Great Western Coffee Shop

I am proposing to go to Birmingham on Tuesday evening returning Wednesday early evening. 

The booking engines seem to say that any anytime return is not valid on services via Cheltenham in the late afternoon surely this is nonsense!

as I also need to call in at Bristol Parkway is this ticket valid via Bristol parkway with a break of journey?

Swindon to Birmingham New Street via Bristol Parkway is not a valid route - even though its often the fastest route - hence the apparent lack of journeys ... screen shot attachment.

If you need to go via Cheltenham Spa, put in "via Kemble" (simples  ;D ) rather than via Cheltenham Spa and it will sort you out ...

If you need to go via Parkway ... probably split tickets but I will leave Dr BigNoseMac to diagnose the best priced and most flexible for you ...

It was always my understanding that, although Swindon to Cheltenham was not valid via Parkway, Swindon to places north of Cheltenham was valid via Parkway. 

Using the NR OJP, and quite early in the evening, it does offer an outward journey changing at Gloucester. Most of the returns are change at Bristol Parkway, with the warning you need two tickets; it's no surprise the routeing Guide says "no" on that one. There's also a return with a change at Cheltenham. No doubt it all depends on what gives the quickest journey at that time of day.

All the returns are period, not day, ones so an off-peak return should do fine. As you say, there maybe be somewhere between Birmingham and BPW for which routes via BHM and BPW are both valid, so a return to there might just work. BRFares says overnight break of journey is allowed, and that goes for singles too!

Then why have XC train staff previously advised me to go via Bristol Parkway when there has been a gap in the services from Cheltenham?

Because in general they just don’t know the routeing rules, and probably aren’t trained to that level of knowledge at all...

Paul

One of the routes offered by the NR OJP involved a change at Reading. I can't see why that's not barred by the rule about doubling back. There are exceptions to that rule for travel via a common routeing point, but in this case both SWI and BHM are routeing points. Mind you, this is one area of the routeing guide I've never really understood.

In this case it's even slower than changing at Didcot and Oxford onto the same XC train to BHM.

There’s a thread on railforums started this week about Swindon to Cheltenham and north, created due to the quickest route (via bristol Parkway) not being valid. It’s more of a trivia thread about any other quickest routes being invalid.
Via Bristol Parkway isn’t valid on a single ticket, and requires split ticketing.

The discussion in this thread illustrates something that the  Williams Review should highlight as one of the problems that derogate from a truly user friendly passenger service.

The industry as a whole has to appreciate that for journeys like this, where there is no direct mainline service, it is unforgivable that you cannot pay a single fare and mix and match any convenient service via Reading, Didcot, Cheltenham or Bristol,  whichever works best at the time you are travelling without having to run the risk of encountering a member of train staff who happens to know the arcane rules who will fine you for doing so or relying on the knowledge of someone who knows at precisely which station en route you can split your tickets to do so.

Quoted in full because you are so right.  Turn up at station "A" at any time, going to station "B" ... and whatever route will get you to "B" earliest should be a permitted route, with "any permitted" tickets available between all pairs of stations ...

Examples of other aberrations ...

* Westbury to Manchester Piccadilly ... available "via London" and "not via London" but no "any permitted".

* Melksham to Bristol Parkway ... only available via Bath Spa, when routinely much faster via Swindon.

Meanwhile, NR still has this brilliant advice on its website (https://www.nationalrail.co.uk/48293.aspx): "All tickets are valid via any reasonable route unless specifically stated on the ticket."

I find myself yet again potentially stimulating debate!

Since the introduction of “selective pricing” in the 1960s the railways have been, in essence, charging what the market will bear, in exactly the same way as many if not all businesses operate. You are not going to work for £10 per hour if you know you can get £20 somewhere else, and Sainsburys aren’t going to flog cans of peas for 45 pence when they know people will happily pay 50 pence for them. This is The Great Order of Things.

Applying these principles to a Swindon to Birmingham trip, we have a number of options, some more convoluted than others, with rounded mileages shown in brackets:

1.   Via Bath, Bristol TM and Cheltenham (132 miles)
2.   Via Badminton, Bristol Parkway and Cheltenham (117 miles)
3.   Via Kemble and Cheltenham (88 miles)
4.   Via Didcot and Leamington (106 miles)
5.   Via Reading and Leamington (139 miles)
6.   Via Paddington and Euston (187 miles)

Of these options, 1, 2 and 4 have their own healthy “domestic trade.” The TOCs may feel no particular need to encourage more traffic onto what are well-patronised services anyway.

