Great Western Coffee Shop

Can a season ticket be purchased for an odd time period.

I have 1 month & 3 days until annual leave (from Monday), so can I buy a season ticket to last me 1 month and 3 days?
 Liskeard to Truro being the route.
If not what would be my cheapest way of getting tickets for 1 month and 3 days please?

Peak time travel, on the very last day i am picking a hire car up from Truro for my annual leave so will only be 1 day on that day.

Sorry for the possibly simple questions, I haven't got internet, and national rail website is awful for mobile use,

Yes you can, and the season ticket calculator on National Rail gives you the option to find out the price.  Astute commuters can do this, always extending a monthly until the end of the week, and starting the new one the following Monday.

Not really astute as odd days over a month will simply involve adding a peak day return to the price of a monthly for each day extended up roba week, when they would add the price of a weekly ticket

So certainly saves time in purchasing the extra days daily, but doesn't save any money

Surely it does, as you are not then paying for the Saturday or Sunday? (I'm assuming a typical 5 day per week pattern.)

Has to be continuous....so yes, saving between tickets can be achieved, but no sacmving to be made adding extra days

So that would make, for example, Bristol to Bath, 1 month + 3 days season:

^149.00 + ^8.50 + ^8.50 + ^8.50 = ^174.50

Yet the season ticket calculator gives a price of ^164.20.

I've worked a few other examples and none of them add the cost of x number of Anytime Day Returns to monthlies.

If you buy 1 month plus 7 days as one season ticket, it's cheaper than a monthly + a weekly.

Also, how do you add Anytime Day Returns to a Season where they don't exist?

Odd date seasons are incremented on a daily basis using a table of multipliers of a base rate, which is the 7 day season.   Now a one month season is 3.84 times the 7 day, so the odd days come at a discount.  As examples one day is 0.13 X the 7 day price, 7 days is 0.9 X the 7 day price.

So a 1 month plus 1 week season combined costs just a bit less (by 10% of the 7 day) than the two separate seasons.

There is a table of separate multipliers for any number of days up to 30, IIRC, but any odd season fare can be worked out as follows:

3.84 X base rate (7 day) per month
PLUS 0.64 for every 5 extra days
PLUS 0.13 for every extra day over a multiple of 5
with an absolute maximum of 40 X the weekly (the cost of an annual ticket).

e.g.  11 extra days over a month is 2 times 0.64 plus 0.13, not 11 times 0.13.

Something I'm not sure about is if the odd pennies are rounded up to a 5 or 10...

Paul

Thanks guys, ^202.xx for 1 month plus 3 instead of ^184 for 1 month. An anytime day return is ^15.30 so a no brainier what I'm going to do!

I sometimes think you just take a wild guess and make it sound as authoritative as you can.   The actual situation is as Paul describes:


Here is the full multiplier list as found in the fares manuals:

Thanks for digging that out, one to save on the PC.

Paul

Required season was sold no problem. ^202.70.

As a plus the ticket office lady pro actively noticed my address might be wrong to the photo card, as my ticket doesn't go near the address held, so she updated my address as well.
I didn't even know they held my address!

Thanks for the correction above....

I knew they held your address for a season, but I didn't think it was attached to your photocard number....data protection issues here?

Can't think of any data protection issues.

The season ticket database would contain photocard number, name, address and there are options for phone number, email and marketing options should a customer want to provide that additional info*.


* naturally it also includes history of season tickets sold/replaced/duplicated/refunded/changed.

Certainly no dpa issues with holding all info together unless it was leaked outside of their system.

Found it to be great customer service to notice potential incorrect address.

As my address is on the system, would GWR return it to me if for example it was left on train as they have all my details?

Is this database shared between TOCs?  I'm just wondering as I originally got my photocard from LOROL and bought my tickets from either LOROL, Gatwick Express or Southern.  SWT had absolutely no record of me or my tickets.  Have things changed more recently?

On the original topic, I calculated that I saved quite a bit by purchasing odd period season tickets.  Why pay for the Saturday and Sunday, or days of leave, if you have no plans to travel anywhere.  With extra days costing around ^15, compared to ^50 for an Anytime Day Return, it worked out pretty well.

No, if logged with GWR would only be on the GWR database. It's why some people will get mailings (as an example) about major works and others may not, as if you buy through GWR you can be contacted, but if you bought for a GWR route but bought through, say, Trainline or London Midland, GWR wouldn't have details to contact you.