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Can anyone tell me why the up Cathedrals Express (ex WOF 0730) is an 'off-peak' train in standard class but an 'anytime' train in first class?

Surely time restrictions should apply to the whole train and not the class of travel. I am not aware of any other instances of this across FGW network.

Another anomaly is that Off Peak Day/Travelcard tickets are not valid on this train, despite it being an Off Peak service.

Although it is useful to know that an Off Peak ticket is only a few quid more, and you can come back anytime - including the evening rush hour!

I expect it is a First Anytime train to stop people on cheaper tickets taking advantage of any enhanced catering there is to offer.

I'd buy the idea of enhanced catering if there was something extra, but the free offerings are the same as on any other HST service. Whilst you get the option of Travelling Chef food served at seat, you still pay for this and the service offered is the same as any other TC train whether peak or off peak.

Probably because there is also a Cheap Day Return fare, subject to restriction P7 (any train arriving London after 1000)

Huh? Off Peak Day Return (CDR) is not valid on the Cathedrals as it arrives 0947. My point is that a whole train should be peak or off-peak, not dependent on what class of travel or whether you buy a travelcard.

I'm aware of what you're saying. I'm saying that there are 2 off peak standard class fares, however only 1 First Class, which probably explains it.

Besides, the First Class fare is cheap compared to Bristol for example.

Ah, so the First Anytime covers Standard Anytime and Standard Off Peak; and First Off Peak coves Standard Off Peak Day.

That makes sense, thanks DM.

But why is an Standard Off Peak Return valid on a train into London before 10.00?

I'm sure I've been through all this before some time ago but let's do it all again, just to be sure.

Way back in the mists of time, when there were precious few Cotswold Line services compared with today's timetable and a long gap between the Cathedrals' arrival in London and that of the next service from the Cotswolds (actually a via Oxford connection back then, I think), BR agreed under pressure from the CLPG to ease certain ticket restrictions on this service, so that from stations west of Oxford only, you could use CDRs (but not Network Cards) and CDRs could also be used for return journeys from London in the evening peak to stations west of Oxford only. Oxford passengers using this train paid - and still do - full peak fares.

This exemption continued under privatisation until the final year of Thames Trains (which as the main operator set the fares and fare rules on the route, even for the services run by FGW), when Govia were determined to grab every penny they could and removed the CDR exemption but instead allowed Savers to be used, rather than enforcing full peak fares, a situation that has continued to this day, under whatever stupid and obscure obscure name Savers now go by.

Given the yawning gap from the Cathedrals' arrival into London until the next train from Worcester (1hr 43min), that will only be closed slightly and for just the eastern part of the line from December, I think even FGW aren't stupid enough to brave the tidal wave of anger they would unleash were they try to enforce full peak fares.

If post-2011 they shuffle things around in such a way as to produce a Cotswold service with say a 10.30-10.45 arrival at Paddington, then the Cathedrals exemption may go, but that's for the future.

Thanks for the explanation Willc, I've never seen it before...

As for "stupid" names. I would argue that names like Saver are far worse than Off Peak. What does "Saver" tell you about the ticket for an inexperienced traveller. I know what "Off Peak" says!

PS: Thames Trains was not Govia. It was Go - Ahead. ::) I bet that makes all the difference! :D

A few years ago some friendly staff at Oxford used to sell off-peak returns (can't remember if it was Savers or Cheap Day Returns) from Hanborough to save people money on the peak Oxford-Padd fare that would otherwise have been required on that train.

The majority of off-peak and off-peak day returns allow break of journey/joining or alighting short on both legs now, so unless there is a specific restriction applied to the Hanborough/Cotswolds tickets, that looks like it would be a legitimate money-saving tip for Oxford travellers. However, I stand to be corrected because I don't have an up-to-date version of Avantix traveller.


Absolutely correct. It always puzzled me that Go-Ahead manage to make such an excellent job of running Oxford local bus services (in the guise of the Oxford Bus Company) but such a shoddy train service (in the guise of Thames Trains), but I don't want to re-tread old ground that I've covered before here  ;)

But Govia operate excellent rail franchises! LM, SN, SE....

I'm prepared to believe that (although no first-hand of any experience of any of those you mention). But my fairly extensive experience of Thames Trains convinced me that they had given up on trying to provide any sort of service some time before the end of the franchise and were just trying to get what money they could out of it before they got out.

Southern and Southeastern maybe. But London Midland?

Thank-you very much for the explanation willc. I'd not come across it before. The 'anomaly' makes much more sense now.

LM is a HUGE improvement on CT! :o They actually clean the trains, so much so that it is hard to find a newspaper lying around. After an initial drop in performance, LM became unbelievably punctual and reliable. They have fitted ticket gates, and put in ticket machines. The publish posters showing which trains have spare seats, and how many carriages rush hour trains are formed of.

And the biggie, is that they are finally replacing the clapped out 150s, several years overdue! At last, ALL of the West Mids area will have acceptable rolling stock. ;D

The only problems they've had are due to the poor WCML upgrade and the problems with the unions. Neither are LM's fault, as the Sunday problems started in Silverlink's days. Hopefully LM will force all staff to accept a new deal where Sunday is part of the week.

I'll concede the point. My limited experience of LM has been clouded by WCML and ex-Silverlink issues. However some of the union issues can be laid at LM's door. It takes two to tango!

