Charged for printing train tickets at station

NoExpertamI

I have been regularly ordering train tickets online using Cross Country trains website. I then print the tickets via the machine at the station. The last time I did this I was charged £1 because I wanted (needed) to print the tickets. Cross Country say they are passing on the costs of whoever manages the train station. Has anyone else come across this practice? Thanks.

agrinnall

Never, in fact I've just booked train tickets this afternoon with Virgin and as always print at station is a free option. I also use West Midland Railways and Scotrail to book tickets and neither of them ever charge. If Cross Country have decided they will charge then vote with your feet and book elsewhere, the cost of the tickets will be the same.

Nasqueron

Do it on the phone app as it's free then

JGB1955

I bought some tickets via Cross Country last week, collected them/printed them at my local station.... didn't have to pay any extra. GWR have never charged me either, but they didn't have the same tickets for sale yet - very random!

JGB1955

Are you sure you didn't buy Cross Country tickets via Raileasy? I think Raileasy charge a fee.

scones

Cross Country are telling the truth - whoever operates the ticket machine charges them to issue the tickets.

However, they only seem to pass on that charge when a free alternative is available. For example:

• If you book for a specific journey travelling wholly on Cross Country services, they will offer you a free e-ticket. If you prefer a printed ticket, there's a charge.
• If you book a complicated journey involving multiple companies or certain types of flexible ticket it can't be issued as an e-ticket so they offer a printed ticket for free.

Cross Country is an unusual train company in that it doesn't operate any stations or ticket machines of its own. So they most likely end up paying out disproportionately more in ticketing charges when compared to other companies such as Scotrail, Virgin, South Western, etc. who presumably fulfill a large proportion of tickets through their own ticket machine networks. It therefore seems reasonable that Cross Country would try to push people towards the lower-cost option.

Of course, if you want a printed ticket and don't want to pay Cross Country's admin fee, you can buy exactly the same range of tickets from any of the 20+ other train companies' websites. Most don't charge for printed tickets, some still offer tickets by post for free and others offer bonuses such as cashback or Nectar points.