i could only manage to find a return fare for them at 45 quid! i couldnt afford that as my budget is 60 quid for the lot! so can i get you lovely people to help me if you can? websites or such...i tried thetrainline, raileasy, virgin and eastcoast and they were pretty much the same! no railcard either as mine has my name and not his sadly! the trips need are:-

27th december, from peterborough to london kings cross arriving before 12 or 1pm, 1 adult and 2 kids, then a return from london to peterborough for one adult.

29th december, from peterborough to london, arriving 10 or 11am, 1 adult, returning before 1pm with 1 adult and 2 kids!

tried various different routes, but wish i could add all the journeys together! life would be easier that way! lol again thanks for any help you can give me! (oh and tried coach too, and that was just as expensive for a longer journey! so will stick to trains! lol) :eek:

Advance singles per journey at £10.50 or £12.50 per adult, half price for kids, seem quite readily available and you should get a discount if you buy them on the East Coast site. Total should be around £60

You may need to compromise on times a little but it looks doable

IanD

Also have a look at First Capital Connect only Day returns, £18 for and adult on 27/12 (as it's a bank holiday), kids for £2.

£24 on 29/12. Not sure if kids are £2 on that date. If not, get advance tickets from East Coast as they should be cheaper.

You might have to go to the station to get the kids for £2 tickets - I've had trouble getting them on-line in the past.

pompeyrich

Cosham or Portsmouth to Hartlepool, return, 10th Dec back next day. YP railcard. Best found £87.05, valid on any off peak train, £76.30 splitting at London then using GC trains for the long bit.

Can knock a £ or 2 off using advanced singles but prefer a bit of flexibility as not 100% sure of times. Any help gratefully received, cheers, Rich

opinions4u

National Express (via Victoria) would be around £62 without a coachcard.

Purplejellybaby

Hi,

I've been looking for vouchers/gift cards for rail travel, specifically on the East Coast. My boyfriend does a lot of travelling and as my parents were looking for a Christmas present for him, I thought a gift card would be a good solution.
However, I've not been able to find anything beyond a Railcard gift card and he's not eligible for a Railcard.
I know rail companies give out their own vouchers when there have been delays, so it seems really obvious to me that they would offer gift cards/vouchers, but apparently not!
If anyone could help, it would be much appreciated! Thanks.

Livingthedream

Purplejellybaby wrote: »

Hi,

I've been looking for vouchers/gift cards for rail travel, specifically on the East Coast. My boyfriend does a lot of travelling and as my parents were looking for a Christmas present for him, I thought a gift card would be a good solution.
However, I've not been able to find anything beyond a Railcard gift card and he's not eligible for a Railcard.
I know rail companies give out their own vouchers when there have been delays, so it seems really obvious to me that they would offer gift cards/vouchers, but apparently not!
If anyone could help, it would be much appreciated! Thanks.

Only 2 things come to mind unfortunately;
1. Ebay/Gumtree - as people sometimes sell their delay repay vouchers on there, however, your not meant to and ebay will remove these auctions once spotted, so you have to be quick. But be careful theirs some on there now that expired in 2 weeks time, not a good Xmas present.
2. If either yourself or your parents has any Tesco clubcard vouchers then you could trade them in on the Redspottedhanky website. However, as of 1st Dec value has dropped from 3x to 2x. You could also do as IanD suggests and buy some Tesco vouchers of Ebay and get the seller too redeem the reward for you into an account of your choice. See this link posts #1636 to #1640