I'm not sure how they were getting away with doing that, as the Cathedrals Express has never stopped at Hanborough, so those tickets would not have been valid.

There is another Cotswold line peculiarity, where you can get a Saver fare from Shipton, Ascott, Finstock and Combe if you're going to London, as there's only the one train a day you can use to make the journey (I'm ignoring the recent addition of an afternoon stop at Shipton, which allows a sort of evening out in London thanks to Shipton's unbalanced service, with extra evening calls westbound).

PS The LM 150s are clapped out because no-one wanted to do anything about refurbishing them while waiting for the franchise to change and because LM then sidestepped the issue by ordering new stock. LM have spent the past two years letting the 150s shake themselves to bits while on a minimum maintenance regime. Anyone thinking these are going to be an instant fix to problems in the West Country and the North of England has got another think coming - they will need a huge amount of work to make them fit for any further use by anyone.

And they won't be forcing the unions to do anything - they will have to negotiate a new agreement.

You can't blame LM for not maintaining the 150s when they've committed to new rolling stock. Central Trains did next to none and they certainly had no intention of replacing them!

And as I said, at least LM are cleaning them!

Why can't I blame them? They've been the operator of the things for the past two years and still will be for months to come - if they're such a great organisation, why aren't they bothered about the state of these trains, which do nothing for their reputation?

They could at least fix all the windows that refuse to close properly and do something about the dodgy transmissions that shake the entire coach every time they pull away from a station - issues which affect pretty much every set I've ridden on between Stratford and Birmingham recently.

Perfectly allowable. Joining/alighting short is allowed and NRCoC makes no mention of services needing to have called at the stations printed on the ticket. The ticket type and permitted route merely has to be valid for the service you board. Also you could say you boarded the preceeding train at Hanborough and changed at Oxford onto the Cathedrals'.

I have used this NRCoC allowance, coupled with the Routeing Guide to get to Hereford from Bristol on a             Bristol TM-Worcester FS Off-Peak Day Return. Bristol to Worcester is route permitted via Newport (Gwent), which means travelling through Hereford. The CDR fare to Hereford is ^19.50 but to Worcester it is only ^10.50. On neither leg do I board or alight a train at Hereford that has gone/is going anywhere near Worcester.

Are more of these 150's going to end up in FGW-land? If so I would rather they came my way in a reasonable condition. Barton Hill and Exeter TMD already have enough work keeping various FGW DMU's in running order.

Why on earth would LM spend money on them when they are due to leave starting next year? They only finished the 170s and 323s about six months ago, so it would be a refurb for a year. Great. And remember that the order has been delayed. LM initially expected them to start arriving 6 months earlier.

LM don't need to worry about their reputation, people know new trains are coming, and they haven't got noticeably worse since CT. In fact, they seem better as they are clean and have less rubbish in them! Besides, any negative thoughts from pax about the 150s is immediately cancelled out by the huge improvement overall from the CT days.

I wasn't talking about a refurbishment, I was talking about basic day-to-day maintenance to keep them in sound condition, like fixing window catches so you don't get a gale blowing through the coach - I repeat, LM have had the things on their books for TWO YEARS, never mind whether the 172s are late. It doesn't take that long to mend window catches or keep the engine and transmission in good order.

It could be interesting to see what happens when the time comes to hand them back to the leasing company, which will expect them to be in decent order so the next users get something that runs - at least until it can get a slot in a workshop for a thorough refit - not wrecks.


But is it? This is a train-specific exemption, so surely that makes it out of the ordinary. Just another little surprise lurking in the so-called 'simplified' fares system.

All right, it may not call Hanborough, but presumably it's still legitimate for an Oxford traveller to circumvent this restriction by buying a ticket from the last Cotswold line station at which the service calls before OXF (Charlbury?)

I still think a SVR from Hanborough is valid boarding the Cathedrals' at Oxford. After all, timetable and journey planners show HND-PAD at 0801 changing onto Cathedrals' at OXF as valid on the SVR fare.

They are indeed coming our way in the not too distant future. One can only hope that before they are arrive here that they go straight into a major overhaul and refresh as you are absolutely right Barton Hill and Exeter have enough to do just maintaining the current FGW DMUs fleet.

"Saver" and "cheap" where much better names.  You are right that they do not convey anything to the inexperienced traveller other than the fact that they are not full price.  Inexperienced travller is then prompted to find out the restrictions.   "anytime" and "off peak" are rubbish names because they imply a simple distinction between peak and off peak which does not in fact exist.  If you are going to have a horrendously complicated system of ticket restrictions then don't make the problem worse by introducing a "fares simplification" which in fact doesn't simplify any fares but just obscured some of teh complexity.

Depends which journey planner you use - FGW's does show this but national rail doesn't - instead sending you on the next stopper from Oxford to Didcot and changing there for London rather than hanging around at Oxford for 40 minutes. Whatever the case, it's not intended to benefit Oxford passengers, who have a far greater choice of trains, hence no easement - and I'd like to see the response if you turned up for the 9.31 from Oxford to London and asked for a Saver/whatever it's called from Hanborough to London on this basis.

Central Trains would have done that anyway, its a franchise commitment.

The relationship between management and workers is very hostile, hardly a great company!