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I have a journey booked on Eurostar and so need to buy connecting tickets from Reading. The advice (from Seat 61 and elsewhere) is generally to buy tickets to "London International (LNE)" as these have the international conditions of carriage, but ticket sale websites seem very confusing when it comes to booking these:

* National Rail, First Great Western, The Train Line, My Train Ticket, Red Spotted Hanky and Take The Train don't mention them (or indeed the destination) at all; some of these have two codes for St Pancras (STP and SPX) but don't show any services to the latter.

* Rail Easy shows the tickets, priced at ^30 return

* Quno shows the tickets at the same price ("anytime return") but confusingly shows an "off peak return" that costs more, the only apparent difference being that it's valid on any route, whereas the ^30 ones are only valid via Slough. But why should anyone pay more to travel on the slower service (via Waterloo rather than Paddington), and why isn't there an "anytime" ticket on that route (or an "off peak" one on the Paddington route, for that matter)?

Can anyone confirm that these tickets really exist, and that the ticket offices will know about them if I try to buy one in person, please? And how come they're so expensive - the last time I bought them (admittedly a few years ago), the cost was only ^16, and I don't think prices in general have doubled since then. It seems a bit much when the cost of getting to London is about half the cost of the journey from London to Paris/Brussels! And from Brussels it's only ^12 return to travel on to anywhere in Belgium!

Most online retailers don't offer the tickets to London International (CIV) who's three letter location code is indeed LNE.

Both the +Slough (^30.00) and +Any Permitted (^30.30) are fares called EURO HIGH SAVER RETURN with no time restrictions. It is a little odd for RailEasy to call the +Any Permitted an Off Peak Return and it's also odd that there is this +Any Permitted fare when should you wish to travel from Reading to London Waterloo instead of Paddington there is a +Staines EURO HIGH SAVER RETURN at ^26.40.

If you wished to travel one way via Slough and the other via Staines then you only need buy the +Staines fare and excess one direction to the via +Slough fare. That excess would be half the difference in fares.

Finally, my advice would be to buy the Reading to London International (CIV) fare from a booking office if at all possible. Whilst Raileasy and Quno will both sell it, they will also add charges. On Raileasy that's a booking fee of ^1, a card fee of ^0.75-^1.46 and postage of ^1.50. On Quno it's ^1 for ticket collection, ^0.50-^2.50 card fee and ^6.00 if you want postage!

EDIT: Having now looked at Quno it appears they aren't offering the ^30.30 +Any Permitted fare, in addition to the +Slough fare, but something totally different called Off Peak Day Open Return ( ???) for ^33.90, which despite having the word Day in its name can be selected for journeys involving return at a later date. I've no idea what this fare is as it does not appear in the latest fares manual at all. It looks like Quno have made it up. Don't buy.  ::)

Are Quno new?  Can't say I'd heard of them until this thread.

Having seen the discussion in another thread about ticket office closures doesn't the discussion above prove the need for face to face ticket sales?  With the greatest of respect to bignosemac, if it takes someone the time to invest in a fares manual and research it as an enthusiastic amateur what hope is there for the ordinary traveller?

Part of a US company called SilverRail Technologies (http://www.silverrailtech.com/). Been around since at least October 2010.

http://www.travelbite.co.uk/travel-news/2010/10/15/uk-rail-ticketing-made-simple

Any chance of finding out the Tamworth to LNE fare via Derby? Required for October.

Am I right in thinking you can buy with an Senior Railcard and use at anytime?

I used one fro Taplow in the peak and it ws only marginally more expensive that an Off Peak single with Senior railcard discount.

In fact is there anywhere you can book Tamworth Etaples as a through journey via Calais Fretun?

Tamworth via Derby to London International? Can't be done on one ticket, not a permitted route.

Tamworth to basically St Pancras via Derby not a permitted route! Crazy!

What do "they" expect you to do go to Euston and lug your bags to St Pancras?

So what is it  two tickets Tamworth - Burton or Tamworth - Derby then to LNE. I know Burton is permitted via Derby.

So for Tamworth Etaples what is it 4 tickets? Although can you get a through ticket from St Pancras.

I don't know enough about European rail tickets to offer advice for your journey from St Pancakes to Etaples.

Also, I'm not confident enough to give you fares information for Burton/Tamworth to London International. I'm getting conflicting information about ticket validities and prices. There are time restrictions into St Pancras and Euston with Euro High Saver tickets with much pricier Euro Standard tickets valid at any time. There is also a range of Advance Purchase fares. This is different to the fares structure if you were travelling into Paddington from the west, where Euro High Savers are unrestricted.

Eurostar domestic travel telesales are, I'm told, very good at finding the best ticket to London International for your needs. I'd suggest calling them for further information. 01233 617913, lines open 09:00 to 17:00 Monday-Friday.

Thanks for your help BNM. Will try Eurostar tele sales and presumably SNCF for their bit!

I find it very sad that in the 21st C it is not possible to buy a rail ticket from Tamworth to Etaples.

In the BR days you could queue up at Victoria or Liverpool St. get a ticket to most European destinations and that was via the ferry.

Now we have a rail link and the continent is cut off by fog!

I believe Eurostar can sell the full range of SNCF tickets over the phone.