When to Book Rail Tickets?

lemontree

Can anyone tell me how to book the cheapest Rail Ticket from Preston to Colchester in July?
I will be leaving Preston on 19th of July and travelling back the evening of the 20th.
Which are the cheapest times to travel?
As I have rarely used the train, I would welcome any advice. Thank You.

kdee_2

train travel is cr*p to say the least. https://www.thetrainline.com are still probably the best way for occasional journeys. You can book up to 90 days in advance but they often don't release their value fares till later on. Get their phone number from the site and ring them and they usually have a good idea about rlease dates. Unfortunately these tend to be "ad hoc" (the cheaper ones that is) but often the midweek ones are released before the weekend ones so as you are travelling then it sohuld be ok. Unfortunately though the really cheap deals do tend to be weekends...hope this helps

fatboyonadiet

They normally release the 14 day advances about 4 weeks before the date - sometimes about 3 weeks onward, they never know when so best to just keep calling and trying. You can get cheaper prices from a station sometimes

alanrowell

For those who hate having to register for a site in order just to look at things try the journeyplanner for https://www.nationalrail.co.uk which also gives prices.

If you want to see what the range of prices are and when they come available the best thing to do is to look at the prices for the same journey one, two, three & four weeks before the date of journey. Then you see when the cheap tickets start appearing.

Additionally travelling "against traffic" is generally cheaper so heading to London in the afternoon will be cheaper than heading to london in the morning

HOWEVER I note that part of the journey will be on Virgin who have "value fares" which are single fares which appear 3, 7 & 14 days before the journey which would give a fare of around £19 each way but there's a risk that tickets may not be available.

For example you can currently get £19 tickets to Colchester form Preston but not back.

Also try breaking your trip down into it's legs - Preston to London, London to Colchester which might give a cheaper overall cost