Under the current fares regime, options 5 and 6 are going to attract a premium anyway because the magic words “Reading” “Paddington” and “Euston” appear.

That leaves option 3 – get the punters to use a comparatively under-used line (which was of course singled for a proportion of its length until just recently), where a few more bums on seats might be welcomed.

Looking at it in that way you begin to see a rationale behind what otherwise appears to be irrational. Whether you personally agree with that rationale is another matter, but at least you can now see it!

So what would have happened under the old “pence per mile” system? If, for sake of argument, we said that the going rate for a mileage-based system was 30 pence per mile in this day and age, we would find the following fares:

Option     single   return   Price Bristol TM     132   264       £79.20 Badminton   117   234       £70.20 Kemble        88   176       £52.80 Didcot      106      212       £63.60 Reading      139       278   £83.40 London       187       374   £112.20     Average                  £76.90

So which of these is the fairest fare? The cheapest (£52.80) but you could go whichever way you wanted? That wouldn’t work because you would actually be charging people going from Swindon to Birmingham via Paddington a lot less than you would for those simply going from Euston to Birmingham (£69.00 using this scenario). That would of course get some interesting headlines in the press about a new improved rail fare shambles… So could you charge the average of £76.90 and let people go whichever way they want? Once again that would be prone to problems if people going from, say. Windsor to Birmingham via Paddington started comparing the fare they paid with someone who started their journey at Swindon.

“Ah!” you may say – “you’re just being stupid! People who want to go via London would expect to have to pay more!” But the minute you say that you accept that you have just introduced a routeing condition, and then you have to decide where to draw the line and which routes to allow, and which routes to deny.

It’s not that simple any more, is it?

I have just noticed that if you pick a place North of Birmingham, such as Derby, then the route Swindon via Bristol Parkway suddenly becomes a valid route!

I haven't looked recently, but I seem to recall the platform timetables at Cheltenham that listed trains to Swindon included trains via Parkway!

I've just thought of something else that would count against an average fare based on a pence per mile fare structure.

The average that I calculated for Swindon to Birmingham by the various routes was £76.90, rather more than the £52.80 for the shortest route.

If there was no average fare that needed to be calculated because there is obviously only one route to take eg. Swindon to Stroud, Stroud to Cheltenham and Cheltenham to Brum, a savvy traveller could save £24.10 by - wait for it - splitting the ticket  ;D

My point remains, and is confirmed - it's meant to be a public transport service, not an initiative test.

Whilst I agree with you in principle, it is when we get down into the details that the problems become apparent. It is easy to say "there should be one fare irrespective of routeing," and when we are talking simple no-argument journeys such as Melksham to Chippenham or Stroud to Kemble then of course it can be done (and is generally being done now of course in terms of one fare for a particular type of ticket).

But as I showed in that little bit of research this could then throw up a new set of quirks and idiosyncrasies elsewhere. On an apparently simple journey from Swindon to Birmingham where there is normally no through service and multiple routes, how do you:

Set a one-size-fits-all fare that is fair to both the passengers and the TOCs?
Make sure that you do not create new anomalies for others making broadly similar journeys?
Make sure that this one-size-fits-all fare does not make it possible for others to get a cheaper fare than they "ought" to be paying?

What happened to me this morning encapsulates the issue for me. I looked at some possible options for doing things differently to how they are done now and posted that research, with comments. I then went off to make a cup of coffee whilst still thinking about it and a new loophole suddenly sprang to mind.

As I said only a few days ago on this forum (but a different thread IIRC) there are similarities here with HMRC and accountants finding new loopholes after HMRC ave just closed the old ones. I found a new loophole that would have blown one of my options out of the water if it had been one recommended in the review, after about 5 minutes further thought. And it would have involved the reintroduction of split ticketing that the railway and passengers in general appear to want to see stopped.

We have only been looking at Swindon to Birmingham, but there are potentially thousands of examples all around the UK. And each one of those examples would have to have a fare set in such a way that no loopholes existed, no new anomalies arose, and the prices charged represented a fair return to the TOCs who were charged with providing the services on which that ticket would be used.

