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Avanti west coast trains - can't collect tickets from machine
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It's the same with Paypal which some ticket sites allow for payment. Any card in the machine then works.
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Makes you wonder why they even ask for a card in this day and age.
Surely a substantially long enough alphanumeric reference number would do? What does shoving a card in actually prove if it can just be any old card?
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The obvious solution is to get them electronically in app, PDF etc that can be scanned on the train or the guard's reader, I imagine they're trying to get rid of paper copies by any means!
Sam Vimes' Boots Theory of Socioeconomic Unfairness:
People are rich because they spend less money. A poor man buys $10 boots that last a season or two before he's walking in wet shoes and has to buy another pair. A rich man buys $50 boots that are made better and give him 10 years of dry feet. The poor man has spent $100 over those 10 years and still has wet feet.
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Transport for Wales require only the booking reference number, card not needed to collect tickets from the machine.
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Okay….due to a change in my plans I was able to get to a train station today and when I clicked 'collect tickets' on the machine I was only asked for the collection reference (no payment card was needed at all!). I then heard the unmistakable dot matrix printer at work before the tickets dropped for me to collect. This was for a journey with Avanti west coast.
Last year I booked with Great Western railway and when I went to retrieve the tickets from a machine at Heathrow airport I was definitely asked to insert my payment card first before entering the collection reference. I seem to recall that the ticket machines at Heathrow were newer and had a different screen layout compared to the older ones that are at most other train stations (like the one I used today). I was able to find the booking email with Great Western which said:
"To collect your tickets, you must have both the credit/debit card used to purchase the tickets and your ticket booking reference. Alternatively if you paid via PayPal, Apple Pay or GPay any credit/debit card registered in your name can be used.
If you do not have them, a new ticket at the full fare will have to be bought to travel."
So…it seems that it depends on both the train company AND the type of ticket machine. I would be interested to know what would happen if I tried to collect Great Western tickets at the older machine that asks for the collection reference first (perhaps the payment card is needed afterwards). One thing is for sure - it would be so much easier if they all just included an e-ticket with QR code with the original booking email as standard.
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Avanti West Coast do offer that service, indeed you have to choose the option for ticket collection as it defaults to e-ticket. I have the PDFs from my last journey to prove it. You can also get them issued via trainpal and trainline (I sometimes use them if the cashback offer is worth doing)
Sam Vimes' Boots Theory of Socioeconomic Unfairness:
People are rich because they spend less money. A poor man buys $10 boots that last a season or two before he's walking in wet shoes and has to buy another pair. A rich man buys $50 boots that are made better and give him 10 years of dry feet. The poor man has spent $100 over those 10 years and still has wet feet.
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