Queries re. ticket bought via LNER App

Yorkie1

When Mum visits me by train, she usually buys her own tickets at her local station - (1) into London, and (2) from London to me. She has a senior railcard and gets a card ticket that goes through the ticket machines in London / the underground.

We are investigating whether I can get her ticket for her, via the LNER App, direct from her station to mine (it's cheaper); I wondered if anyone knew the answers to the following questions:

1. Is it possible for me to buy a ticket for someone who holds a railcard (when I don't)? Do I need the details to book? (I know she needs it to travel)

2. When I buy tickets for myself via the App, I get an email with a PDF and QR code of the ticket, which I can display and/or print out. Even if I emailed these to Mum, she is not smart phone savvy so would have to print out the ticket. But she says that paper A4 printouts are not compatible with the ticket machines in London / the tube. How would she navigate the machines with the paper A4 print out of the ticket?

3. What happens if strike dates are announced - how do I / can I rebook for her ticket? Is this an insurmountable problem or straightforward enough?

Or is it best just to get her to continue booking the tickets locally (whether a direct through ticket or her usual two stages)?

Thanks for any thoughts.

katejo

It might be that she can show the printout of the ticket at the tube station and they would let her through the barrier (if the ticket showed clearly that the journey included crossing London). Perhaps ring National Rail and ask about this.  I assume she doesn't live close enough to London to have an Oyster  account? It is possible to load the senior citizen card onto the Oyster account and use that for the tube part of the journey.
You don't need to have the physical senior citizen card to buy the ticket online/via a station ticket machine but I had to show mine recently when buying a ticket at a station ticket office. I explained that I wasn't travelling straight away but they insisted on seeing it. I can't help re. strikes. I have decided not to book a trip planned next month because this may happen. 

Yorkie1

Thanks @katejo - she doesn't use Oystercard, no.

Appreciate you taking the time to reply.

BigBazz42

Journeys that involve a cross-London transfer by London Underground shouldn’t be offered as e-tickets, as LU ticket barriers don't have the necessary readers.

As such, you'd have to get the tickets sent by post if you were to buy them on her behalf, as she wouldn't be able to collect them at a station without having the card they were paid for in most cases. 

MSE_James

The workaround is to use Paypal to pay for the tickets, as this sets the tickets to 'any card collection' meaning any bank card can be used to release the ticket. But someone not tech-savvy may struggle with operating the ticket machine to collect the tickets so may not be of help to the OP.

Yorkie1

Thanks everyone :-)

She's going to go to her local station as usual, just to avoid any potential tech issues down the track - but the tips are very helpful for the future anyway

MilesT6060842

MSE_James said:

The workaround is to use Paypal to pay for the tickets, as this sets the tickets to 'any card collection' meaning any bank card can be used to release the ticket. But someone not tech-savvy may struggle with operating the ticket machine to collect the tickets so may not be of help to the OP.

I've noticed in the past that some TOCs require the "matching" card to be presented to dispense tickets, and some don't. 

I'm not sure if this is based on the TVM software the TOC uses (making a specific check), or whether the issuing TOC requires this (although the backend for online/call centre ticketing including ticket on departure is a common service used by all TOCs and I think others like trainline).  Passing the card number from the TVM "upstream" into the centralised issuing service does require extra security design/approvals/ongoing auditing (under PCI-DSS regulations) which is maybe why some TVMs don't bother to check which card was presented (just recording a partial card number/cardholder name/cryptographic hash of card number for loss prevention analysis later).

Also, although you have to select a specific station for collection, in practice I have never had an issue collecting from a TVM in another station, as long as you leave it an hour or so.

Plenty of videos on YouTube to learn how to collect from a TVM to help educate people who are unfamiliar.
https://youtu.be/ZyReqWK6wsA?t=33
https://www.youtube.com/results?search_query=how+to+use+a+UK+rail+ticket+machine+to+collect+a+ticket

NBLondon

MilesT6060842 said:

I've noticed in the past that some TOCs require the "matching" card to be presented to dispense tickets, and some don't. 

Must also depend on the method of sale.   I get tickets for business travel booked for me through a corporate travel agent and I pickup on departure with any card.

MSE_James

MilesT6060842 said:

I've noticed in the past that some TOCs require the "matching" card to be presented to dispense tickets, and some don't. 

I'm not sure if this is based on the TVM software the TOC uses (making a specific check), or whether the issuing TOC requires this 

It's a flag set by the ticket issuer - for personal cards most retailers set the flag to same-card collection to reduce the fraud risk.

For corporate bookings, it's normally set to any card collection.

If you pay by Paypal (or using Apple Pay, etc) there's no physical card number so bookings default to any card collection.

Yorkie1

Thanks everyone - she's booked the tickets herself and received them by email (but now can't print them out so I am getting someone to help her save them to the phone / share via email and I can them print them out for her). Ain't technology wonderful when it moves on and you're not sure about how to do it!!

peb

Just for another time, book, select the collection of tickets at a convenient to you station (it does get a bit upset but you confirm it's right). Collect and post to your mum.   Obviously the minute you do it there will be a postal strike......