 Brexit is a piece of cake by comparison  ;D

I always get concerned when no-one argues with me in circumstances like these - I don't know  if that means everyone is in agreement or you all think I'm an idiot and not worth responding to!  ;D

Anyway, I thought I'd look more closely this morning into this, looking at the off peak fares and the potential options available:


Melksham to Bristol Parkway £14.10 off peak return (36 miles via Trowbridge, 72 round trip. 19.58 pence per mile)

Swindon to Bristol Parkway £16.50 off peak return (34 miles, 68 round trip. 24.26 pence per mile)

You could of course buy an off peak return from Melksham to Swindon (£7.60) and another from SWI to BPW (16.50), total price £24.10 (57 miles, 114 round trip. 21.14 pence per mile.

I think we can now see why those tickets are routed via Bath rather than “any permitted.” The fare from Swindon to BPW is actually more expensive than Melksham to BPW, and buying two tickets to travel via Swindon (which nobody is stopping you doing) would still give a lower pence per mile rate than people travelling from Swindon to BPW only would get.

This seems to be yet another example of something that might seem absurd on a superficial level having much more logic behind it when one delves into the detail

I think most people would understand that if you go the "long way round", even if faster, it's reasonable that you may have to pay more.  But, I think the information provided could be a lot better as to which routes you can go.

I discovered the Routing Guide yesterday and, goodness, it's complicated.  I'm still not sure I understand it, and it certainly isn't something you can expect people to use. So, what should there be?

I see that tickets now often have a restrictions reference on it that signposts to where you can find details online.  Why not also include (or have a separate reference) that tells you what routes you can use if necessary.  If you buy online it could be included in the email you get.  And booking office staff could be trained to ask if passengers need it if the journey route isn't obvious, and then it could be printed off there too.

Yes it would cost a lot to develop, but surely in this day and age it should be possible, and would give much better information to passengers. 

That's why they say "use the (our) online journey planner". All the functions of routeing and selecting tickets have to be done there, and given that they interact it is probably he only practical place to do it. Of course it's driven by the ticket and routeing data feeds, not the text version, so it can't cope when that coding is wrong!

How does that work if you want to take completely different routes on a return journey?  Say I want to travel from Newport to Glasgow, going out via Newcastle, but then want to visit my Auntie Flo' in Manchester on the way back.

Most people probably wouldn't imagine that one return ticket could cover both journeys, and as far as I can see, the journey planner doesn't give you the option of choosing different routes for the out and return journeys. 

Yes I know that is probably an extreme example, but there will be other, more plausible ones, I'm sure.

It's always frustrating when the journey planner goes against the Flo'...

It's surprising how useful these things are ... and how difficult to research.  Even National Rail Telephone enquiries, where you speak to a real person, seem to have trouble with their own system.

Perhaps it's because of my work-pattern of a split week between two cities I have done quite a few of these ... your "our via Newcastle / back via Manchester" is nothing like as extreme as you might think!

I have found that planning two destinations it's good to start the week at the more distant place - then you can travel out within the one or two days of the outbound validity.  Break the return journey for multiple days if you need on the return journey when you have much longer validity.

Obviously you can ask for extra options in the OJP - though the list might be quite long; for example it can't do step-free journeys or remove "walking legs". But with the current degree of complexity of the fares system, I reckon most users need the validity shown in a journey planner rather than having it explained in (many) words.

I usually find the OJP offers most routes on one or both directions, provided you turn off the "fastest trains only" option, and look over most of the day. However, it never offers all possible instances of every route, and why it misses the ones it does isn't obvious. If it did offer all routes and every time there would often be a lot more of them - which might be an issue in itself.

Specifying non-reciprocal returns is likely to be seen as too minority to be worth providing as an option. So I would check it by doing both routes as separate round trips - after all, the return ticket has no idea how you used its outward twin.

Swindon to Worcester is valid via Bristol Parkway, and fares from Worcester to Birmingham are much cheaper than from Cheltenham, so you could consider making the journey that way.

However, your general point is correct, made by myself previously and also made by many others here, is that the route you wish to use should be a valid route. It is a nonsense that it is not.

I suspect the fare routing was created when Melksham-SWI had very few trains/day & has noot been looked at since the expansion of services to SWI. Suggest MUG take it up with GWR fare people.

Oooh, grahame wont like being called that...

Don't mind being called a mug - at times I can be  ;D ;D.   But really it's MRUG - Melksham Rail User Group that I think ChrisB is suggesting take it up.  And it gives me a chance to post an link to their web site which is at http://www.mrug.org.uk without being flagged up for advertising!

glad to have been of assistance there :-)